Walter Salles receives The Silver Mirror Honorary Award 2025

During the anniversary screening An Ode to the Missing at Cosmopolite on Saturday evening, Brazilian director Walter Salles was presented with The Silver Mirror Honorary Award 2025 – Film's from the South's highest distinction.

Red., 10 Nov 2025

The award is presented to filmmakers who have made an outstanding contribution to the art of cinema and who, through their work, have helped build bridges between people, cultures, and perspectives.

– Walter Salles is one of the world’s great humanist filmmakers. With poetic precision and deep human warmth, he has created films that move and unite. It is an honor to present him with The Silver Mirror Honorary Award 2025, says Lasse Skagen, Head of Programming at Films from the South.

Fremdeles her. En kvinne med mørkt hår og grønn skjorte sitter i et rom med grønne vegger og et bord i bakgrunnen.

I'm Still Here (2024)

A lifelong love for the power of cinema

Walter Salles receives the award for his masterful filmmaking and his exceptional contribution to modern Latin American cinema. With his latest work, I’m Still Here (2024), he crowns a career defined by films such as Foreign Land (1995), Central Station (1998), and The Motorcycle Diaries (2004) – works that have made him one of the most influential directors of his generation.

Films from the South has followed Salles for three decades and has proudly screened all of his Brazilian films. His works are visually striking and weave complex stories about people, relationships, and society with remarkable ease. The emotional power of his storytelling resonates with audiences worldwide and has forever secured his place in film history.

Salles was unable to attend the award ceremony in person but sent a video message expressing his gratitude to the festival and reflecting on the role of cinema in his life:

Film is, as we all know, a collective endeavor. This Silver Mirror Award I share with the wonderful actors, collaborators, and technicians I’ve had the privilege to work with over the years.

When Films from the South chose to screen Foreign Land in 1995, Brazilian cinema was finding its voice again after years of dictatorship and censorship. Few festivals looked our way at that time – but this one did.

I am deeply grateful for that, and moved to be able to share my most personal film, I’m Still Here, with you.

 

Fremmed land. To personer står på en strand og ser på et stort, rustent skipsvrak i vannkanten. Bildet er i svart-hvitt.

Foreign Land (1995)

Retrospective and exclusive interview with Salles

Throughout the festival, audiences will still have the chance to experience several of Walter Salles’ films. On Tuesday, NOV 11 at 17:00, the festival invites you to an exclusive pre-recorded interview with the director, in conversation with Karsten Meinich from the film journal Montages. The interview will be shown ahead of the screening of I’m Still Here at Cinemateket in Oslo.

Below is an overview of the other films in the retrospective being screened throughout the week: