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Russia’s ‘Leviathan’ named best foreign language film by London Critics Circle Film Awards

The movie by Andrey Zvyagintsev was also included in the top ten world films of 2014, getting the sixth place of the list

© AP Photo/Sony Pictures Classics, Anna Matveeva

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Russian director Zvyagintsev to await ‘response from destiny’ at Academy Awards ceremony

LONDON, January 19. /TASS/. Russian film ‘Leviathan’ by director Andrey Zvyagintsev continues its awards-season showing as it picked a title of best foreign-language film at the annual London Critics Circle Film Awards on Sunday night.

London Critics Circle Film Awards also included "Leviathan," which won a Golden Globe award last week in Los Angeles, in the top ten world films of 2014 placing it in the sixth place of the list.

The Russian film premiered at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival in May and won the award for Best Screenplay. Last week it was named as one of the five finalists of the 87th Academy Awards in the category of the best foreign language film.

Other contenders for the Academy Award's best foreign-language film are the Polish film "Ida" by Pawel Pawlikowski, Mauritanian director Abderrahmane Sissako's "Timbuktu," Argentine filmmaker Damian Szifron's comedy-drama movie "Wild Tales" and "Tangerines," an Estonian-Georgian film by Zaza Urushadze.

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"Leviathan" is an offbeat interpretation of the Biblical story of Job placed into the context of the Russia of nowadays and simultaneously an allusion to the work by Thomas Hobbs.

The protagonist of the story, Nikolay (played by Alexey Serebryakov) and his wife Lilia (Yelena Lyadova) live in a small northern town where he has a car repair shop. When the town’s mayor tries to pull down his house and to confiscate property, Nikolay turns for assistance to his longtime friend Dmitry Seleznyov (Vladimir Vdovichenkov), who is a lawyer and who bumps into the freewheeling actions of officials and representatives of the Orthodox Church when he comes to his friend’s rescue.

The 87th annual Academy Awards ceremony will be held at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles on February 22.

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