Besides the seventh Oscar nomination for Dante Ferretti and the sixth nomination for Francesca Lo Schiavo, art director and set decorator for the film The Aviator by Martin Scorsese, Italy joins the five nominees for best feature length documentary, with The Story of the Weeping Camel by Luigi Falorni and Byamasuren Davaa.
“I still have not had time to recover from hearing the wonderful news, which was totally unexpected. We knew the film was in the short list of the twelve titles from which the five nominees are chosen, but we never thought it would make the top five. It was the Thesis I discussed at graduation, from the Film and Television school in Munich. It is a small film without any major backing behind it, no big distributor creating pressure….I am really in seventh heaven and for the moment am thinking about how to celebrate, most assuredly, with my family and friends”.
These were the first words spoken by Luigi Falorni, on hearing the news of the Academy Award nomination for his documentary co-directed with the young Byambasuren Davaa, also a graduate from the Film and Television School in Munich.
The Story of the Weeping Camel was screened at the Toronto Film Festival in 2003.