Body of Glass wins San Sebastián's New Directors prize, with a conditional €50,000 split

Naëmi Ada's Body of Glass won the Kutxabank-New Directors Award at the 74th San Sebastián International Film Festival on September 26. It is a prize for a particular section and stage of a filmmaker's career: the festival places first or second features in New Directors and appoints a separate international jury to choose its winner. Ada's film, a Germany-France production, is her first feature, according to the festival catalogue. The win should therefore be read as a New Directors result, not as the Golden Shell for the festival's best film.

Interpretation

The distinction carries €50,000 gross, but the published rules do not award the entire sum to the filmmaker. Article 7 divides it into two equal parts, one for the director and one for the film's Spanish theatrical distributor. If the film has no such distributor, the distributor's half stays vacant rather than passing to another person or company. The rules allow three months after the festival ends to notify the festival of a Spanish theatrical distributor. The catalogue's separate sales listing for Alpha Violet in France does not, by itself, establish that the film has a Spanish distributor or that the second half has been paid.

The festival identifies the New Directors jury as five people, chaired by producer Juan Pablo Miller, alongside Marina Charriton, Jonathan Romney, Dana Blankstein Cohen and Tamar Novas. Its published results name Body of Glass as the winner and Yoon Dan-bi's The World Before as a special mention. A special mention is recognition in the same section, but the rules and results do not describe it as another €50,000 winner. The Golden Shell went to Mike Leigh's Tender Loving Care through the Official Selection, a different competition and jury process.

For English-speaking readers encountering the title through its award, the festival's film entry gives concrete identifiers. Body of Glass runs 90 minutes and lists English, French and German as original languages. Its synopsis follows Tian, a dancer leaving a controlling partner in Marseille, who enters the mourning circle of someone she did not know while hiding a secret at home. That is the festival's description of a fictional story, not a claim that the events happened or a judgment about the film's merits. The catalogue credits Ada with direction and screenplay and names Soilfilms in Germany and Soldats Features in France under production and co-production.

Interpretation

The festival also programmed a public conversation with Ada about making a first feature, separate from the award decision. Its event page describes her background in contemporary dance and film study in Berlin. Those biographical details help explain why a dance-centred fictional film appeared in a debut filmmaker section, but they do not reveal how jurors weighed the competing works. The festival's public result names the winner; it does not supply individual juror votes or scores for this prize.

Uncertainty

As of October 1, the verified record supports the result, eligibility, film credits and monetary rules. It does not establish a general theatrical release date for English-speaking territories or prove that a Spanish distributor has met the conditions for payment. A reference image of the Kursaal auditorium from an earlier festival year, if used, shows the venue only; it does not document Ada's 2026 award ceremony or a scene from Body of Glass.