Actors Benedict Cumberbatch and Claire Foy honoured at Zurich Film Festival

Benedict Cumberbatch and Claire Foy honoured at the ZFF Keystone-SDA

Two British film stars, Benedict Cumberbatch and Claire Foy, are honoured at the 21st Zurich Film Festival (ZFF) to kick off the week.

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“I’ve only slept for three hours and I’m not sure my voice will last long,” said Benedict Cumberbatch (Doctor Strange, The Power of the Dog, Sherlock) in a Zurich cinema late on Monday afternoon.

He just received the Golden Eye for his acting achievements, but Cumberbatch, wanted to talk about music. “I was at the Oasis concert last night” – his rapturous look said it all. Claire Foy, who presented her new film H is for Hawk in another Zurich cinema was also at the concert.

Father loses ground under his feet

Despite being tired, the 49-year-old actor and producer travelled to Zurich to present his new film The Thing With Feathers. In this feature film debut by British director Dylan Southern, he plays a father of two sons who loses his footing after the sudden death of his wife.

This is the second parallel to his professional colleague Clare Foy. The actress, who is probably best known to most as the young Queen Elizabeth II in the series The Crown, is presenting a film about the loss of a loved one.

Overcoming death

The film is a true story. She plays the British author Helen McDonald, who in her bestseller with the translated title H for hawk tells how she tries to overcome the death of her father with the help of falconry.

When asked about her work with hawks, the 41-year-old, who will also return home with a Golden Eye, exuded passion. Getting the birds to trust humans is incredibly fascinating, she said.

It’s “almost a bit like house spiders scare a lot of people, even though they feel the most fear themselves”, she said in an interview.

Hawks and farting horses

She was allowed to work with a total of four hawks for the book adaptation (the film is about a female hawk called Mable): Lotti, who specialised in hunting, Jessi, who was afraid of nothing, and two Mables. “One of them had to be afraid of me, the other had to be closely bonded with me”.

The Masters interview with Benedict Cumberbatch was also about filming with animals but with horses. For the film The Power of the Dog, he “had to work with a farting and very stubborn horse that constantly wanted to go home to its hay”.

Cumberbatch and Foy entertained their audience with their humorous stories. And who knows, perhaps they will be back at the same event the next evening.

Adapted from German by DeepL/jdp

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