Sarah Polley will receive the Director of the Year award at the Palm Springs International Film Awards in January, the Palm Springs International Film Society announced Friday. The award will be presented at a ceremony at the Palm Springs Convention Center on Thursday, January 5, 2023.
Polley is being honored for “Talking Women,” her first film in 11 years. Adapted from the Miriam Toews novel which was based on the true story of a group of women in a religious colony who were sexually assaulted by several men in the colony, the film stars Jessie Buckley, Rooney Mara and Claire Foy. Writing for TheWrap, critic Tomris Lafly called the film “a raw, cutting, hopeful feminist manifesto of philosophical insights, both timely and timeless.”
Past Palm Springs Director of the Year Award winners have included Jane Campion, Chloé Zhao, Alexander Payne, Alejandro G. Iñárritu and Quentin Tarantino. Polley’s selection marks the third consecutive year the award has been given to a female director, though the 2021 and 2022 award ceremonies were unable to take place due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The awards ceremony will kick off the 2023 Palm Springs International Film Festival, which runs through January 16 in the desert resort city east of Los Angeles.
Polley is the second winner to be announced, with the Desert Palm Achievement Award, Actor for Colin Farrell for “The Banshees of Inisherin.”
Additional honorees will be announced in the coming weeks.
