Prize of the Ecumenical Jury

Prize of the Ecumenical Jury
Logo of the Jury œcuménique
Awarded for	Honours works of quality which touch the spiritual dimension of our existence
Location	Various international film festivals
First awarded	1973 (Locarno) 1974 (Cannes) 1979 (Montréal) 1992 (Berlin) 1994 (Karlovy Vary) 1994 (Leipzig DOK) 1995 (Mannheim-Heidelberg) 1998 (Fribourg) 1999 (Cottbus) 2000 (Oberhausen Kurzfilmtage) 2001 (Bratislava) 2001 (Zlín Children & Youth) 2007 (Yerevan) 2008 (Kyiv Molodist) 2010 (Warsaw) 2011 (Miskolc) 2015 (Saarbrücken)

The Prize of the Ecumenical Jury (French: Prix du Jury Œcuménique) is an independent film award for feature films at major international film festivals since 1973. The award was created by Christian film makers, film critics and other film professionals. The objective of the award is to "honour works of artistic quality which witnesses to the power of film to reveal the mysterious depths of human beings through what concerns them, their hurts and failings as well as their hopes." The ecumenical jury can be composed out of 8, 6, 5, 4 or 3 members, who are nominated by SIGNIS for the Catholics and Interfilm for the Protestants. SIGNIS and Interfilm appoint ecumenical juries at various international film festivals, including Cannes Film Festival (where The Ecumenical Jury (French: Jury Œcuménique) is one of three juries at the film festival, along with the official jury and the FIPRESCI jury), Berlin International Film Festival, Locarno International Film Festival, Montreal World Film Festival and the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.

Films from diverse countries have won the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury at the Cannes Film Festival. Most films having won the award are from European countries, with Italy, Germany and Poland dominating. Andrei Tarkovsky is the only director to have won three times. Samira Makhmalbaf is the only woman who has won the award and, until Asghar Farhadi won the prize in 2013, she and her father Mohsen Makhmalbaf were the only winning directors from a predominantly Muslim country. Other countries that are not predominantly Christian that have won the award are Japan and the People's Republic of China. At the 2009 Cannes Film Festival the ecumenical jury gave its award to Ken Loach's Looking for Eric and not to Lars von Trier's film Antichrist which was a rumor.