Traditional arthouse cinema won out at the closing ceremony of the 51st Cannes Film Festival last night when the uncompromising Greek film-maker, Theo Angelopoulos (63), was awarded the major prize, the Palme d'Or, for his film, Eternity and a Day.
It features Bruno Ganz as a man putting his affairs in order and reflecting on his past as he prepares to enter hospital in unendurable pain.
This is the 11th feature film directed by Angelopoulos, a former film critic, in a 33-year directing career which produced such remarkable films as The Travelling Players and the Balkan epic, Ulysses' Gaze, which many thought would win the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 1995. Instead, it was runner-up.
English film-maker John Boorman (65), who has been living in Wicklow for more than 25 years, was named best director by the Cannes jury for his film, The General, the first Irish entry selected for competition at Cannes since Cal in 1984.
Dedicating his award to the people of Ireland, Mr Boorman said in his acceptance speech: "I have lived in Ireland for many years. This week the Irish nation voted for peace, and we are all very thrilled about that." It is his second time to win best director at Cannes. In 1970, he won for Leo the Last.
From his Cannes hotel, Mr Boorman spoke to me last night of his move to Ireland shortly after winning that award. "Since then we've had the conflict in the North and then, this weekend, this extraordinary vote for peace. There was huge applause when I made that point in my speech. The whole place got up in the Cannes Palais."
Brendan Gleeson, who plays Dublin criminal Martin Cahill in The General, was unlucky not to receive the festival's best actor award. His performance was one of two tipped to take the prize.
The award went instead to the other front-runner, Scottish actor Peter Mullan who plays a recovering alcoholic in the Ken Loach drama, My Name is Joe.
The award caps an outstanding Cannes for Mullan, whose first film as a director, Orphans, was warmly received.
In his acceptance, Mr Boorman said half the award belonged to Brendan Gleeson. "I hoped Brendan would get the award," he said last night.
"It was just a flip of the coin, I think, and it could easily have gone the other way with Ken Loach taking best director and Brendan winning best actor."
Mr Gleeson, who accompanied the director to Cannes for the awards ceremony was "genuinely delighted" for Peter Mullan.
"I worked with Peter on Braveheart and he's a fantastic artist," he said last night. "But to have John returning here to Cannes in triumph is such a buzz. It's great for everyone who worked on The General. We all won a prize tonight."
The best actress award was shared between two young rising talents, Elodie Bouchez from France and Natacha Regnier from Belgium, who co-star in the French entry, La Vie Revee des Anges (The Dreamlife of Angels), directed by Erick Zonca.
The Chaplinesque comic actor, writer, producer and director received the festival's Grand Jury Prize for La Vita E Bella (Life is Beautiful), which successfully dares to draw humour from the desperate plight of a Jewish man and his young son in a Nazi concentration camp.
The festival's Special Jury Prize was shared between the young Danish director, Thomas Winterberg, for the family drama, Festen (A Celebration), and the French film-maker, Claude Miller, for a sketchy picture of a child murderer and his sensitive young son in La Classe de Neige (Class Trip).
American director Todd Haynes received the jury's award for Best Artistic Contribution for his poorly received evocation of the glitter rock era of the 1970s in Velvet Goldmine, which stars the prolific 20-year-old Cork actor, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers as a decadent pop star.
The best screenplay award went to another American, the writer-director, Hal Hartley, for Henry Fool, which received a mixed reaction.
This year's Cannes jury comprised four film directors: Martin Scorsese, the jury president, Alain Corneau, Michael Winterbottom and Chen Kaige; four actresses - Sigourney Weaver, Lena Olin, Winona Ryder and Chiana Mastroianni; the Cuban novelist, Zoe Valdes; and the French rap singer, MC Solaar.
Ireland was represented in the short film competition by Martin Mahon's enthusiastically received Happy Birthday to Me, one of 14 shorts selected from a huge international entry.
But the Palme d'Or for best short film went to the French entry, Xavier Giannoli's L'Interview, which imagines a difficult interview between a French journalist and the late Hollywood star, Ava Gardner.
In the awards of the international film critics' body, FIPRESCI, presented at a separate ceremony, Tsai Ming-Ling's Taiwanese film, The Hole, surprisingly was voted best of the films in competition. The FIPRESCI award for best film showing out of competition at Cannes went to the American film, Happiness, directed by Todd Solondz.
Arguably the most controversial film at the festival this year, Happiness deals with an ostensibly happy all-American family beset by personal problems and neuroses.
One character is an unrepentant paedophile who preys on his 11year-old son's school friends.
Another separate jury voted the Camera d'Or award for best first-time director to the American film-maker, Marc Levin, for Slam, dealing with a poet and rap singer jailed on petty drugs charges.
The film was shot in a Washington DC jail with its prisoners and guards.
Meanwhile, the Minister for Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands has warmly welcomed the news of John Boorman's win. Ms de Valera extended her congratulations to Mr Boorman, to Merlin Films, and to the strong Irish team which worked on the film. She also said this success would have important consequences for the Irish film industry.
The positive response to it had given the Irish team in Cannes a strong platform for the promotion of the Irish industry, and had opened up opportunities for many promising contacts to be made.