THE British entry, Secrets and Lies, dominated last night's awards ceremony at the close of the 49th Cannes Film Festival, which was widely regarded as a vintage year for competition films.
The biggest surprise was the jury's decision to give a special prize to the festival's most controversial and divisive entry, the Canadian film, Crash. There were no awards for the Irish entries.
Secrets and Lies received the major award, the Palme d'Or, which was accepted by its director, Mike Leigh (53). Set in London, the film explores the consequences when a black optometrist, after the death of her adoptive mother, seeks out the identity of her birth mother and discovers she is a lonely, insecure, white woman.
Secrets and Lies took a second award when Brenda Blethyn was voted best actress for her emotionally raw and poignant performance as the biological mother.
The jury, under president Francis Ford Coppola, gave the runner up prize, the Grand Prix du Jury, to the Danish director Lars von Trier, for his highly emotional drama, Breaking the Waves.
The film deals with the marriage between a young Scottish woman and a Danish oil rig worker.
The Canadian film, Crash, based on the novel by J.G. Ballard and directed by David Cronenberg, won the Special Jury Prize.
It was hissed and booed by media at its Cannes press screening at the weekend.
This violent and sexually explicit film operates from the thesis that people can be sexually aroused by being in or witnessing a car accident. Francis Ford Coppola explained that certain members of the jury had "passionately abstained" rather than vote for Crash, but that the prize was given for the film's "audacity, originality and daring".
An actor with Down's Syndrome, Pascal Duquenne, shared the best actor award with Daniel Auteuil, his co star in the Belgian entry, The Eighth Day. Joel Coen won the best director award for the dark comedy thriller, Fargo.
There was no joy for the Irish, with no prizes for the competition entry, The Van, written by Roddy Doyle and directed by Stephen Frears, or for Terry George's HBlock hunger strike film, Some Mother's Son, which was eligible for the Camera d'Or.