Venice and Berlin: Golden Lion & Golden Bear Winners
The top prizes of the Venice and Berlin film festivals, year by year — every Golden Lion and Golden Bear winner in our library.
Award results are facts and are listed in full. The score chip is our composite canon score.
Golden Lion (Venice)
The Story of Qiu Ju1992 · Zhang Yimou2.63
Manon1950 · Henri-Georges Clouzot2.63
Justice Is Done1950 · André Cayatte4.33
Rashomon1950 · Akira Kurosawa3.92
Forbidden Games1952 · René Clément5.29
Romeo and Juliet1954 · Renato Castellani2.50
Ordet1955 · Carl Theodor Dreyer4.84
Aparajito1956 · Satyajit Ray2.49
Rickshaw Man1958 · Hiroshi Inagaki2.33
Il generale della Rovere1959 · Roberto Rossellini2.59
The Great War1959 · Mario Monicelli2.00
Tomorrow Is My Turn1960 · André Cayatte2.39
Last Year at Marienbad1961 · Alain Resnais3.69
Family Diary1962 · Valerio Zurlini2.36
Ivan's Childhood1962 · Andrei Tarkovsky2.16
Hands Over the City1963 · Francesco Rosi2.16
Red Desert1964 · Michelangelo Antonioni3.41
The Battle of Algiers1966 · Gillo Pontecorvo4.80
Sandra1965 · Luchino Visconti2.63
Belle de Jour1967 · Luis Buñuel2.93
Artists Under the Big Top: Perplexed1968 · Alexander Kluge2.00
Atlantic City1980 · Louis Malle3.26
Gloria1980 · John Cassavetes2.85
Marianne and Juliane1981 · Margarethe von Trotta2.00
The State of Things1982 · Wim Wenders2.00
First Name: Carmen1983 · Jean-Luc Godard2.50
A Year of the Quiet Sun1984 · Krzysztof Zanussi2.13
Vagabond1985 · Agnès Varda3.17
The Green Ray1986 · Éric Rohmer3.38
Au revoir les enfants1987 · Louis Malle2.51
The Legend of the Holy Drinker1988 · Ermanno Olmi2.00
A City of Sadness1989 · Hou Hsiao-Hsien3.41
Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead1990 · Tom Stoppard2.00
Close to Eden1991 · Nikita Mikhalkov2.36
Short Cuts1993 · Robert Altman2.66
Three Colours: Blue1993 · Krzysztof Kieślowski2.29
Before the Rain1994 · Milcho Manchevski2.46
Vive L'Amour1994 · Tsai Ming-liang2.00
Cyclo1995 · Trần Anh Hùng2.00
Michael Collins1996 · Neil Jordan2.00
Hana-bi1997 · Takeshi Kitano4.18
The Way We Laughed1998 · Gianni Amelio2.00
Not One Less1999 · Zhang Yimou2.50
The Circle2000 · Jafar Panahi2.00
Monsoon Wedding2001 · Mira Nair2.16
The Magdalene Sisters2002 · Peter Mullan2.00
The Return2003 · Andrey Zvyagintsev2.50
Vera Drake2004 · Mike Leigh2.00
Brokeback Mountain2005 · Ang Lee5.56
Still Life2006 · Jia Zhangke3.63
Lust, Caution2007 · Ang Lee2.43
The Wrestler2008 · Darren Aronofsky2.39
Lebanon2009 · Samuel Maoz2.00
Somewhere2010 · Sofia Coppola2.00
Faust (2011 film)2011 · Alexander Sokurov2.30
Pietà2012 · Kim Ki-duk2.00
Sacro GRA2013 · Gianfranco Rosi2.00
A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence2014 · Roy Andersson2.00
From Afar2015 · Lorenzo Vigas2.00
The Shape of Water2017 · Guillermo del Toro5.66
Roma2018 · Alfonso Cuarón5.38
Nomadland2020 · Chloé Zhao6.00
Happening2002 · Audrey Diwan2.00
All the Beauty and the Bloodshed2022 · Laura Poitras2.16
Poor Things2023 · Yorgos Lanthimos3.93
The Room Next Door2024 · Pedro Almodóvar2.43
Father Mother Sister Brother2025 · Jim Jarmusch2.00
Golden Bear (Berlin)
El Lazarillo de Tormes1959 · César Fernández-Ardavín2.00
La colmena1982 · Mario Camus2.00
Bolero1992 · Ivan Maximov2.00
A Good Day for a Swim2008 · Bogdan Mustață2.00
On Body and Soul2017 · Ildikó Enyedi2.00
Dahomey2024 · Mati Diop2.00
Justice Is Done1950 · André Cayatte4.33
Cinderella1950 · Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske, Clyde Geronimi2.23
Four in a Jeep1951 · Leopold Lindtberg2.00
Without Leaving an Address1951 · Jean-Paul Le Chanois2.00
One Summer of Happiness1951 · Arne Mattsson2.00
The Wages of Fear1953 · Henri-Georges Clouzot8.02
Hobson's Choice1954 · David Lean2.16
Die Ratten1955 · Robert Siodmak2.00
Invitation to the Dance1956 · Gene Kelly2.00
12 Angry Men1957 · Sidney Lumet6.37
Wild Strawberries1957 · Ingmar Bergman4.85
The Cousins1959 · Claude Chabrol, Philippe de Broca2.77
La Notte1961 · Michelangelo Antonioni3.53
A Kind of Loving1962 · John Schlesinger2.00
Bushido, Samurai Saga1963 · Tadashi Imai2.39
To Bed or Not to Bed1963 · Gian Luigi Polidoro2.00
Dry Summer1964 · Metin Erksan2.16
Alphaville1965 · Jean-Luc Godard2.55
Cul-de-sac1966 · Roman Polanski2.16
The Departure1967 · Jerzy Skolimowski2.00
Who Saw Him Die?1968 · Jan Troell2.00
Early Works1969 · Želimir Žilnik2.00
The Garden of the Finzi-Continis1970 · Vittorio De Sica2.00
The Canterbury Tales1972 · Pier Paolo Pasolini2.16
Distant Thunder1973 · Satyajit Ray2.00
The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz1974 · Ted Kotcheff2.00
Adoption1975 · Márta Mészáros2.16
Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull's History Lesson1976 · Robert Altman2.00
The Ascent1977 · Larisa Shepitko3.36
Ascensor1978 · Tomás Muñoz Torres2.00
Las truchas1978 · José Luis García Sánchez2.00
What Max Said1978 · Emilio Martínez-Lázaro2.00
David1979 · Peter Lilienthal2.00
Palermo or Wolfsburg1980 · Werner Schroeter2.29
Heartland1979 · Richard Pearce2.00
Deprisa, Deprisa1981 · Carlos Saura2.00
Veronika Voss1982 · Rainer Werner Fassbinder2.29
Ascendancy1983 · Edward Bennett2.00
Love Streams1984 · John Cassavetes2.95
Wetherby1984 · David Hare2.00
The Woman and the Stranger1985 · Rainer Simon2.00
Stammheim1986 · Reinhard Hauff2.00
The Theme1979 · Gleb Panfilov2.00
Red Sorghum1988 · Zhang Yimou2.50
Rain Man1988 · Barry Levinson5.43
Music Box1989 · Costa-Gavras2.00
Larks on a String1990 · Jiří Menzel2.00
The House of Smiles1991 · Marco Ferreri2.29
Grand Canyon1991 · Lawrence Kasdan2.00
The Wedding Banquet1993 · Ang Lee2.00
Woman Sesame Oil Maker1993 · Xie Fei2.00
In the Name of the Father1993 · Jim Sheridan2.90
The Bait1995 · Bertrand Tavernier2.00
Sense and Sensibility1995 · Ang Lee3.19
The People vs. Larry Flynt1996 · Miloš Forman2.29
Central Station1998 · Walter Salles2.22
The Thin Red Line1998 · Terrence Malick3.69
Magnolia1999 · Paul Thomas Anderson2.53
Intimacy2001 · Patrice Chéreau2.00
Spirited Away2001 · Hayao Miyazaki3.71
Bloody Sunday2002 · Paul Greengrass2.00
In This World2002 · Michael Winterbottom2.00
Head-On2004 · Fatih Akin2.00
In Good Company2004 · Paul Weitz, Lawrence Pressman2.00
U-Carmen eKhayelitsha2005 · Mark Dornford-May2.00
Grbavica2006 · Jasmila Žbanić2.00
Tuya's Marriage2006 · Wang Quan'an2.00
Elite Squad2007 · José Padilha2.00
The Milk of Sorrow2009 · Claudia Llosa2.00
Honey2010 · Semih Kaplanoğlu2.00
A Separation2011 · Asghar Farhadi3.35
Caesar Must Die2012 · Vittorio Taviani, Paolo Taviani2.00
Child's Pose2013 · Călin Peter Netzer2.00
Black Coal, Thin Ice2014 · Diao Yinan2.00
Taxi2015 · Jafar Panahi2.00
Fire at Sea2016 · Gianfranco Rosi2.00
Touch Me Not2018 · Adina Pintilie2.00
Synonyms2019 · Nadav Lapid2.50
There Is No Evil2020 · Mohammad Rasoulof2.00
The Works and Days2022 · Anders Edström, C.W. Winter2.00
Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn2021 · Radu Jude2.00
Alcarràs2022 · Carla Simón2.00
On the Adamant2023 · Nicolas Philibert2.00
Dreams2024 · Dag Johan Haugerud2.00
The other two summits
Cannes takes the headlines, but Europe's festival triangle has two more vertices, each with a distinct canonical personality. Venice is the elder — founded 1932, the oldest film festival in the world — and its Golden Lion has a habit of arriving first at historical turning points. The 1951 Lion for Kurosawa's Rashomon is arguably the single most consequential festival decision ever made: it introduced Japanese cinema to the West, launched the art-house import circuit, and established the festival prize as the mechanism by which national cinemas enter the world canon. Half a century later, Venice reinvented itself again as the launchpad for autumn prestige — the 2017 and 2018 Lions (The Shape of Water, Roma) both went on to dominate the Oscar season, making Venice the modern awards corridor's front door.
The Berlinale is the political festival, by geography and temperament. Founded in 1951 in a divided city — deliberately placed as a "showcase of the free world" — it programs with a civic conscience the other festivals only visit. Its Golden Bear record reflects that identity: 12 Angry Men (1957), a jury-room argument about civic duty, was a perfectly Berlin choice in the festival's early years; Spirited Away (2002) made history as the first animated film to win a major festival's top prize; and A Separation (2011) — an Iranian domestic drama that doubles as an anatomy of a society's institutions — carried the Bear to Tehran and then to the Oscars, the Berlinale's model canonization.
How the two prizes read together
Venice and Berlin bracket Cannes usefully: the Lion increasingly predicts institutional consecration (its winners keep converting to Academy recognition), while the Bear preserves a record of cinema's political conscience, frequently crowning films from cinemas under pressure — Iranian, Eastern European, East Asian — years before other institutions catch up. On this page both prize lines appear in full, each winner with our composite canon score attached, so the two festivals' verdicts can be read against the broader cross-list canon: which Lions and Bears the rest of the measurement apparatus ratified, and which remain each festival's own minority reports.