Isabelle Huppert, ‘Elle’ Win France’s Cesar Awards

Paul Verhoeven’s “Elle” has been named the best French film of 2016 at the Cesar Awards, while Isabelle Huppert also won the Best Actress award for her performance in that film.

Huppert won the award two days before she’ll be up for Best Actress at the Oscars for the same performance, and one day before she’ll be competing at the Film Independent Spirit Awards.

French-Canadian director Xavier Dolan won the best-director Cesar for his divisive family drama “It’s Only the End of the World,” and his lead actor Gaspard Ulliel won the best-actor award for the same film.

Recent best-film winners at the Cesar Awards include a few with some visibility in the United States, including the Oscar Best Picture winner “The Artist” and Oscar foreign-language winners “Amour” and “A Prophet,” along with less known films like 2014 winner “Me, Myself and Mum” and last year’s “Fatima.”

British director Ken Loach‘s working-class drama “I, Daniel Blake,” which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes last year, was named the year’s best foreign-language film in a category that also included Oscar nominees “Manchester by the Sea” and “Toni Erdmann.”

Supporting actor and actress awards went to James Thierrée for “Chocolat” and Deborah Lukumuena for “Divines.”

The Oscar-nominated animated film “My Life as a Zucchini” won two Cesars, one for its adapted screenplay and one as best animated film.

Maïmouna Doucouré’s “Maman(s),” one of the finalists in TheWrap’s ShortList Film Festival, won the Cesar for live action short, which in a tie also went to Alice Diop’s “Vers la Tendresse.”

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