Cannes: Turkey's Nuri Bilge Ceylan won the Palme d'Or top prize at the Cannes Film Festival Saturday for "Winter Sleep", a slow-burn domestic drama that mesmerised audiences despite its more than three-hour length.
Jury president Jane Campion, the New Zealand filmmaker, handed over the trophy to Ceylan, who beat out 17 other contenders including David Cronenberg, Jean-Luc Godard and the Oscar-winning director of "The Artist", Michel Hazanavicius, to claim top honours.
It was the first win at the world's biggest cinema showcase for Turkey since 1982, when "Yol" by Yilmaz Guney shared the gong with "Missing" by Costa Gavras.
Ceylan dedicated the prize to the Turkish youth "who lost their lives" in violent anti-government protests that have rocked Turkey over the last year.
He had already won other awards at Cannes for his previous films "Uzak", "Climates", "Three Monkeys" and "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia".
Bookies had tipped "Winter Sleep" even before its screening as the favourite to capture the Palme d'Or, based on his track record and a sense that he was due.
Set in Turkey's stunning Cappadocia region, "Winter Sleep" drew rave reviews after its red-carpet premiere and a lengthy standing ovation.
The film stars Haluk Bilginer, known to international audiences from the long-running British soap opera EastEnders, as a wealthy retired actor living with his much younger wife (the stunning Melisa Sozen) and his recently divorced sister (popular comic actress Demet Akbag).
Based on short stories by Anton Chekhov, their tense family triangle plays out in a quaint hotel serving hikers and motocross enthusiasts drawn to the rugged region.
Aydin, the husband, acts like the benevolent monarch of his remote community, dispensing charity and, when he sees fit, harsh discipline to the villagers.
He sees himself, however, as a champion of enlightened reason in conservative Muslim Anatolia, and a guardian of Turkey's rich cultural tradition.
Their intricately pitched, often remarkably lengthy dialogues, written by Ceylan and his wife Ebru, dig deep and drew comparisons to Swedish director Ingmar Bergman, a master of moral questioning and the personal drama writ large.
Ebru Ceylan admitted to reporters at the festival that the writing process with her husband was "very intense -- we often had quite serious quarrels".
Nuri Bilge Ceylan expressed "great surprise" in winning the prize in a historic year for the industry in Turkey.
He pointed out that this year was the 100th anniversary of Turkish cinema, adding it was a great "coincidence."
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