Chicago. “Sweat,” a Polish-language film by Swedish director Magnus von Horn took the top prize, Gold  Hugo, in the 56th Chicago International Film Festival (CIFF)  The prizes were announced  in a virtual live-streamed ceremony on Friday.

The film is a  three-day record of a social media celebrity’s life and represents loneliness and insecurity in the digital age. The jury hailed the film for its directorial vision that is “exciting and coherent, with breathtaking framing and compositional choices that work beautifully together with its art direction.” “Sweat” also won a best art direction award.

The Silver Hugo Jury Prize went to,”Careless Crime”, a drama about an Iranian movie theater targeted by anti-Shah arsonists in 1978 directed by Shahram Mokri from Iran, and the Silver Hugo for Best Director was awarded to Andrei Konchalovsky from Russia for his film “Dear Comrades!”, which is about Soviet suppression of strikers in 1962.

Lili Horvat from Hungary took home top prize in the New Directors Competition with “Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time,” while the Silver Hugo in this competition went to Ignacio Marquez with “The Special.”

“Apples” from Greece received a Silver Hugo for best screenplay. “Night of the Kings” won two prizes for best cinematography and best sound.

Japanese actor Yakusho Koji nabbed Silver Hugo Best Performance award for his role in “Under the Open Sky.” The jury praises Koji’s in-depth performance and his revelation of “a true range of emotions.”

This year the CIFF awarded prizes to films in the categories of International Feature Film Competition, New Directors Competition, International Documentary Competition, Out-Look Competition and Short Film Competition. The Chicago Award and the Roger Ebert Award were also presented.