'Winter Sleep' Wins Cannes' Palme D'Or

The Cannes Film Festival is drawing to a close meaning this year's winners have been announced. The biggest prize, Cannes' Palme d'Or, has been awarded to Winter Sleep, a film by Nuri Bilge Ceylan. Ceylan, who dedicated his award to “the young people in Turkey and those who lost their lives in the last year," directed the drama about a family who ran a hotel in the Turkish mountains. The film beat out 17 other movie competitors for this award which is the top prize at the festival.

Here is everything you need to know about this Cannes Film Festival winner:

YOU PROBABLY DON’T KNOW WHO THE ACTORS ARE

Main character Aydin is played by Haluk Bilginer, who is also a Turkish actor. Bilginer may be known for his role as Mehmet Osman in the soap opera EastEnders, but has also acted in Five Minarets in New York, The International and Buffalo Soldiers. His co-stars are Melisa Sozen and Demet Akbag, who are also from Turkey.

THE PLOT WILL MAKE YOU THINK ABOUT THE BONDS OF FAMILY

The movie tells a story of Aydin, a former actor who lives in Anatolia with his wife Nihal and his sister Necla. While Aydin “has a stormy relationship” with Nihal, his sister is “suffering from her recent divorce.”

WINTER SLEEP IS NOT THE ORIGINAL NAME

It's been translated from its original, Turkish title, Kis Uykusu.

THE FILM DOES NOT FOLLOW YOUR AVERAGE RUNTIME

Winter Sleep is three hours and 16 minutes long and consists of a large amount of dialogue, according to some critics. Additionally, this makes it the second year in a row that the longest film up for the award has won the Palme d’Or.

CEYLAN ACTED IN ONE OF HIS OWN MOVIES WITH HIS WIFE

Ceylan and his wife acted together in his film Iklimler (Climates) as Isa, a university instructor, and Bahar, a TV-business wife. Like Winter Sleep’s aim to reveal a family struggle, Climates illustrates the troubled relationship between husband and wife.

AND HE WRITES WITH HER, TOO

Ebru Ceylan helped write Winter Sleep with her husband.

THIS IS NOT CEYLAN’S FIRST AWARD

Not only have many of Ceylan’s films been nominated for awards, but several of them have won awards as well. In fact, this year was not even his first Cannes Film Festival award. In 2006, he won the FIPRESCI Movie Critics’ Award for Iklimler (Climates), in 2008 he won best director for his film Uc Maymum (Three Monkies), and in 2011 his movie Once Upon a Time in Anatolia won the Grand Jury Prize.