BRITISH film was recognised at the Venice Film Festival with Michael Fassbender awarded the prize for best actor for his role in Shame, directed by the Turner Prize-winning artist Steve McQueen. The film, in which Fassbender plays Brandon, a sex addict living in New York and also stars Carey Mulligan as his sister, was co-written by Abi Morgan, the screenwriter behind the recent BBC series The Hour. Fassbender and McQueen previously collaborated on the film Hunger, in which Fassbender played Bobby Sands, the Irish republican who led the 1981 hunger strike at the Maze Prison in Northern Ireland. Another British film, Wuthering Heights, a provocative adaptation of Emily Bronts classic 1847 novel set in the Yorkshire moors, directed by Andrea Arnold was also recognised at Saturdays award ceremony in Venice, with Robbie Ryan winning the prize for best cinematography. The film stars Kaya Scodelario as Cathy, who previously starred in the Channel 4 series Skins, while Heathcliff is played by newcomer James Howson. Much of the action shot on hand-held cameras. It was a disappointing night for Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, the widely acclaimed film adaptation of John le Carrs Cold War-era novel, starring Colin Firth, John Hurt, Benedict Cumberbatch and Gary Oldman, which failed to win an award. Russian filmmaker Alexander Sokurov won the Golden Lion award at the Venice film festival on Saturday for Faust, a visceral take on Goethes play which explores the theme of corrupting power. There are films which make you dream, which make you cry, laugh and think, and there are films which change your life forever. This is one of those films, said jury head Darren Aronofsky, saying the decision had been unanimous. Beating 22 other films to the prize, the stomach-turning movie is the final instalment of Sokurovs cinematic tetralogy on the nature of power, following his acclaimed portraits of Adolf Hitler, Vladimir Lenin and Emperor Hirohito. Sokurov is the second Russian director ever to win the Golden Lion, after it was awarded to Andrey Zvyagintsev for The Return in 2003. Making auteur cinema is very difficult these days, the St Petersburg-based director said, adding that he was very happy to live in a Europe where we can understand each other. The Silver Lion director award went to Chinas Cai Shangjun for his revenge tale People Mountain People Sea, this years surprise addition to the festival line-up, in which a man ceaselessly hunts down his brothers killer. The film has been censured in China, revealing as it does the appalling conditions in a Chinese mine. Best actress went to Deanie Yip for her portrayal of an elderly maid in a moving tale of the trials of growing old gracefully, A Simple Life.TG/AFP