Lisa Petrucci 🏆

PRESS RELEASE

For Immediate Release

August 12, 2024

Lisa Petrucci Receives Inaugural Torgny Award at Wickman Week

HAGFORS, SWEDEN - Film historian and preservationist Lisa Petrucci of Something Weird Video, was honoured as the first-ever recipient of The Torgny Award at the inaugural Wickman Week film festival, which concluded on Sunday in Hagfors, Sweden.

The Torgny Award, named after pioneering Swedish director Torgny Wickman, recognizes outstanding individuals working in the independent spirit of exploitation and genre cinema. Petrucci received the award for her decades of work preserving and distributing cult and genre films through Something Weird Video, the company she co-founded with her late husband Mike Vraney.

In presenting the award, the festival organiser Rickard Gramfors offered the following citation:

"An annual award will be handed out to an outstanding person who has been working in the independent exploitation spirit of Swedish director Torgny Wickman.

With stamina and determination, she has single-handedly maintained and developed the company and the legacy of Something Weird Video, the company she built together with her late husband Mike Vraney. The world would be a much poorer place, if it wasn't for the amazing output of vintage genre and exploitation movies over the decades from Something Weird, pioneering already back in the VHS era, and a very long time before today's fancy boutique labels.

The first Torgny Award goes to Lisa Petrucci!"

Petrucci expressed gratitude for the recognition, stating: "I'm deeply honored to receive this award named after such an influential filmmaker. Something Weird has always been dedicated to preserving cinematic history that might otherwise be lost. This award is a wonderful validation of that mission."

The inaugural Wickman Week festival, held August 7-11, celebrated the legacy of Swedish exploitation cinema pioneer Torgny Wickman through screenings, lectures, and panel discussions. Organisers have announced plans to make the Torgny Award an annual tradition at future editions of the festival.

For more information, contact:

Rickard Gramfors, rickard@cultpix.com