SEAN PENN - JUNO JOY AT ROME FILM FESTIVAL

JUNO JOY AT ROME FILM FESTIVAL

Quirky comedy Juno, about an unwanted teenage pregnancy, has won the top prize at the second annual Rome film festival.

The Jason Reitman film, taking its UK box at the Times BFI 51st London film festival tonight, scoped the €200,000 Marcus Aurelius prize while its young star, Hard Candy actress Ellen Page, won the best actress prize.

The film sees Page as bright 16-year-old Juno whose first sexual experience with classmate Paulie (Michael Cera) leads to a bun in the oven, causing her to find the 'perfect' parents (Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner) through the small ads.

Reitman paid tribute to the screenwriter Diablo Cody and thanked Italian audiences while accepting the prize at the Auditorium Parco della Musica stage.

"This is our first trip overseas with it, so we had no idea how non-English speakers would react," he added.

According to Variety, ticket sales for this second year of film festivities in Rome rose to 62,000, while an improved lineup and growing international prestige sees the festival more firmly enshrined in European moviegoers' minds.

Other winners at the festival were Sean Penn's Into the Wild, which won the Fastweb prize for the best premiere of the festival and Australian film Forbidden Lies, which received the cult documentary award.