‘I love you San Sebastian’. These were the words of Julia Roberts at yesterday’s award ceremony in which she was given the Donostia award by Javier Bardem who stars alongside the actress in her latest film ‘Eat Love Pray’. Julia Roberts also said that ‘San Sebastian was the most enthusiastic city she had ever visited’.

Julia Roberts arrived at the Kursaal to receive the award by car but once there she walked up the red carpet so that she could greet her fans in person and at one point she shed some tears of emotion at the show of affection she received from the public.

She was wearing an elegant dark blue dress and some very high heels. Bardem accompanied Roberts along the red carpet together with Richard Jenkins who also appears in the film ‘Eat Love Pray’ and the director and producer of the film.

The ceremony in the Kursaal began almost 30 minutes later than scheduled but despite this the public gave Bardem, who presented Roberts with the award, a warm welcome.

Bardem also took the opportunity to praise the San Sebastian International Film Festival and wish the new director of the festival good luck.

Javier Bardem spoke about Robert’s versatility as an actress and said that she worked from the heart not the head and said that it had been a pleasure to work with such a generous and funny person who knew how to enjoy both work and life.

On receiving the prize Roberts gave a short speech in which she said that she was very lucky in life and in work and added that she would like to talk about the details over dinner but that she did not have time for this. She spoke about working with Bardem on the film and said that he was a fantastic actor and above all a great person.

Roberts thanked her husband for his continual support and ended her speech by saying ‘the method to sculpt an elephant consists in getting a piece of marble and chipping away at everything that is not an elephant…until you are left with just the elephant’ She explained that this is what her career had consisted of…getting rid of the superfluous and keeping the essential bits.

Finally she finished by saying in Spanish ‘thank you from the bottom of my heart’.

Video of Julia Robert’s San Sebastian Film Festival speech