Branko Lustig, the film producer who has twice walked off the stage with Oscars for Best Picture, yesterday received the National Order of Merit for his significant contribution to the increasing validity of the film industry in Malta.
Mr Lustig, whose name is tagged onto Oscar-winning Gladiator and Schindler's List, flew to Malta for a day to receive the award, which was presented to him by President Guido de Marco at the Palace.
Speaking to The Times about the honour of receiving the National Order of Merit - "a big thing" for me and an important sign of appreciation, he described it - the 70-year-old Croatian Jew, who joined the film industry after surviving two years in a World War II concentration camp, remarked that it was "a long way from Auschwitz to the Palace".
Malta, he said, has become a "world-recognised film centre" over the past four years.
His contact with the island dates back to 1998 for the filming of the $100 million-budget epic Gladiator, and has been ongoing ever since.
"In these four years, I have made lots of friends here and I am sorry that I did not come earlier," he said at the ceremony.
Mr Lustig says he immediately recognised Malta's potential in the film industry, which was based primarily on the locals and not only on the water tanks.
"In movie-making, the most important thing is the people. Stone and wood can be found all over in the world, but you cannot find film-friendly people everywhere.
"Today, it is very hard to find an environment like Malta in Europe."
Even the extras in Gladiator were "fantastic", he recalled.
"I was the first, in 1998, to point out to the government of the day that Malta needed to set up a film commission and enter the world market."
Mr Lustig believed Malta would be a major success if it were promoted better and he consulted the government on the setting up of the film commission.
What Malta needs now is more investment in studios and equipment and Mr Lustig was confident that the Maltese would rise to the challenge.
His love for Malta goes beyond its film servicing industry and he pledged his continuous support.
"You can always count on my help," he said.
"If anybody, today, asks me where to produce and shoot a movie, I am more than confident to tell them to go to Malta - a great place for movie-making."
Mr Lustig's belief in Malta was further confirmed by his visit yesterday to the set of Troy at Fort Rinella, which he said looked better than Cinecittà in Rome...".
He was impressed with the work and organisation at the set.
"Today, if someone wants to make a movie on boats, they do not go to the UK anymore; they come here. A few technicians may be brought over, but Malta even has its own at the shipyard."
About the future of Malta's film industry, Mr Lustig said no production company should need to bring in people from overseas. Malta should work on ensuring that it had the necessary human resources, as it was not convenient to put everybody on per diem allowances and in hotels.
He said Malta should pump more money into the film industry and build a large sound stage, which was sorely required.
Mr Lustig commented on the 28 trailers on the set of Troy, which have been brought in from the UK. About 15 had been brought over for Gladiator and he could not understand why no one in Malta had ever decided to invest and have them available here.
He has been to Malta a number of times, the last few on a recce for another major epic film, Tripoli, which was again intended to be directed by Ridley Scott and starring Russell Crowe. His successful experience on Gladiator had led him to select Malta again as the location for the shooting of the big-budget film.
However, the project, "a wonderful script", was cancelled because "Fox did not want to do it anymore". Part of the set had already been built in Agadir and has not yet been destroyed, so Mr Lustig was still hopeful that it has only been postponed.
The producer is also working with a "big" US director on another "big" film in Malta, which has been postponed to next March. It was too early to release more details, he said. The film was supposed to be shot in Morocco, but there have been problems due to the war in Iraq and Malta is a good substitute for Tangiers.
Between Gladiator and Tripoli, Mr Lustig had also tried to bring Alexander the Great to Malta, but the project fell through because Ridley Scott did not want to direct it and it is now being made by Oliver Stone in Morocco.
Mr Lustig is currently working on The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, with director Andrew Adamson (Shrek).
About his Academy Awards, he feels "Oscars are not everything. They are just the result of making a good movie and I make good movies because I like them.
"The Oscar is not important. It is just an acknowledgment. You do not make movies for Academy awards."
However, the Oscar for Schindler's List on the Holocaust is definitely his most valuable "because I went through it all" and he considers that to be the high point of his career.
Mr Lustig left an impact on the stellar audience during his acceptance speech for reading out his concentration camp number tattooed on his arm.
"I just did not know what to say... and just wanted to tell the audience that I was in Auschwitz and that the movie, which was made by me, was authentic. I was there and I know that everything we showed on the screen was real. That was why I mentioned the number. It was so emotional."
From his experience in Auschwitz, Mr Lustig gained "the will to survive... and to win. Survival is victory and every movie is a big victory when I finish it. It is almost a battle for survival."
Mr Lustig's career took off in 1955 and he cannot keep count of the many movies he has made since then - "about 100". He started off as a location manager, moving on to production manager, line producer and producer.
In 1988, he left for the US for supposedly no more than two years, but has not looked back since. Mr Lustig lived the American dream: director Steven Spielberg was the first to offer him a breakthrough opportunity in the US with Schindler's List.
Since then, Mr Lustig was executive producer on Black Hawk Down and Hannibal (2001) and produced The Peacemaker (1997).
Working with top directors such as Spielberg and actors of the calibre of Russell Crowe is "more difficult than working with normal people", he said.
"They expect more and, naturally, you try to give them more."
For Mr Lustig, "making a good movie today is very expensive and bringing a big audience to the theatres depends on quality, but also on luck," which he firmly believes in.
"That is also why I survived the concentration camp."
Glamour aside, "every job is difficult. The difference lies only in whether you do it for love, or not" he said. And the producer has chosen the former approach.