Actor and activist Liev Schreiber will receive the Global Noir Icon Award at the Lakes Noir International Film Festival's closing ceremony, which will also honour BlueCheck Ukraine, the humanitarian organisation he co-founded, and present the Global Noir Visionary Award to Janek Ambros, director of the documentary "Ukrainians in Exile". The festival will also pay tribute to the late actress Hayden Panettiere, a supporter of BlueCheck Ukraine, with a moment of silence, underlining the event's strong focus on Ukraine-related humanitarian causes within its wider celebration of noir cinema.

The gala takes place on 27 September in Luino, Italy, and will screen "Ukrainians in Exile", a 2024 documentary filmed near the Ukrainian border shortly after the 2022 invasion began, executive produced by Schreiber and Oscar-winning cinematographer Janusz Kaminski. Panettiere, who died on 17 August aged 36 in circumstances still under investigation, backed Ukraine partly through her nine-year relationship with Wladimir Klitschko and founded the charity Hoplon International in March 2022 to supply body armour and medical kits to front-line troops; BlueCheck Ukraine was launched the same month to aid war-affected populations.