In 1986 the Festival created the Donostia Award, awarded to a great film personality in recognition for their work and career.

The first one was awarded to Gregory Peck (1986), followed by award-winners Glenn Ford (1987), Vittorio Gassman (1988), Bette Davis (1989), Claudette Colbert (1990), Anthony Perkins (1991), Lauren Bacall (1992), Robert Mitchum (1993), Lana Turner (1994), Susan Sarandon and Catherine Deneuve (1995), Al Pacino (1996), Michael Douglas, Jeremy Irons and Jeanne Moreau (1997), John Malkovich and Anthony Hopkins (1998), Fernando Fernán-Gómez, Vanessa Redgrave and Anjelica Huston (1999), Michael Caine and Robert de Niro (2000), Julie Andrews, Warren Beatty and Francisco Rabal (2001), Jessica Lange, Bob Hoskins, Dennis Hopper and Francis Ford Coppola (2002), Isabelle Huppert, Sean Penn and Robert Duvall (2003), Woody Allen, Annette Bening and Jeff Bridges (2004), Ben Gazzara, and Willen Dafoe (2005), Max Von Sydow and Matt Dillon (2006), Richard Gere and Liv Ullman (2007), Antonio Banderas and Meryl Streep (2008), Ian McKellen (2009), Julia Roberts (2010) and Glenn Close (2011), John Travolta, Oliver Stone, Ewan McGregor, Tommy Lee Jones and Dustin Hoffman (2012).