“Summer Of Soul” won the jury and documentary audience awards in the USA.
The 2021 Sundance Film Festival, mostly virtual, is coming to an end. The festival will announce the winners of the awards on Tuesday night, exchanging a face-to-face ceremony with one broadcast live and presented by Patton Oswalt.
The awards will honor outstanding films in all sections of the festival: non-fiction and US narrative, foreign documentaries and fiction, NEXT, Midnight and shorts. A total of 72 features aired last week, along with 50 shorts, four indie series and 14 new frontier VR / new media projects.
These projects were judged by a jury composed of Zeynep Atakan, Raúl Castillo, Ashley Clark, Julie Dash, Tacita Dean, Cynthia Erivo, Isaac Julien, Inge de Leeuw, Kim Longinotto, Laura Mulleavy, Kate Mulleavy, Joshua Oppenheimer, Mohamed Ouma Saïd, Jean Tsien, Daniela Vega, Lana Wilson and Hanya Yanagihara.
Although this year marked the first virtual festival, the festival opened strongly with a parade of titles that won critical acclaim, including Sian Heder’s drama about a deaf family and their listening daughter, “CODA”; Animated documentary by Jonas Poher Rasmussen on refugees, “Flee”; and Ahmir’s musical documentary “Questlove” Thompson “Summer of Soul (… Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Television).”
Other highlights of the festival include Rebecca Hall’s racial drama “Passing”, Dash Shaw’s animated psychedelic tale “Cryptozoo” and Jamila Wignot’s Alvin Ailey “Ailey”.
The festival was also strong from the sales point of view. Apple’s $ 25 million acquisition of “CODA”, less than two days after its debut, broke a sales record set last year. Neon picked up “Flee” and “Ailey”, while Sony Pictures Classics made another prominent theatrical choice with “Jockey”.
More sales activity is expected in the coming days, as distributors continue to engage in disputes over various titles that need distribution.
IndieWire will update the list of winners as they are announced. You can also broadcast the ceremony below starting at 8:00 pm Eastern Time.
Shorts
Special Jury for Performance Award: Deanna Gibson, “Wiggle Room”
Special jury award for screenplay: Serhat Karaaslan, “The Criminals”
Jury Prize, Animation: “Souvenir Souvenir”, dir. Bastien Dubois
Jury award, non-fiction: “Don’t Go Tellin ‘Your Momma”, dir. Topaz Jones and elastic
Jury Prize, International Fiction: “Bambirak,” dir. Zamarin Wahdat
Jury Prize, US Fiction: “The Touch of the Master’s Hand”, dir. Gregory Barnes
Grand Jury Prize: “Lagarto”, dir. Akinola Davies Jr.
NEXT
NEXT Audience Award presented by Adobe: “Ma Belle, My Beauty,” dir. Marion Hill
NEXT Innovator Award presented by Adobe: “Cryptozoo,” dir. Dash Shaw
World cinema documentary
Special Jury Award for Filmmaking Verite: “President”, dir. Camilla Nielsson
Special Jury Award: Impact for Change: “Writing With Fire”, dir. Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghosh
Direction award: Hogir Hirori, “Sabaya”
Grand Jury Prize: “Escape”, dir. Jonas Poher Rasmussen
Audience Award: “Writing With Fire”, dir. Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghosh
World Cinema Dramatic
Special Jury Award for Performance: Jesmark Scicluna, “Luzzu”
Special Jury Award for Creative Vision: “One for the Road,” dir. Baz Poonpiriya
Direction award: Blerta Basholli, “Hive”
Grand Jury Prize: “Hive”, dir. Blerta Basholli
Audience Award: “Hive”, dir. Blerta Basholli
US Documentary
Audience Award: “Summer Of Soul (… Or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Television),” dir. Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson
Special jury award for emerging filmmaker: “Cusp”, dir. Parker Hill and Isabel Bethencourt
Special Jury Award for Non-Fiction Experimentation: “All Light, Everywhere,” dir. Theo Anthony
Jonathan Oppenhein Editing Award: Kristina Motwani and Rebecca Adorno, “Homeroom”
Direction Award: Natalia Almada, “Users”
Grand Jury Prize: “Summer Of Soul (… Or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Television),” dir. Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson
US Dramatic
Public award: “CODA”, dir. Sian Heder
Special Jury Award for Performance: Clifton Collins Jr., “Jockey”
Special Jury Award for Best Set: “CODA”
Waldo Salt Screenplay Award: Ari Katcher and Ryan Welch, “On the Count of Three”
Direction award: Sian Heder, “CODA”
Grand Jury Prize: “CODA”, dir. Sian Heder
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