Our first edition of the 2009 Nonfiction Feature Honor Roll is now up, tracking top tier festival awards (and later critics and institutional prizes) for this year's crop of documentaries. And just looking at sheer numbers, three films are currently leading the list of 2009 titles: Anders Østergaard's BURMA VJ, Louie Psihoyos' THE COVE and Aron Gaudet's THE WAY WE GET BY.
BURMA VJ scored multiple awards at this year's Full Frame Film Festival as well as prizes at Sundance, San Francisco, Thessaloniki and last year's IDFA (not included on this year's Honor Roll). THE COVE is this year's Audience Award champ, picking up the title at Sundance, Hot Docs, Seattle and Silverdocs, among others. And THE WAY WE GET BY has received jury prizes and honorable mentions, including a Special Jury prize at SXSW and the Audience Award at Full Frame.
Films with two or more mentions include 16 MEMORIES, 45365 (three awards), AFGHAN STAR, EL GENERAL, OFF AND RUNNING, PRODIGAL SONS, ROUGH AUNTIES, SOUL POWER, UNMISTAKEN CHILD (with four awards, three from Full Frame), WE LIVE IN PUBLIC and WINNEBAGO MAN.
Festival prizes are often (but not always) bellwethers of year-end prizes. Last year at this time, MAN ON WIRE, TROUBLE THE WATER and UP THE YANGTZE were way out in front in this tally and all three figured prominently in year-end awards. Conversely, three eventual Oscar nominees - THE BETRAYAL, ENCOUNTERS AT THE END OF THE WORLD and THE GARDEN each had a single prize to their credit.
The Cove is gonna keep getting bigger and bigger. It's going to play in Japan at the Tokyo International Film Festival!
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1923252,00.html
Posted by: Luke | September 16, 2009 at 10:28 AM