‘Trains,’ ‘Chronicles of the Absurd,’ ‘American Pastoral’ Win Main Awards at Documentary Festival IDFA
Maciej J. Drygas’ “Trains” won Best Film in the International Competition at this year’s International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, with Miguel Coyula’s “Chronicles of the Absurd” taking the Best Film in the Envision Competition.
“Trains” is a journey through the 20th century told entirely through archival footage. The jury of the International Competition, comprising Juliana Fanjul, Sophie Fiennes, Grace Lee, Asmae El Moudir and Kazuhiro Soda, said they were unanimous in their decision, highlighting Drygas’ “bold and inventive use of archive.”
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“The film shows us routes to the positive and negative consequences of modern industrial innovation. It harnesses the magic of cinema and as an audience, we are haunted by our present historical time, even while we bear witness to the past,” the jury added of the winning film, which will take home a €15,000 cash prize.
The International Competition jury awarded the Best Directing prize worth €5,000 to Auberi Edler for “An American Pastoral,” which trails an election for seats at the public school board in a small conservative town in Pennsylvania amid an intense cultural and ideological battle.
“By simply looking and listening, this director reveals the current complexity at the heart of the United States,” said the jury statement. “Her deep commitment to observation allows the viewer to come face to face with the communities in the film and provides critical insight into the results of the last U.S presidential election.”
In Coyula’s documentary, he and his artist partner Lynn Cruz deploy a string of secret audio reports to expose the control and intimidation suffered by independent artists in their home country of Cuba. The Envision Competition Jury, formed by Sam Green, Nduka Mntambo, Kumjana Novakova, B. Ruby Rich and Wael Shawky, said “Chronicles of the Absurd” is “formally complex with a film language that arises organically and directly from its limitations.”
The jury also highlighted the film’s “radical form that matches and embodies the radical spirit of artists refusing to be silenced.” Cuba was the subject of a Spotlight section at this year’s IDFA, with artistic director Orwa Nyrabia telling Variety that Cuba is “a country in distress but also absolutely out of any media attention” and that documentary film “operates in a different way from the news and the media, where [things] only happen when it’s happening.”
The Envision Competition Award for Best Directing worth €5,000 went to Massimo D’Anolfi and Martina Parenti for “Bestiaries, Herbaria, Lapidaries” and the award for Outstanding Artistic Contribution went ex aequo to Omar Mismar for “A Frown Gone Mad” and Yo-Hen So for “Park.”
Elsewhere, the award for Best First Feature went to “CycleMahesh” by Suhel Banerjee, Best Dutch Film to Luuk Bouwman for “The Propagandist” and the FIPRESCI award to Najiba Noori’s “Writing Hawa.” The Best Short Documentary Award went to “The Flowers Stand Silently, Witnessing” by Theo Panagopoulos.
Earlier this week, the festival handed out the awards for its market arm, the Forum. Ibrahim Omar’s “Dry Sky” won the IDFA Forum Award for Best Pitch, Lana Y. Daher’s “Do You Love Me” took the Forum Award for Best Rough Cut, and the DocLab Forum Award went to “Amorphous” by May Abdalla. The inaugural Producers Connection Award went to “Looking for the Mermaid” by Yara Costa.
Find the full list of winners below:
International Competition
IDFA Award for Best Film (€15,000) – “Trains” by Maciej J. Drygas
IDFA Award for Best Directing (€5,000) – Auberi Edler for “An American Pastoral”
IDFA Award for Best Editing – Maciej J. Drygas for “Trains”
IDFA Award for Best Cinematography – Zvika Gregory Portnoy and Zuzanna Solakiewicz for “The Guest”
Envision Competition
IDFA Award for Best Film (€15,000) – “Chronicles of the Absurd” by Miguel Coyula
IDFA Award for Best Directing (€5,000) – Massimo D’Anolfi and Martina Parenti for “Bestiaries, Herbaria, Lapidaries”
Award for Outstanding Artistic Contribution – ex aequo to Omar Mismar for “A Frown
Gone Mad” and Yo-Hen So for “Park”
DocLab
Award for Immersive Non-Fiction (€5,000) – Lisa Schamlé for “Me, a Depiction”
Special Mention for Immersive Non-Fiction – “The Liminal” by Alaa Al Minawi
Award for Digital Storytelling (€5,000) – Pegah Tabassinejad for “Entropic Fields of Displacement”
Special Mention for Digital Storytelling – “Burn from Absence” by Emeline Courcier
Short Documentaries
IDFA Award for Best Short Documentary (€5,000) – “The Flowers Stand Silently, Witnessing” by Theo Panagopoulos
Special mention – “Mama Micra” by Rebecca Blöcher
Competition for Youth Documentary
IDFA Award for Best Youth Documentary (13+) (€2,500) – Eefje Blankevoort and Lara Aerts for “Everything Will Be Alright”
Special mention (13+) – “Simply Divine” by Mélody Boulissière
IDFA Award for Best Youth Documentary (9-12) (€2,500) – Poorva Bhat for “What’s the Film
About?”
Special mention (9-12) – “The Invisible Ones” by Martijn Blekendaal
Additional awards
IDFA Award for Best First Feature (€5,000) – “CycleMahesh” by Suhel Banerjee
IDFA Award for Best Dutch Film (€5,000) – Luuk Bouwman for “The Propagandist”
Beeld & Geluid IDFA ReFrame Award (€5,000) – Farahnaz Sharifi for “My Stolen Planet”
Beeld & Geluid IDFA ReFrame Award special mention – Radu Jude and
Christian Ferencz-Flatz for “Eight Postcards from Utopia”
FIPRESCI Award – “Writing Hawa” by Najiba Noori
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