DOCUMENTARY FEATURES

 

BEST EDITING

DO NOT RESIST Director: Craig Atkinson Producer: Laura Hartrick 2015 | 72 min | USA Trailer This urgent documentary explores the militarization of local police departments—in their tactics, training, and acquisition of equipment—since 9/11. With unprecedented access to police conventions, equipment expos, and officers themselves, filmmaker Craig Atkinson, the son of a SWAT team member, has crafted an eye-popping nonpartisan look at the changing face of law enforcement in America.  

BEST DIRECTOR

HOOLIGAN SPARROW Director: Nanfu Wang Producer: Nanfu Wang 2016 | 84 min | China Trailer The danger is palpable as intrepid young filmmaker Nanfu Wang follows maverick activist Ye Haiyan (a.k.a Hooligan Sparrow) and her band of colleagues to Hainan Province in southern China to protest the case of six elementary school girls who were sexually abused by their principal. Marked as enemies of the state, the activists are under constant government surveillance and face interrogation, harassment, and imprisonment. Sparrow, who gained notoriety with her advocacy work for sex workers’ rights, continues to champion girls’ and women’s rights and arms herself with the power and reach of social media. Filmmaker Wang becomes a target along with Sparrow, as she faces destroyed cameras and intimidation. Yet she bravely and tenaciously keeps shooting, guerrilla-style, with secret recording devices and hidden-camera glasses, and in the process, she exposes a startling number of undercover security agents on the streets. Eventually, through smuggling footage out of the country, Wang is able to tell the story of her journey with the extraordinary revolutionary Sparrow, her fellow activists, and their seemingly impossible battle for human rights.  

BEST DOCUMENTARY

JACKSON Director: Maisie Crow Producers: Maisie Crow & Jamie Boyle 2016 | 93 min | USA Trailer Jackson is an intimate, unprecedented look at the lives of three women caught up in the complex issues surrounding abortion access, capturing the essential and hard truth of the lives at the center of the debate over reproductive healthcare in America.  

BEST SOUND EDITING

SACRED WATER Director: Olivier Jourdain Producer: Michel Dutry 2016 | 55 min | Rwanda Trailer Guided by Vestine, an extravagant star of radio nights, the film discovers Rwandan sexuality in search of the water that gushes out the female body. Sacred Water reveals with humor and spontaneity the mystery of female bliss. With all the lightness but also seriousness the subject requires, the film takes us to a modern Africa and its founding myths, and reflects our view about sex and pleasure in the Western World. Sacred Water immerses you into contemporary Rwandan culture in the most intimate way : Sex.  

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

SAMUEL IN THE CLOUDS Director: Pieter Van Eecke Producer: Hanne Phlypo 2016 | 70 min | Bolivia Trailer In Bolivia, the glaciers are melting. Samuel, an old ski lift operator, is looking out of a window on the rooftop of the world. Through generations, his family lived and worked in the snowy mountains, but now snow fails. While scientists are discussing and measuring ominous changes Samuel honors the ancient mountain spirits. Clouds continue to drift by.         UNTOUCHABLE (TRANSPARENCY, MOVE) Director: David Feige Producer: Rebecca Richman Cohen 2016 | 105 min | USA Trailer When the most powerful lobbyist in Florida discovers that the nanny has sexually abused his daughter, he harnesses his extraordinary political power to pass the toughest sex offender laws in the nation. UNTOUCHABLE chronicles his crusade, and its impact on the lives of several of the 800,000 people forced to live under the kinds of laws he has championed. The film interweaves intimate portraits of men and women who have been branded sex offenders with the heartbreaking stories of those who have suffered sexual abuse. It is a film that pushes viewers toward an uncomfortable place, requiring them to walk in the shoes of those who have survived sexual abuse but to still bear witness to the experiences of those we revile.

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VIRTUAL REALITY / 360

BEST SOUND EXPERIANCE

ACROSS THE LINE Director: Madeline Power Producers: Planned Parenthood, Julie Young & Morgan Elise Johnson 2016 | 7 min | USA

Across the Line is an immersive virtual reality experience that combines 360° video and computer generated imaging (CGI) to put viewers in the shoes of a patient entering a health center for a safe and legal abortion. Using real audio gathered at protests, scripted scenes, and documentary footage, the film is a powerful hybrid documentary-fiction depiction of the gauntlet that many abortion providers, health center staff, and patients must walk on a typical day in America.    

BEST DIRECTOR & JOURNALISTIC ACHIEVEMENT JURY PRIZE WINNER

HOME | AAMIR Directors: Erfan Saadati, Toby Coffey, & Rufus Norris Producers: Richard Nockles, James Louis Hedley, & Johanna Nicholls 2016 | 12 min | Calais, France “Home: Aamir” is the first of a series of Surround Vision 360 degree films exploring the meaning of home through the stories of refugees in the Calais “Jungle”. This first film, a collaboration between the National Theatre, Surround Vision and Room One, follows a 22-year-old man escaping the threat of murder in Sudan.  

BEST EDITING

I, PHILIP Director: Pierre Zandrowicz Producer: Antoine Cayrol 2016 | 14 min | France In early 2005, David Hanson, an American robotics, is developing its first android human. His name is Phil and it is simply the copy of the famous science fiction author Philip K. Dick. In a few weeks, Phil became famous on the Web and in the author’s fan circles. It is presented at several conferences around the world. In late 2005, the head of the android disappeared during a flight America West Airlines between Dallas and Las Vegas. Through the memories of the android and those of the author, the film offers an interpretation of Phil’s life.  

BEST VR EXPERIENCE, BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY & IMMERSIVE IMPACT JURY PRIZE WINNER

NOMADS Directors: Felix Lajeunesse & Paul Raphael Producers: Felix Lajeunesse & Paul Raphael 2016 | 30 min | Mongolia, Kenya, Malaysia The Nomads Series transports you across the Earth into the intimate reality of several nomadic cultures. Experience the way of life of Yak Herders in the Mongolian steppes, Maasai in Kenya, and Sea Gypsies living off the coast of Borneo.    

EXPERIMENTAL ADVOCACY JURY PRIZE WINNER

TRACES Director: Gabriela Arp Producer: Gabriela Arp 2016 | 8 min | USA Traces is a cinematic virtual reality film exploring the memories of one woman living with Alzheimer's disease. In the film, the main character Willie White, an 88-year old woman living with dementia, recounts her time as a young girl living in the fields near Mason, Tennessee. As her words transport us back in time, traces of memory fall in and out—the old wooden farmhouse where she was raised, the coconut cakes her mom would make on Sunday mornings, her favorite white dress, the hymns she’d sing in the choir at church. Through these vibrant recollections, illustrated through re-enactments, we journey with Willie as she searches for the words to one of her favorite songs and the meaning of memory in this new and fragmented landscape.

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DOCUMENTARY SHORTS

    INNER ME(SPECIAL MENTION, MOVE) Director: Antonio Spanò Producers: Giacomo Spanò and Antonio Spanò 2016 | 30 min | D.R.Congo Trailer While following Jemima, a little curious girl who wanders through dusty roads, crowded markets, slaughterhouses, furnaces and bat hunters we get acquainted with three women who describe the harsh realities of being born female and deaf in a society that discriminates against both women and people with disabilities. The stories of Immaculée, Sylvie and Stuka are stories of everyday struggle against marginalization, abuse, and oppression, but despite the insurmountable obstacles imposed on them by society, the protagonists show us how their strong and undefeated will allows them to take hold of their fate every single day and reveals the beautiful resilience of the human spirit.  

BEST SHORT DOCUMENTARY & BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

KAYAYO, The Living Shopping Baskets Director: Mari Bakke Riise Producer: Jørgen Lorentzen 2016 | 30 min | Ghana Trailer Kayayo means “girl-carrier” in the Ga language. In the capital of Ghana, 10 000 girls from the ages of 6 work as real life shopping baskets - called Kayayo. This documentary is about Bamunu, an 8-year old girl who hasn’t seen her family since she was sent away from home two years ago to work as a Kayayo to support her family. We follow her incessant longing to get away from the harsh markets, her journey back home and what awaits there.  

BEST DIRECTOR, BEST EDITING & STYLISTIC ACHIEVMENT JURY PRIZE WINNER

LAST DAY OF FREEDOM Directors: Dee Hibbert-Jones & Nomi Talisman Producers: Dee Hibbert-Jones & Nomi Talisman 2015 | 32 min | USA Trailer When Bill Babbitt realizes his brother Manny has committed a crime he agonizes over his decision — should he call the police? Last Day of Freedom is a richly animated personal narrative that tells the story of Bill’s decision to stand by his brother, a Veteran returning from war, as he faces criminal charges, racism, and ultimately the death penalty. The film is a portrait of a man at the nexus of the most pressing social issues of our day- entrenched racism, veteran’s rights, mental health care and criminal justice.   MAMA RWANDA (SPECIAL MENTION, MOVE) Director: Laura Waters Hinson Producers: Laura Waters Hinson & Andrea McDaniel 2015 | 35 min | Rwanda Trailer Mama Rwanda is the story of Rwanda’s new generation of working mothers whose passion for entrepreneurship is transforming their nation into one of the world’s fastest growing economies just two decades after the genocide. ROUTES (SPECIAL MENTION, MOVE) Director: Cristian P. Coll Producer: Es Far Cultural 2016 | 32 min | Greece, Fyrom, Serbia Trailer “ROUTES” is a journey of refugees recounts a small daily reality on their arrival in Europe. A topical issue which has become a humanitarian crisis. Through recorded interviews in the autumn of 2015, between the Isle of Lesbos (Greece) and the Macedonian border with Serbia, is still one of the most common routes for refugees to head to northern Europe. Anonymous people who tell us their journey and motivation for traveling to Europe.  

BEST SOUND EDITING

THE SUPER SALMON Director: Ryan Peterson Producers: Ryan Peterson 2016 | 25 min | USA Trailer Proponents of a plan to construct a $5.2 billion hydroelectric mega-dam on Alaska’s Susitna River say it wouldn’t affect the watershed’s famous salmon runs because of its location – upstream of where fish usually swim. Tell that to The Super Salmon.  

STUDENT CHOICE AWARD (NEW ROADS)

THROUGH THE WALL Director: Tim Nackashi Producers: Chelo Alvarez-Stehle & Tim Nackashi 2016 | 6 min | USA & Mexico Trailer A documentary short about a family divided by the US/Mexico border. Abril is living undocumented in the United States with her 2-year-old son Julian. Julian’s father was stopped by police for a minor traffic incident and was deported back to Mexico. In order to see each other, Uriel, Abril and Julian must cross difficult terrain to reach the border fence where they spend time together through the wall.  

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IMPACT VIDEO AWARDS

 

HUMANITAS AWARD

FREEING GIRLS FROM TRAFFICKED TO ITALY FOR SEX: ‘You Will Not Be A Slave Forever’ Director: Clementine Malpas Producers: Claudine Spera & Annie Kelly 2016 | 9 min | Italy Thousands of women and girls are being trafficked to Italy from Nigeria, into a life of forced prostitution. Abused and desperately vulnerable, they have a champion in Princess Okokon, who was herself trafficked from Nigeria in 1999. Okokon fled her captors, and, with her husband, Alberto, set up the NGO Piam Onlus. Together they have helped hundreds of women in Asti and Sicily - including those who have just stepped off the boat after being hidden among migrants - to escape their traffickers, giving them refuge and support. WALKING 2.0 (INNOVATION JURY PRIZE, MOVE) Director: Dan Hayes Producers: Dan Hayes, Kmele Foster, Dustin Oakley & Robert Chapman Smith 2016 | 7 min | USA After a construction site accident, Robert Woo was paralyzed from the chest down. Woo spent the next four years in a wheelchair. But even as he learned how to live his new life, he couldn’t stop asking one very simple question: How could humans build skyscrapers, but not something better than a wheelchair? Then Woo heard about bionic exoskeletons. And it changed his life.

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IMPACT VIDEO: CREATIVE IMPACT

   

CREATIVE ACTIVISM AWARD

DON’T COVER UP, STEP UP Directors: Huhe Yan & Qianyi Chen Producers: Huhe Yan & Qianyi Chen 2016 | 3 min | China The film is a public service announcement. The protagonist, a video blogger, teaches her fans in the video how to cover the bruises up with make-ups after being beaten by her husband. The story sees a twist as the husband enters the scene at the end of the video.   MEDIAOCRACY (IMPACT JURY PRIZE, MOVE) Director: Ellen Goosenberg Kent Producers: Paul G. Allen, Carole Tomko, Jody Gottlieb, Rocky Collins, Mira Chang & Cindy Vanegas 2016 | 5 min | United States Mediaocracy is part of “We the Voters: 20 Films for the People” which is a nonpartisan digital slate of 20 short films designed to inform, inspire and activate voters nationwide with fresh perspectives on the subjects of democracy, elections, and governance in the lead up to the 2016 elections. In Mediaocracy, we Americans are stuck in social media news bubbles that block exposure to opposing points of view. Here you'll get concrete advice from leading media experts on how to break free and get fully informed. Narrated by Glynn Washington.

JURY PRIZES – DOCUMENTARY & VR CATEGORIES

  SOUTHWEST OF SALEM: The Story Of The San Antonio Four(LENS TO ACTION JURY, MOVE TO BOTTEM LATER) Director: Deborah S. Esquenazi Producer: Sam Tabet 2016 | 91 min | USA Trailer After being wrongfully convicted of gang-raping two little girls during the Satanic Panic witch-hunt era of the 80s and 90s, four Latina lesbians fight against mythology, homophobia, and prosecutorial fervor in their struggle for exoneration in this critically acclaimed 'True Crime' tale.   SWIM TEAM (ETHOS, MOVE TO BOTTEM) Director: Lara Stolman Producer: Shanna Belott 2016 | 100 min | USA Trailer What would you do if your community gave up on your child? In New Jersey, the parents of one autistic boy take matters into their own hands. They form a competitive swim team, recruiting multiethnic autistic teens and training them with high expectations and zero pity. What happens next alters the course of the boys' lives. SWIM TEAM chronicles the extraordinary rise of the Jersey Hammerheads, capturing a moving quest for inclusion, independence and a life that feels winning.  

JURY PRIZES – IMPACT CATEGORY

 

SPECIAL MENTIONS - DOCUMENTARY FEATURE CATEGORY

  IN UTERO Director: Kathleen Gyllenhaal Producer: Stephen Gyllenhaal 2016 | 89 min | USA Trailer IN UTERO is a cinematic rumination on what will emerge as the most provocative subject of the 21st century – the environmental impact on pregnancy and its lasting imprint on human development, human behavior, and the state of the world. Fetal origins experts, research scientists, psychologists, doctors and midwives – as well as examples from popular culture and mythology – collectively demonstrate how our experiences in utero shape our future.   THEY WILL HAVE TO KILL US FIRST: Malian Music In Exile  Director: Johanna Schwartz Producers: Johanna Schwartz, Sarah Mosses, John Schwartz and Kat Amara Korba 2015 | 100 min | Mali, Burkina Faso, West Africa, England Trailer Imagine waking up and finding out music has been banned. This is what happened to the characters in They Will Have to Kill us First. In Mali, music is a way of life, a prime communication tool and when you hear the music you understand why Mali is renowned as the birthplace of the Blues, and therefore, Rock 'n Roll. Faced with being stripped of their freedom, the musicians decide to fight back in any way they know how. This film follows their journeys - personal, political and downright heroic - to bring music back to their country.  

SPECIAL MENTIONS - DOCUMENTARY SHORT CATEGORY