The American Documentary Film Festival/ Winners

Amdocs distributed several awards on the final evening of the festival. I was involved in the pitch competition and a juror for the Best American Feature Documentary. For that reason they come first on the list with some comments from my side. I did not watch the other winners.

The American Documentary Film Fund, part of the festival gave support to three film projects in different stages. 7 projects were pitched, 3 of them got $5000 as a grant, they all had an international perspective:

The Surrounding Game by Will Lockart, Cole D. Pruitt and Richard Miron… is a film about the Chinese fascinating play Go, its origin and some of its players.

The Most Fearless by Heather Kessinger… is a film about a Bangladesh girl, who wants to surf and thus break rules of a society that does not easily give space for women.

Encounter by Bruce Donnelly and Fermin Rojas… is a film about an upcoming (the first) gay men’s chorus in Cuba. It is in an early stage but the two showed an impressive documentary about artists in Cuba, “Alumbrones”, at the festival.

Best American Feature Documentary ($500 each)

Queens & Cowboys by Matt Livadary, a warm, touching, well constructed, character driven documentary about members of the Gay Rodeo Association, shot over a year. 92 mins. Website link below. (PHOTO).

A Man Called God by Christopher and Kristoff St. John, a sensational film told by the son Kristoff about himself, his father and step-mother going to India in 1980 to make a film about Sai Baba, the spiritual leader, who seduced thousands of people – and sexually abused children, Kristoff being one of them, now as a grown-up telling the story. The film is to be released in the US, the Sai Baba organisation is expected to what it can to prevent it. 107 mins.

Best Foreign Feature Documentary ($500 each)

Edison Cajas: The Waltz (Chile)

Hugo Latulippe: Alphee of the Stars (Canada)

Best Foreign Short Documentary ($1000)

Sami Ajrami: On The Spot (Hungary)

Best Animated Short ($1000)

Rambaum/Scharbatke: Olgastrasse 18 (Germany)

Best American Short Documentary ($1000)

Lukas Dong: Smoked Salmon (USA/Sweden)

Filmmaker Who Makes a Difference Award: Harvey Weinstein

Rozene Supple Humanitarian Award: Cleve Jones

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3487170/synopsis?ref_=tt_stry_pl

http://www.queensandcowboys.com/

www.americandocumentaryfilmfestival.com

 

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Tue Steen Müller
Tue Steen Müller

Müller, Tue Steen
Documentary Consultant and Critic, DENMARK

Worked with documentary films for more than 20 years at the Danish Film Board, as press officer, festival representative and film consultant/commissioner. Co-founder of Balticum Film and TV Festival, Filmkontakt Nord, Documentary of the EU and EDN (European Documentary Network).
Awards: 2004 the Danish Roos Prize for his contribution to the Danish and European documentary culture. 2006 an award for promoting Portuguese documentaries. 2014 he received the EDN Award “for an outstanding contribution to the development of the European documentary culture”. 2016 The Cross of the Knight of the Order for Merits to Lithuania. 2019 a Big Stamp at the 15th edition of ZagrebDox. 2021 receipt of the highest state decoration, Order of the Three Stars, Fourth Class, for the significant contribution to the development and promotion of Latvian documentary cinema outside Latvia. In 2022 he received an honorary award at DocsBarcelona’s 25th edition having served as organizer and programmer since the start of the festival.
From 1996 until 2005 he was the first director of EDN (European Documentary Network). From 2006 a freelance consultant and teacher in workshops like Ex Oriente, DocsBarcelona, Archidoc, Documentary Campus, Storydoc, Baltic Sea Forum, Black Sea DocStories, Caucadoc, CinéDOC Tbilisi, Docudays Kiev, Dealing With the Past Sarajevo FF as well as programme consultant for the festivals Magnificent7 in Belgrade, DOCSBarcelona, Verzio Budapest, Message2Man in St. Petersburg and DOKLeipzig. Teaches at the Zelig Documentary School in Bolzano Italy.

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