WatchDocs Awards 2025/2
Academic Cinema Association Awards
Jury in the team: Michał Konarski, Michał Surówka and Maja Gomulska awarded the film “Silver” directed by. Natalie Koniarz
“For the extraordinary combination of form and substance. Photos and camera work deserve attention and appreciation, showing how moving silence can be. The use of a wide frame in a documentary creates a sense of claustrophobic danger, in which various forms of goosebumps combine with human greed. However, breaking the editing key and the introduction of elements of magical realism does not undermine its documentation, but only complements the other elements of the film, so they form a well-thought and cohesive whole.”
“Silver” also got a Special Mention in the New Polish Films section, where the winner was “Child of Dust”. The jury consisting of Michał Merczy Jski, Paulina Reiter and Anna Wydra awarded the Grand Prize to the movie “Child of Dust” by Weronika Mliczewska. Motivations:
“We give the main prize to the movie, about which we can say with full responsibility, is an excellent document.
It is an emotionally moving, multidimensional, intellectually ambitious, sharp social criticism, at the same time intimate and taking on public, private and political issues, talking about a historical issue but also extremely relevant.
It’s a movie about how long the teddy bears are — it touches several generations every time. It’s a story about a moving absence of a father, about racial discrimination, and about a system that, although it seems to try to save a man, abandons him back to fate and separates him from his family again. It’s a visually beautiful image, with tenderness following the hero’s long and painful journey to regain his identity, sense of dignity and peace of mind. Tears of sadness and tears of joy of Mr. Sang, the extraordinary hero of the movie “Dust Child” directed by Weronika Mliczewska, will stay with us forever. „
Natalia Koniarz’s film “Silver”:
“For a staggering image of the profit that, unfortunately, we are all beneficiaries from, using electronics or using artificial intelligence.” “Silver” represents the fate of families — mothers, fathers and children — who are living in extreme poverty and working at risk in a Bolivian silver mine.
We observe environmental degradation and lack of social solidarity. An image that raises objections and questions as to how the world is still like this? Photos in the mountains are terrifying. We want to reward not only the weight of the topic and its take, but also the courage of the team. ”
