Orgreave anniversary documentary wins Audience Award at Sheffield Doc/Fest
Doc/Fest’s Audience Awards were announced this week. Now in it’s eighth year, the Sheffield Doc/Fest Audience Award gives Sheffield’s public audience and delegates the chance to honour their favourite film of the festival.
The Audience Award winner for the 21st edition of Sheffield Doc/Fest is STILL THE ENEMY WITHIN directed by Owen Gower and produced by Sinead Kirwan and Mark Lacey. This archive-rich film looks back to Margaret Thatcher’s battle with the unions and specifically the 1984 miners strike. Told primarily from the retrospective of the mining communities the Doc/Fest screenings received a standing-ovation from Sheffield audiences and delegates. This World Premiere screening at Doc/Fest was one of a number of films at the festival that marked the 30th anniversary on 18th June of the “Battle of Orgreave.”
The Short Film audience award goes to OUR CURSE directed by Tomasz Sliwinski, produced by Maciej Slesicki, an intimate and moving self-portrait about a young couple whose newborn child has been diagnosed with Ondine’s curse meaning he must be attached to a ventilator when he sleeps. Our Curse also won the Student Doc Award.
The Interactive audience award goes ASSENTdirected and produced by Oscar Raby which enables the user to witness the execution of a group of prisoners by the military regime in Chile in 1973, as witnessed by the filmmaker’s father.
This year’s first ever In The Dark Sheffield Audio Award, which recognises a new golden age of radio and audio documentary storytelling both in podcasting and traditional radio, was awarded to Pejk Malinovski’s EVERYTHING, NOTHING, HARVEY KEITEL about a man who struggles to meditate when he realises he’s sitting next to the actor Harvey Keitel.
The Sheffield Doc/Fest 2014 awards, presented by Jeremy Hardy, were announced last Thursday (12 June) at The Crucible Theatre, Sheffield.
The awards for 2014 announced today were: Special Jury Award, Sheffield Innovation Award, Sheffield Green Award, Sheffield Youth Jury Award, Sheffield Student Doc Award, Sheffield Short Doc Award, The Tim Hetherington Award and the first ever Peter Wintonick Award which celebrates activist filmmaking,in honour of the late Canadian documentary filmmaker and friend of the festival Peter Wintonick.
This year the Inspiration Award was awarded to Laura Poitras. Poitras sent a message dedicating her award to Edward Snowden, Glenn Greenwald, Jacob Appelbaum, William Binney, Julian Assange and Sarah Harrison.
The Sheffield Doc/Fest 2014 award for Lifetime Achievement was presented to Roger Graef. Accepting the award Roger said “it’s true that when we take people’s pictures, we capture their souls and that is a great responsibility” and paid tribute to “those souls who have been brave enough to let us capture them.”
Roger also praised Sheffield Doc/Fest and the community spirit of the documentary festival, commenting that the loneliness that can come with documentary filmmaking is “mitigated by the chance to come to together at a festival like this.” He dedicated his award to CEO and Festival Director Heather Croall.
Sheffield Doc/Fest’s Special Jury prize was awarded to Attacking The Devil: Harold Evans and the Last Nazi War Crime (directors Jacqui Morris & David Morris, United Kingdon/Canada, 2014, 99mins).
The Sheffield Innovation Award was awarded to A Short History of the Highrise (Dir. Katerina Cizek, Canada/United States, 2013, 17mins).
The Sheffield Youth Jury Award was awarded to The Internet’s Own Boy: The Story of Aaron Swartz (Dir. Brian Knappenberger, United States, 2014, 105mins).
The Sheffield Green Award was awarded to Unearthed (Dir. Jolynn Minnaar, South Africa, 2014, 90mins).
The Sheffield Student Doc Award was awarded to Our Curse (Dir. Tomasz Sliwinski, Poland, 2013, 28mins).
The Sheffield Short Doc Award, sponsored by the London Short Film Festival, was awarded to Amanda F***ing Palmer on the Rocks(Dir. Ondi Timoner, United States, 2014, 18mins).
The first ever Peter Wintonick Award, celebrating activist filmmaking, was awarded to Vessel (Dir. Diana Whitten, United States, 2014, 88mins).
What next?
- A number of Sheffield Live programmes have covered Doc/Fest including Business Live (13 June episode); The Max Chance Show (10 June episode); Mouthpiece (10 June episode); Slam Dunk Cinema ( 14 June & 31 May episodes) – access them via the podcasts from our shows pages.
- Also listen to interviews with Doc/Fest’s Hussain and Heather here.
