The International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) has announced the competition winners for its 37th edition. The awards were unveiled at a ceremony on Thursday in Amsterdam at the Internationaal Theater Amsterdam, just a few blocks from the iconic Rijksmuseum. This year’s IDFA selection includes more than 250 documentary titles, many hinging on the current wars and ideological fissures plaguing the world.
In a unanimous decision from jurors Juliana Fanjul, Sophie Fiennes, Grace Lee, Asmae El Moudir, and Kazuhiro Soda, Maciej J. Drygas’ Polish archival documentary “Trains” took the IDFA Award for Best Film in the international competition. The film is a rail journey through 20th-century Europe taking place entirely within steam locomotives and railroad cars.
“The jury was unanimous. This is a bold and inventive use of archive. 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 said in a statement. The win includes a 15,000 euro cash prize.
The IDFA Award for Best Directing (worth 5,000 euros) in the international competition went to Auberi Edler for “An American Pastoral,” centered on ideological battles in a small, conservative Pennsylvania town.
“By simply looking and listening, this director reveals the current complexity at the heart of the United States. 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,” said the jury.
The IDFA Award for Best Editing also went to Maciej J. Drygas for “Trains,” while the IDFA Award for Best Cinematography went to Zvika Gregory Portnoy and Zuzanna Solakiewicz for the refugee portrait “The Guest,” from Poland and Qatar.
In the Envision Competition, which showcases daring international and world premieres, the award for Best Film went to “Chronicles of the Absurd,” a hybrid portrait of Kafkaesque repression within and outside Cuba.
“Formally complex with a film language that arises organically and directly from its limitations, this film impressed us with the use of an audio track as a political diary,” the jury said.
The Award for Best Directing in the Envision Competition went to Massimo D’Anolfi and Martina Parenti for “Bestiaries, Herbaria, Lapidaries” (Italy/Switzerland), while the Award for Outstanding Artistic Contribution went in a tie to Omar Mismar for “A Frown Gone Mad” (Lebanon) and to Yo-Hen So for “Park” (Taiwan). The jury members for the Envision Competition were Sam Green, Nduka Mntambo, Kumjana Novakova, B. Ruby Rich, and Wael Shawky.
In the DocLab Competition for Immersive Non-Fiction, Lisa Schamlé won the top prize for “Me, a Depiction” hailing from the Netherlands. Another local title, “The Liminal” (also from Lebanon, Palestine, and Norway) from Alaa Al Minawi won a special mention in that section.
Pegah Tabassinejad’s “Entropic Fields of Displacement” (Canada) won the IDFA DocLab Award for Digital Storytelling. Emeline Courcier’s “Burn from Absence” (France/Canada) received the DocLab Special Mention for Digital Storytelling.
In the short documentary competition, Theo Panagopoulos’ “The Flowers Stand Silently, Witnessing” (U.K.) won for Best Short Documentary. A special mention also went to “Mama Micra”
(Germany) by Rebecca Blöcher.
The IDFA Award for Best Youth Documentary (13+) went to Eefje Blankevoort and Lara Aerts for “Everything Will Be Alright” (Netherlands). A special mention here went to “Simply Divine” (France/Romania) by Mélody Boulissière. The IDFA Award for Best Youth Documentary (9-12) went to Poorva Bhat for “What’s the Film About?” (India). Martijn Blekendaal received a special mention here for “The Invisible Ones” (Netherlands/Belgium).
More overall awards were given, including The IDFA Award for Best First Feature for “CycleMahesh” (India) by Suhel Banerjee. The IDFA Award for Best Dutch Film went to Luuk Bouwman for “The Propagandist” (Netherlands).
The Beeld & Geluid IDFA ReFrame Award went to Farahnaz Sharifi for “My Stolen Planet” (Iran/Germany), a moving essay film about the filmmaker’s experience emigrating to Germany at the peak of the Woman, Life, Freedom protests in her home country, which she watched from afar on social media.
Radu Jude and Christian Ferencz-Flatz received the Beeld & Geluid IDFA ReFrame Award special mention for “Eight Postcards from Utopia” (Romania), a collage of Romanian commercials made after the country converted to capitalism after Nicolae Ceaușescu’s death.
inally, the FIPRESCI Award went to “Writing Hawa” (France/Netherlands/Qatar/Afghanistan) by Najiba Noori.
IDFA opened on Thursday, November 14 and runs through Sunday, November 24. Festival director Orwa Nyrabia, who has been at IDFA since 2018, previously announced that he will step down after this year’s edition.
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