Earlier today, the jury and audience award winners for the 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival Festival were announced at an Awards Brunch hosted by CHAYA Downtown for the third year in a row. Actors Jon Heder and Ari Graynor were on hand to present.

“Every single filmmaker in this year’s Festival deserves kudos for their artistry and compelling stories. Our juries had such gems to choose from in each competition and the winners truly represent what we hold dear—diversity and uniqueness of vision,” said Festival Director Stephanie Allain.

The two top juried awards of the Los Angeles Film Festival are the Narrative Award and Documentary Award, each carrying an unrestricted $15,000 cash prize funded by Film Independent for the winning film’s director. The awards were established by the Festival to encourage independent filmmakers to pursue their artistic ambitions.

“In an extremely competitive year, our juries had hard choices to make. The winning films are wonderful examples of what the Festival celebrates: bold, fresh, personal visions that expand the horizons of independent cinema,” said Artistic Director David Ansen.

And without further ado, those winners are:

Jury Award Winners – Feature Films

★ Narrative Award: All is Well, directed by Pocas Pascoal. This award recognizes the finest narrative film in competition at the Festival.

★ Honorable Mention: Thursday Till Sunday directed by Dominga Sotomayor.

★ Documentary Award: Drought, directed by Everardo González. This award recognizes the finest documentary film in competition at the Festival.

★ Best Performance in the Narrative Competition: Wendell Pierce, Emory Cohen, E.J. Bonilla and Aja Naomi King for their performances in the World Premiere of Joshua Sanchez’s Four. Given to an actor or actors from an official selection in the Narrative Competition.

Jury Award Winners – Short Films

(each awarded an unrestricted cash prize of $5,000)

★ Best Narrative Short Film: The Chair, directed by Grainger David.

★ Best Documentary Short Film: Kudzu Vine, directed by Josh Gibson.

★ Best Animated or Experimental Short Film: The Pub, directed by Joseph Pierce.

Audience Award Winners

★ Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature winner: Beasts of the Southern Wild, directed by Benh Zeitlin.

★ Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature winner: Birth Story: Ina May Gaskin and The Farm Midwives, directed by Sara Lamm and Mary Wigmore.

★ Audience Award for Best International Feature winner: Searching for Sugar Man, directed by Malik Bendjelloul.

★ Audience Award for Best Short Film: Asad, directed by Bryan Buckley

★ Audience Award for Best Music Video: Piranhas Club, directed by Lex Halaby.

The Narrative Feature Competition jury was comprised of actress Rachael Harris (Natural Selection, Diary of a Wimpy Kid movies), actor/writer/producer/director Robert Townsend (Hollywood Shuffle, The Five Heartbeats) and film critic Sheri Linden (LAFCA, The Hollywood Reporter, The Los Angeles Times).

The Documentary Feature Competition jury was comprised of producer Heather Rae (Frozen River, The Dry Land), producer Karin Chien (Circumstance, The Exploding Girl) and director Mark Landsman (Thunder Soul).

The Shorts Competition Jury was comprised of film critic and author Ernest Hardy (Blood Beats Vols. 1 and 2), cinematographer Nancy Schreiber (Your Friends and Neighbors, The Celluloid Closet) and writer/director/editor Javier Fuentes León (Contracorriente).

Read the full press release and get more info on all the winners and their films from our press and press materials site!

 

June 24th, 2012 • 1 Comment