IDFA 2018 awards announced​ with two Indian winners​, and Anand Patwardhan brings home the big one!

The main prizes have been announced at the 31st International Documentary Filmfestival Amsterdam (IDFA, 14 – 25 November).

Reason by Indian director Anand Patwardhan​ has​ won the IDFA Award for Best Feature-Length Documentary​, the festival’s main award worth 15,000 E​U. The film, told in eight parts, charts the rise of religious and nationalist fundamentalism in Indian society.​ It is ​sold internationally by Cinephil​.​​​ ​The jury statement read as, 

“the epic storytelling of the rise of the far right in one of the most populated countries of this planet, the violence of religious and ultranationalist militias with the support of authorities and dominant medias, the dignity of resistance in multiple forms, often at life-cost, in a way that acknowledges the complexity of the situation but put it in a very understandable shape. “

Reason had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival ​2018. Patwardhan’s documentary filmmaking credits include Waves of Revolution (1971), Ram Ke Naam (1992), Father, Son, and Holy War (1995) and Jai Bhim Comrade (2012).

​Of the four Indian films competing at the festival (find out everything about them here), Payal Kapadia’s And What Is The Summer Saying, a poetic glimpse at a village in Maharashtra’s Sahyadri’s hills, has also won the IDFA Special Jury Award for Short Documentary worth 2500 EU.

​Find all the winners below: ​

IDFA Competition for Feature-Length Documentary

Best feature-length documentary
Reason (Anand Patwardhan, India)

Special Jury Award for feature-length documentary
Los Reyes (Bettina Perut and Iván Osnovikoff, Chile​ | ​Germany)

IDFA Competition for Mid-Length Documentary

Best mid-length documentary
Summa (Andrei Kutsila, Poland​ | ​Belarus).

Special Jury Award for mid-length documentary
In Touch (Pawel Ziemilski​ |​ Poland​ | ​Iceland)

IDFA Competition for Short Documentary

Best ​short-length documentary
I Signed the Petition (Mahdi Fleifel​, ​United Kingdom​ |​ Germany​ |​ Switzerland) 

Special Jury Award for Short Documentary 

And What Is the Summer Saying (Payal Kapadia​, India)​

IDFA Competition for First Appearance

Best first appearance
Giacinto Scelsi. The First Motion of the Immovable (Sebastiano d’Ayala Valva, France​ | ​Italy)

Special Jury Award for first appearance
Kabul, City in the Wind (Aboozar Amini, Netherlands​ | ​Afghanistan​ | ​Japan​ | ​Germany)

IDFA Competition for Dutch Documentary

Best Dutch Documentary
Now Something Is Slowly Changing (Mint Film Office)

Special Jury Award for Dutch Documentary 
But Now Is Perfect (Carin Goeijers)

IDFA Competition for Student Documentary

Best Student Documentary 

In Search…(Beryl Magoko​, ​Germany​ |​ Kenya)

Special Jury Award for Student Documentary 

Backwards (Dana Gelman​, ​Israel)

IDFA Kids Docs Winners

The IDFA Award For Best Children’s Documentary
Dancing For You (Katarzyna Lesisz, Poland)

IDFA DocLab Award For Digital Storytelling
1 The Road (Ross Goodwin, U.S.)

IDFA DocLab Award for Immersive Non-Fiction 
Eat | Tech | Kitchen​ ​(Klasien van de Zandschulp and Emilie Baltz​, ​Netherlands​ |​ United States)