The jury noted in a statement: "Jesse Moss' The Overnighters, which follows a pastor's efforts to house job-seekers in an insular North Dakota town, is exceptional as an exercise of narrative craft, as a feat of immersion journalism, and as an intimate portrait of one man's struggles. In driving to the heart of local discontent, the documentary is admirably fair-minded, yet it is Moss' alertness as a filmmaker that lets him stay close to the story as its subjects take unexpected, sometimes shocking, turns. The result illuminates a messy confluence of American interests: faith, altruism, family, opportunity, and the search for honest self-expression."
