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Edward Lachman, Jomo Fray, and Sam McCurdy take home top honors at the 39th annual ASC Awards, while ‘Maria’ and ‘Nickel Boys’ stand out among the winners.

Edward Lachman won his first ASC Award for Maria, beating out Greg Frasier for Dune: Part Two and Lol Crawley for The Brutalist at the 39th annual ASC Awards, held on February 23 at The Beverly Hilton. Lachman’s surprise win comes after five previous nominations, marking a long-awaited achievement in his career.

Maria, Lachman’s collaboration with director Pablo Larraín, focuses on the final days of opera singer Maria Callas, reflecting on her life and the challenges of maintaining her voice. To capture this story, Lachman utilized Kodak film in 35mm, 16mm, and Super 8, shooting in both color and black-and-white stock. This film is part of Larraín’s Important Women Trilogy, alongside Jackie and Spencer.

Other notable winners included Robert Elswit for Ripley in the Limited Series category,...

Edward Lachman has taken top honors at the 39th annual American Society of Cinematographers Awards for his work on “Maria.”

In a competitive year, the ASC nominated seven cinematographers in the feature film category. The last time the field expanded beyond five was in 2014. The other nominees are Lol Crawley for “The Brutalist,” Phedon Papamichael for “A Complete Unknown,” Stéphane Fontaine for “Conclave,” Greig Fraser for “Dune: Part 2,” Jarin Blaschke for “Nosferatu,” and Alice Brooks for “Wicked.”

In its 38-year history, only 18 have gone on to win the Oscar. Last year, Hoyte Van Hoytema won the ASC for “Oppenheimer” and went on to win the Oscar.

In TV, winners included Robert Elswit for “Ripley.” Elswit won the Creative Art Emmy last year. Speaking with Variety for Inside the Frame, Elswit spoke about shooting the black and white limited series. He said, “Lighting was important. It needed to reflect who...

The American Society of Cinematographers Awards were handed out Sunday night, with the film prize going to Edward Lachman for Maria.

This is Lachman’s first ASC win. He was previously nominated for Far From Heaven (2003), Mildred Pierce (2011), Carol (2016) and El Conde (2024). He received the ASC’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 2017.

On the TV side, Richard Rutkowski won for Sugar in the episode of a half-hour series category, and Sam Mccurdy won for Shogun in the one-hour regular series category, while the limited or anthology series of motion picture made for television award went to Robert Elswit for Ripley.

The Spotlight Award was awarded to Jomo Fray, cinematographer of Nickel Boys.

The 2025 ASC Career Achievement in Television Award was awarded to Michael Goi, whose credits have included Web Therapy, Glee, American Horror Story and Scream Queens. Pete Romano was honored with the 2025 Curtis Clark ASC Technical Achievement Award for revolutionizing underwater cinematography.

“Maria” cinematographer Ed Lachman has won the top feature-film award at the American Society of Cinematographers’ ASC Awards, which took place on Sunday evening in Los Angeles.

The film, which charts the final week of opera diva Maria Callas’ life, is one of the five nominees in the Oscars Best Cinematography category and won over fellow Oscar nominees “The Brutalist,” “Conclave,” “Nosferatu” and “Wicked,” as well as “Dune: Part Two” and “A Complete Unknown.”

In the 38 years that the ASC has been giving out an award for feature-film cinematography, its winner has gone on to win the Oscar for Best Cinematography a little less than half the time, with the two voting bodies agreeing 18 times and disagreeing 20 times. Recently, though, the ASC and Oscars have gone to the same film more often, with four matches in the last five years.

Jomo Fray won the Spotlight Award, which goes to smaller and often more adventurous films,...

Maria cinematographer Edward Lachman took the marquee Theatrical Feature Film prize at the 39th annual ASC Awards, which were handed out Sunday night at the Beverly Hilton. It’s the first major award for the Netflix pic starring Angelina Jolie as Maria Callas. See the full winners list below.

The ASC’s Theatrical Feature Film prize winner has gone on to claim the Best Cinematography Oscar nearly half of the time — 18 times in its 38 years — including Hoyte van Hoytema for Oppenheimer last year. Maria also is up for the Best Cinematography Oscar, which is its only nomination. Lachman will vie for the prize against Lol Crawley (The Brutalist), Greig Fraser (Dune: Part Two) Paul Guilhaume (Emilia Pérez) and Jarin Blaschke (Nosferatu). All five also were up for the ASC Award tonight.

Ed Helms hosted the American Society of Cinematographers’ ceremony, where Jomo Fray won the Spotlight Award for his work...

As we gear up for the big afternoon on the beach this Saturday, now’s a great time to get to know your nominees. Hopefully you’ve seen their films, and if you’re a Film Independent member, watched your screeners and voted too. But there’s nothing quite like hearing about the process from the creative minds themselves.

That’s exactly what we did with this year’s Directors Close-Up, where we brought together the nominees from some of the top filmmaking categories, to talk shop. Over two weeks this February, we held Zoom sessions for our members, where these creators tell how exactly they got their projects off the ground, the creative choices they made, and what inspires them.

If you missed them live, we’ve got you covered. Let’s take a look at all the action from this year’s Directors Close-Up:

Spirit Of...

Following on from their critically acclaimed The Truffle Hunters, documentary duo Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw have sniffed out another rare delicacy in Gaucho Gaucho. This gorgeous black-and-white film focuses on the lives and traditions of a community of gauchos, the wild northwest cowboys of Argentina. The film is intimate and expansive, immersive and immense, operatic and folksy. It is a film that takes you on a journey, often at a gallop, but never strays far.

The film opens with a man sleeping out on the prairie and it takes a moment to realise he is sleeping on his horse, which is also sound asleep. Immediately, the filmmakers depict the symbiotic relationship between man and horse. But it’s not just about men: there is also a gaucha, seventeen-year-old schoolgirl Guada. She wears her wide beret and trousers in lieu of a uniform, earning a telling-off from her teacher. She’s a girl apart,...

The photographic excellence of The Brutalist, A Complete Unknown, Conclave, Maria, Dune: Part Two, Nosferatu, and Wicked were cited in the marquee Theatrical Feature Film category as the American Society of Cinematographers announced nominees Thursday morning for the 39th Annual ASC Awards. The ASC Awards span features, documentaries, television, and music videos among its seven categories, with these nominations delayed a week due to the Los Angeles wildfire crisis.

This feature lineup is packed with awards season favorites, including cinematographers Lol Crawley for The Brutalist, Greig Fraser for Dune: Part Two, and Jarin Blaschke for Nosferatu. Last year’s ASC feature winner, Hoyte van Hoytema for Oppenheimer, went on to win the Academy Award. The ASC winner has claimed that year’s Oscar 18 times in 38 years, or a smidgen less than half the time.

The number of nominees in the feature category — seven this time — can vary between five and...

The American Society of Cinematographers today focused in on the delayed nominations for its 39th annual ASC Awards, which celebrate the year’s best in cinematography in seven categories spanning feature films, TV, documentaries and music videos. See the list below.

Vying for the marquee Theatrical Feature Film prize are the DPs behind Nosferatu, Wicked, The Brutalist, Conclave, Dune: Part Two, Maria and A Complete Unknown. The number of nominees in the category can vary from five to 10, depending on vote percentage. The last time there were seven was in 2014.

Winners will be feted February 23 during 39th annual ASC Awards at the Beverly Hilton. The ceremony will be livestreamed at theasc.com.

Related: 2025 Awards Season Calendar: Dates For Oscars, Spirits, Grammys, Tonys, Guilds & More

Producer and Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy is set for the ASC’s 2025 Board of Governors Award, and longtime Sidney Lumet collaborator Andrzej Bartkowiak will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award.

After a delay due to the ongoing wildfires in Los Angeles, the American Society of Cinematographers (ASC) announced the nominees for its 2025 Outstanding Achievement Awards, spanning feature films, documentaries, television, and music videos. “Dune: Part 2” continues to be a craft favorite with a nomination for Greig Fraser, but winter films made their mark, with nominations for “Nosferatu” and “A Complete Unknown,” among others. The ASC’s spotlight award, which highlights outstanding features with a more limited release or festival run, also nominated Jomo Fray’s work on “Nickel Boys,” keeping it in the conversation.

On the television side, both “House of the Dragon” and “Shōgun” earned multiple nominations for sweeping and sometimes fantastical work in the One-Hour Regular Series category; “Hacks” and “The Franchise” earned nominations for the sharp, funny backstage view of the entertainment industry that Adam Bricker’s and Carl Herse’s cameras each take. The ASC...

Hafsia Herzi’s coming-of-age story La Petite Dernière, about a young woman balancing her faith and family with her ambitions and sexuality, has just wrapped for rising French production outfit June Films; mk2 Films has acquired the buzzy title for international sales.

Newcomer Nadia Melliti stars alongside Return To Seoul’s Park-ji Min with Louis Memmi, Mouna Soualem, and several non-professional actors in an adaptation of Fatima Daas’ novel. It is about the daughter of Algerian immigrants in Paris struggling to reconcile what is expected of her by her family and society and the life she wants for herself.

One of the most thrilling scenes in recent cinema history comes not from a big budget Hollywood production but via independent documentary filmmakers Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw, directors of Gaucho Gaucho.

To capture the tremendous horsemanship of cowboys and cowgirls in a remote area of Argentina, Dweck and Kershaw wanted to film the gauchos galloping at great speed across the open range. But pulling off a tracking shot of that nature required a Herculean effort.

“First, we had to get a device to film that,” Dweck explains. “And there was only one guy that had that. He was in Buenos Aires. He had a Polaris truck, like a four-wheel drive SUV. It’s like a Mad Max-mobile, with an arm and a gyro, very complicated machine. And we had to truck it 25 hours across [the country] because we were on the other end of Argentina completely, near Chile and Bolivia,...

In one of the narratives that directors Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw braid together in Gaucho Gaucho, their documentary on that much-represented Argentine figure, the mestizo horseman of the Pampas, a father teaching his son the gaucho tradition asks him what he wants to be when he grows up. A gaucho, the boy replies, “but a gaucho gaucho”—not a faux gaucho, that is, but a real one. Here we have a source for the film’s title, but considering what Gaucho Gaucho actually depicts (and what it doesn’t), this doubling smacks of a mirror image, where it’s tricky to distinguish the real from the reflection.

Shot in luxuriant black and white by Dweck and Kershaw, the film follows a handful of gauchos from three generations, but from a distance, letting their stories unfold without the intervention of voiceover commentary. Considered for its cinematography, shot composition, and motifs alone,...

The fight for Palestinian livelihood, repatriation, the Argentine gaucho community, a pair of England’s greatest directors, Chinese textile mills, a legendary artist’s final performance, the frontlines of the war on Ukraine––just a few of the subjects and stories this year’s documentaries brought us. With 2024 wrapping up, we’ve selected the non-fiction features that left us most impressed. If you’re looking for where to stream them, check out our handy guide here.

Dahomey (Mati Diop)

In 1953, Alain Resnais, Chris Marker, and Ghislain Cloquet produced Statues Also Die, one of the fiercest and most lucid indictments of white imperialism ever captured on film. Commissioned by the magazine Présence Africaine, it sought to dissect Western attitudes toward African art. The 30-minute short did not begin as an anti-colonial project but became one along the way, informed by the belittling treatment that antiquities from the continent had received across...

As 2024 comes to a close, much of the month will be dedicated to wrapping up the year in cinema with a plethora of year-end features (bookmark here for those), but let’s take a deeper look at the December line-up. Featuring some of the most-praised films of the year, including my favorite shortest and longest works, and much more, it’s a great time for holiday movie-going.

We should note also that a number of notable films are getting Oscar-qualifying runs before the end of the year, which we’ll feature on this in proper when they get their official releases.

15. A Complete Unknown (James Mangold; Dec. 25)

Nabbing the last spot on this for sheer fascination with Bob Dylan alone and not much else, James Mangold in biopic mode is often far less interesting than some of his other work. However, with what seems to be a committed Timothée Chalamet...

Edge of Tomorrow (2014) director Doug Liman will be collaborating with Tom Cruise once again on the new supernatural thriller called Deeper. Per Showbiz 411, Liman confirmed the plans at a screening of the Gregory Kershaw, Michael Dweck documentary Gaucho Gaucho.

Liman said he and the Mission: Impossible star, with whom he also worked together on 2017’s American Made, are planning to work on the movie soon. “I have never done one, and neither has Tom Cruise,” Liman said of working on the "scary" movie.

I have never done one, and neither has Tom Cruise.

In addition to Edge of Tomorrow, which Liman produced, he also produced 2010’s Fair Game, which starred Naomi Watts and Sean Penn, and was an executive producer on the popular TV series, Suits. He also directed 1996’s Swingers, starring Vince Vaughn and Jon Favreau, as well as 2024’s Road House, which starred Jake Gyllenhaal. No production date for Deeper has been announced.

Editor’s Note: This story was originally published in March 2024 and has since been updated to include new distribution details for “Gaucho Gaucho.”

Landing a good distributor is the holy grail for every indie filmmaker at Sundance. But when it comes to documentaries, while Netflix picked up a few titles out of the festival this year, the market remains soft.

Even as the theatrical market has improved for Oscar nominees and winners like “The Holdovers” and “Poor Things,” it’s tough to find a buyer for a lot of movies these days. For a movie like “Gaucho Gaucho,” which earned a Sundance jury prize and played well at Cph:dox, the filmmakers Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw finally landed a distributor at online company Jolt.film, which is also releasing another difficult-to-place documentary, producer Alex Gibney and director Alexis Bloom’s “The Bibi Files.”

Cinematographer Kershaw and photographer Dweck first met years...

Three gauchos on horseback gallop across an Argentine landscape, their connection to their animals and their surroundings palpable. In a crumbling church, an elderly gaucho confers with a parish priest, worried that his life has lost its meaning. A young girl risks injury to become part of the gaucho tradition.

Moments like these make up Gaucho Gaucho, a documentary from the team of Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw and finalist for the 2024 Indie Film Site Network Advocate Award. Shot over several years in remote mountain villages, the movie offers a glimpse into a way of life in danger of disappearing.

Dweck and Kershaw previously collaborated on The Last Race (2018) and The Truffle Hunters (2020). Their work is marked by an empathy with their subjects and attention to details––qualities missing from too many documentaries.

Following its Sundance Film Festival premiere at the beginning of the year, Gaucho Gaucho screened at the Morelia Film Festival,...

Each year at the Indie Film Site Network (Ifsn), we’re honored to highlight independent films that illuminate a humanitarian or environmental issue with a singular artistic vision. In 2024 we’ve announced Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, and Rachel Szor’s essential, urgent documentary No Other Land as the recipient of the Ifsn Advocate Award.

The top prize is awarded one million (1M) media impressions across the Indie Film Site Network, which represents The Film Stage, Hammer to Nail, Ioncinema.com, RogerEbert.com, Slant Magazine, and Screen Anarchy. Letterboxd, the popular social network for cinephiles, is also contributing to this award.

Finalists for the 2024 Ifsn Advocate Award are Mati Diop’s Dahomey, Gregory Kershaw and Michael Dweck’s Gaucho Gaucho, Jane Schoenbrun’s I Saw the TV Glow, Monica Sorelle’s Mountains, and Julian Brave NoiseCat and Emily Kassie’s Sugarcane, which will each be awarded 100K media impressions across Ifsn.

“The Bibi Files,” a documentary about Benjamin Netanyahu that features never-before-seen video of the Israeli Prime Minister being interrogated by police on corruption allegations that led to his indictment in 2019, will be available to stream on Jolt.film beginning Dec. 11.

In September, Netanyahu attempted to block “The Bibi Files” from premiering at the Toronto Film Festival. The doc, directed by Alexis Bloom and produced by Oscar winner Alex Gibney, ultimately screened at the fest hours after a Jerusalem court rejected Netanyahu’s suit, which claimed that the film violated Israeli law by making use of unapproved interrogation footage.

Given its political nature “The Bibi Files,” not surprisingly, did not sell to any major streamers following the doc’s Sept. 9 TIFF debut. Bloom and Gibney ultimately decided to bring the film to Jolt, a direct-to-consumer film distribution platform that launched in March with Ross Kauffman’s documentary “Of Medicine and Miracles.

"Stunningly beautiful." Indeed.

Bringing a pristine level of craft with their portraits of subcultures in The Last Race and The Truffle Hunters, Gregory Kershaw and Michael Dweck turned their vision to the world of gauchos for their latest project. Returning to Sundance Film Festival for a third time earlier this year, Gaucho Gaucho beautifully captures this particular way of life in Argentina. Now set for screenings at LA’s AFI Fest on October 23, Doc NYC on Nov. 16 & 18, and more, followed by a streaming release on Jolt beginning December 1, the first trailer and poster have arrived.

Here’s the synopsis: “Gaucho Gaucho paints an Argentinian Western with image and sound that reach an operatic beauty. Acclaimed photographers and now three-time Sundance-fêted filmmakers Gregory Kershaw and Michael Dweck return with another striking nonfiction work after first taking audiences to the final stock car racetrack of Long Island with The Last Race and the secret corners...

It has to be among the best open-air public spaces at any festival to premiere a film and it also counts as a safe space for some world premiere screenings. Included in the Piazza Grande section, the folks that fill up the 8,000 seats will find a mix of world premieres, Swiss preems and so polished-off older films. Sundance preemed Gaucho Gaucho by Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw will be nice to take in in the great outdoors and so will Tarsem Singh‘s The Fall (Restored Cut). On the world premieres side Simon Jaquemet‘s Electric Child in finally complete – filmed in October 2022 this is about a couple whose child develops an unusual illness.…...

Taking place August 7-17, the official selection for the 77th Locarno Film Festival has been unveiled, featuring a stellar-looking slate of highly anticipated films. Highlights include Hong Sangsoo’s second feature of the year, By the Stream, starring Kim Minhee, Kwon Haehyo, and Cho Yunhee; Ramon Zürcher’s The Sparrow in the Chimney, Wang Bing’s second part of his Youth trilogy, Youth (Hard Times), as well as new films by Radu Jude, Bertrand Mandico, Courtney Stephens, Ben Rivers, Gürcan Keltek, Denis Côté, Kevin Jerome Everson, Fabrice Du Welz (featuring Abel Ferrara!), and many more. Also of particular note is the world premiere of Tarsem Singh’s restored cut of The Fall, which features a slightly different edit as he recently noted.

Giona A. Nazzaro, Artistic Director of the Locarno Film Festival said, “We are very excited and happy with our selection for Locarno’s 77th edition, which we believe...

Switzerland’s Locarno Film Festival will debut 17 world premieres, including new works by Hong Sang-soo and Wang Bing, as part of its 2024 competition program. This year’s event runs from August 7 – 17.

The festival announced its competition lineups this morning. The Hong Sang-soo feature is titled Suyoocheon (By The Stream) and stars Kim Minhee, Kwon Haehyo, and Cho Yunhee. The Wang Bing feature is a France, Luxembourg, and Netherlands co-production titled Hard Times. Scroll down to see the full Locarno competition lineup, which also includes new titles from Ben Rivers, Mar Coll, and Christoph Hochhäusler.

The festival today also announced that French acting veterans Mélanie Laurent and Guillaume Canet will receive the event’s honorary Excellence Award Davide Campari at the opening ceremony on August 7. Previous recipients of the award include Riz Ahmed and Aaron Taylor Johnson.

Locarno’s separate Piazza Grande lineup features 18 titles, including Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig,...

Paris-based sales house Charades has sold the Argentinian Western-inspired documentary “Gaucho Gaucho” across much of Europe.

The film — which won a Sundance Jury Prize in January and recently played at Cph:dox — has landed deals with Tandem (France), Filmin (Spain), Selmer Media, M2, Praesens (Switzerland) and Bantam Films (Benelux). Variety understands a U.K. sale is currently under discussion.

Directed by Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw, the duo behind the box office hit “The Truffle Hunters,” “Gaucho Gaucho” explores the story of a community of cowboys and cowgirls in Northern Argentina who live outside the modern world.

Produced by Dweck and Kershaw for Beautiful Stories Prods., the film is shot in black-and-white and celebrates the beauty and passion of a group of skilled Argentine cowboys and cowgirls, known as gauchos. It weaves together a mosaic of tales about gauchos confronting the fragility of their world in the face of unprecedented change.

Paris-based sales house Charades has acquired international sales rights to Argentinian Western-Inspired documentary “Gaucho Gaucho” which earned a Sundance Jury Prize in January and recently played at Cph:dox.

Directed by Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw, the duo behind the box office hit ‘The Truffle Hunters,’ “Gaucho Gaucho” explores the story of a community of cowboys and cowgirls in Northern Argentina living outside of the modern world.

Produced by Dweck and Kershaw for Beautiful Stories Productions, the film is shot in black-and-white and celebrates the beauty and passion of a group of skilled Argentine cowboys and cowgirls, known as gauchos.

“Gaucho Gaucho” has been praised international critics, including Variety’ Guy Lodge who described the film as a “perfectly framed,” “loving, visually resplendent documentary” that “gives the Argentine cowboy community ample space to bond and merge.”

Charades’ co-founder Carole Baraton said the company was “very proud to bring this special masterpiece from...

Cph: Dox, Copenhagen’s International Documentary Festival, has set the full lineup for its 2024 edition, including 84 world premieres, 32 international premieres, and 9 European premieres.

Running March 13-24, the festival will feature six competition categories: Dox: Award, F: Act Award, Nordic: Dox Award, Next: Wave Award, New: Vision Award, and the new Human: Rights Award.

Musician Pete Doherty will attend the festival for a screening of Peter Doherty: Stranger in My Own Skin. The event will take place on March 18 at Bremen Theater, when he and the film’s director Katia de Vidas – who became Doherty’s wife over the ten years she followed him with her camera – openly discuss the substance abuse that has shadowed his entire career. After the screening, Doherty will give an acoustic concert. Other high-profile titles include Lana Wilson’s Look Into My Eyes, Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw’s Gaucho Gaucho, Carla Gutierrez’s Frida, Yance Ford’s Power,...

“Gaucho Gaucho” opens on a pristinely framed, lushly monochromatic shot of something that can only, at first glance, be described as an unidentified lying object. On a flat expanse of matted grassland, under a rolling widescreen canvas of sky, the camera centers a large, dark clump of what may be rock, earth or animal matter. Eventually it stirs, revealing the folds of its composition. A man rises from his slumber, clad in high boots, wide-brimmed hat and layers of hard-wearing fabric; then a horse’s head emerges from the mass, shaking and snorting and returning awkwardly to its feet. It’s an apt visual representation of the close kinship between human life, animal life and landscape that defines the Argentine cowboy community; in frame after perfectly composed frame, Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw’s loving, visually resplendent documentary gives them ample space to bond and merge.

When it comes to...

Sundance documentaries are alive and well. And it looks like there’s some acquisition action this year, too. Which Sundance documentaries have the best shot at landing in Oscar contention this year? It helps to get bought early or to have an international footprint.

A rickety theatrical market for non-fiction features and a dwindling number of active documentary buyers meant that many Sundance 2023 films did not get picked up for distribution, or met serious delays before companies came through. As the top American film festival for docs, Sundance usually supplies as many as four out of the final five Oscar nominees each year.

And usually, by late summer, Oscar promotion is well underway. But last year, “Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project,” which was rumored to be an HBO Documentary Films pickup for months, wasn’t announced until August 29, when other Sundance grads had been campaigning all summer.

One...

Following the success of The Truffle Hunters, which showed all it takes to make a subject interesting is to approach it with curiosity and openness to wonder, directors Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw are back with Gaucho Gaucho, a stunningly beautiful chronicle of an Argentine gaucho community who closely follow the rules and traditions of their culture, despite time and progress.

Their unique attire and the allure of legends about their courage and strength turned them into defining symbols of Argentina––as well as parts of Uruguay and Brazil––where they mastered the art of horseriding and working with cattle. Like their analogs in other cultures, these cowboys came to signal different values based on the gazer. They represented ideals of masculinity and simplicity as easily as they could be seen as outlaws and fugitives who sought the safety of the plains and mountains, the way pirates hid in open oceans.

The Sundance Film Festival announced its 2024 winners on January 26, two days before the festival’s end date. The Awards Ceremony took place at The Ray Theater in Park City, Utah. This year marks its 40th annual festival run taking place from January 18 to January 28.

In the Summer, a film director Alessandra Lacorazza, won the top honor, U.S. Grand Jury Prize, starring Lio Mehiel.

Last year, Mehiel told uInterview exclusively about the importance of trans representation.

“Whenever there is an uptick of queer or trans representation in the media, there is an equal and perhaps greater response from the other side … that are looking to suppress trans rights, trans agency [and] queer liberation,” Mehiel told uInterview founder Erik Meers. “While in Hollywood we are seeing trans representation and this film is able to be part of that movement, this film is more important now than ever because even just in Utah,...

The 2024 Sundance Film Festival awards were announced today at The Ray Theatre in Park City, Utah.

See the list of 2024 winners below, and congrats to all the winners.

Festival Favorite Award

Daughters (USA) – Angela Patton and Natalie Rae

U.S. Dramatic Competition

Grand Jury Prize

In the Summers (USA) – Alessandra Lacorazza

Directing Award

In the Summers (USA) – Alessandra Lacorazza

The Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award

A Real Pain – Jesse Eisenberg

Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Performance

Suncoast (USA) – Nico Parker

Special Jury Award for Best Ensemble

Dìdi – Sean Wang

Audience Award

Dìdi – Sean Wang

U.S. Documentary Competition

Grand Jury Prize

Porcelain War – Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev

Directing Award

Sugarcane – Julian Brave NoiseCat and Emily Kassie

Special Jury Award for Sound

Gaucho Gaucho (USA, Argentina) – Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw

Special Jury Award for The Art of Change

Union (USA) – Stephen Maing and Brett Story

Jonathan Oppenheim Editing Award

Frida...

The 2024 Sundance Film Festival winners are in, with films like “In the Summers,” “Didi,” and “Daughters” dominating across the categories. “In the Summers” filmmaker Alessandra Lacorazza, whose film centers on a fractured family in New Mexico, also won the Directing prize in U.S. Dramatic.

On Friday, January 26, the winners of juried prizes were shared out of the competition sections, including the U.S. Dramatic Competition, U.S. Documentary Competition, World Cinema Dramatic Competition, World Cinema Documentary Competition, and the Next lineup.

The 2024 Sundance jury consisted of 16 filmmakers and artists across all sections, with the U.S. Dramatic Competition jury made up of “Winter’s Bone” director/co-writer Debra Granik, “Shortcomings” screenwriter Adrian Tomine, and “Master of None” producer Lena Waithe.

“Navalny” producer Shane Boris, “The Disappearance of Shere Hite” director Nicole Newnham, and “The Sentence” director Rudy Valdez serve on the U.S. Documentary Competition jury, with “The Babadook” director Jennifer Kent,...

Update: By Saturday afternoon up to five buyers were understood to be in serious discussions for Jeff Zimbalist’s documentary Skywalkers: A Love Story.

The film caused a stir ever since it premiered on Thursday night and hails from XYZ Films’ documentary division. Sources reported streamers and at least one theatrical buyer were in pursuit.

Meanwhile interest was understood to be building rapidly following the Saturday premiere of Jesse Eisenberg’s US Dramatic Competition entry A Real Pain.

Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin star as cousins on an emotional tour to see their late grandmother’s home in Poland. WME Independent...

Heading into the weekend Skywalkers: A Love Story is gathering momentum at Sundance with multiple buyers circling the documentary following a strong response at Thursday night’s world premiere.

The groundswell of interest comes hot on the heels of two early transactions announced on Friday, with Sony Pictures Classics closing a deal for North America and multiple territories on Rich Peppiatt’s Next entry Kneecap and Netflix taking World Cinema Documentary Competition selection Ibelin by The Painter And The Thief director Benjamin Ree.

XYZ Films executives were on Friday locked in discussions with streamers and more traditional documentary distributors on Jeff Zimbalist’s U.

No strangers to Sundance, filmmaker/cinematographer Gregory Kershaw and filmmaker/visual artist Michael Dweck are back for this 40th edition with their latest unsurprisingly cinematic, nonfiction study “Gaucho Gaucho.” While the acclaimed duo’s previous docs were set at a Long Island racetrack and in the Italian countryside, respectively, “Gaucho Gaucho” is an “Argentinean Western” (according to the Sundance synopsis) that takes place in the remote plains of that faraway, South American land. And therein lies the rub.

On the upside, “Gaucho Gaucho” is exquisitely crafted, with sumptuous black-and-white cinematography, camera angles framed askew, and eye-catching slo-mo sequences. (Cowboys atop galloping horses makes for one heart-pounding mix.) Not to mention an operatic — at times literally — score. (And Los Gatos’s “La Balsa” is an ear worm for sure.) And yet this heavily stylized, and often overly staged, approach actually ends up overwhelming the story the North American filmmakers have supposedly...

“Gaucho Gaucho” marks the third documentary Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw have debuted at Sundance and the second film that they have made that plunges viewers into a remote, yet enchanting world. Their 2020 acclaimed doc “The Truffle Hunters” followed a handful of men in Piedmont, Italy, in the search for rare and expensive white Alba truffles. In “Gaucho Gaucho,” the duo explore the lives of a group of skilled Argentine cowboys and cowgirls, known as gauchos.

Using stunning black-and-white cinematography, “Gaucho Gaucho” captures older generations of gauchos who dispense their wisdom, while also following a new generation who fight to continue their families’ legacies in a modern world.

It took two years to film and edit the 143 shots featured in the 85-minute doc.

Variety spoke to Dweck and Kershaw ahead of the film’s Jan. 19 premiere.

How did you manage to gain the trust of a very small, very tight Argentinian community?...

Returning to an in-person edition, along with the continuation of virtual offerings, the Sundance Film Festival kicks off this Thursday and lasts through January 28, offering a first glimpse at the year in cinema. While the annual festival has its fair share of returning filmmakers, it is certainly most renowned as a beacon of discovery, and we look forward to providing extensive coverage that one can follow via our daily newsletter.

Before reviews arrive, we’re highlighting the premieres that should be on your radar––a few we’ve already had the opportunity to see. If you’re interested in experiencing Sundance in person or from afar, one can see available tickets here ahead of Thursday’s in-person opening and an online viewing window that kicks off January 25.

Between the Temples (Nathan Silver)

After working at a prolific pace throughout his early career, it’s been a few years since we...

Exhibiting Forgiveness.The Sundance Institute has announced the films selected for their 2024 Festival, which will take place January 18-28, 2024, in person in Utah. A selection of the films are available online across the U.S. from January 25-28.U.S. Dramatic COMPETITIONBetween the Temples (Nathan Silver): A cantor in a crisis of faith finds his world turned upside down when his grade school music teacher reenters his life as his new adult bat mitzvah student. World Premiere. DìDi (弟弟) (Sean Wang): In 2008, during the last month of summer before high school begins, an impressionable 13-year-old Taiwanese American boy learns what his family can’t teach him: how to skate, how to flirt, and how to love your mom. World Premiere. Exhibiting Forgiveness (Titus Kaphar): Utilizing his paintings to find freedom from his past, a Black artist on the path to success is derailed by an unexpected visit from his estranged father,...

Providing our first glimpse at the next year in cinema, the 2024 Sundance Film Festival has unveiled its lineup of 82 films, eight episodic titles, and New Frontier interactive experiences. Taking place January 18–28, 2024, in person in Park City and Salt Lake City, with a selection of titles available online nationwide from January 25–28, 2024, the festival celebrates its 40th anniversary this year.

Notable highlights in this year’s edition includes Steven Soderbergh’s new Lucy Liu-led feature Presence, Rose Glass’ Love Lies Bleeding starring Kristen Stewart, Jane Schoenbrun’s I Saw the TV Glow, Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden’s Freaky Tales starring Pedro Pascal, the Zellners’ Sasquatch Sunset, Aaron Schimberg’s A Different Man, Handling the Undead starring Renate Reinsve and Anders Danielsen Lie, the Saoirse Ronan-led The Outrun, Jesse Eisenberg’s A Real Pain, Nathan Silver’s Between the Temples starring Jason Schwartzman, Brett Story and Stephan Maing’s Amazon Labor Union documentary Union,...

It’ll be highly likely that we’ll be talking about these docu films by the end of 2024 – as the cream of the crop easily rises to the top. We find the likes of docu helmers we like in Michael Dweck, Jeff Zimbalist, Stephen Maing & Brett Story returning to the fest with their latest films. Here is the batch of ten!

As We Speak / U.S.A. — Bronx rap artist Kemba explores the growing weaponization of rap lyrics in the United States criminal justice system and abroad — revealing how law enforcement has quietly used artistic creation as evidence in criminal cases for decades.…...

Director Marion Neumann not only pays tribute to the magic of mushrooms but claims they could save humanity from the coming climate apocalypse

At once earthy and magical, fungi not only link us to the origins of life itself but also open doors to alternate realms of consciousness. In Marion Neumann’s loose-limbed documentary, just the latest in a string of films that opine on its enigma, the mushroom can even save the world.

Compared with the surreal time-lapse photography of Louie Schwartzberg’s Fantastic Fungi (2019) or the rustic charm of Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw’s The Truffle Hunters (2020), Neumann’s approach is more free-wheeling and eccentric. Interviews with a wide host of fungi lovers – who include scientists, culinary specialists and devoted enthusiasts – delve into the generative power of mushrooms with vigour and optimism. Considering that the cultivation of fungal cultures has allowed us to ease our physical ailments...

West Side Story‘s Steven Spielberg, The Power of the Dog‘s Jane Campion, Dune‘s Denis Villeneuve, Licorice Pizza‘s Paul Thomas Anderson and Kenneth Branagh of Belfast have been nominated for the top feature film prize as the Directors Guild unveiled nominations Thursday for its 74th annual DGA Awards.

Winners will be announced March 12 during a planned in-person ceremony at the Beverly Hilton.

The guild, a strong predictor of Oscar success historically, missing the eventual Best Director winner only eight times in 73 years, also handed out noms for its First-Time Feature Film category. Nominees there include Lin-Manuel Miranda for Tick, Tick…Boom!, Maggie Gyllenhaal for The Lost Daughter, Rebecca Hall for Passing, Michael Sarnoski for Pig, Emma Seligman for Shiva Baby and Tatiana Huezo for Mexico’s Oscar International Feature-shortlisted Prayers for the Stolen.

Last year, the guild awarded Chloé Zhao its top film prize for Nomadland, which...

Feature and first-time feature nominees to be announced on Thursday.

Ascension, Attica, Exterminate All The Brutes, Summer Of Soul and The Rescue have been nominated in the Directors Guild of America documentary category announced on Wednesday (26).

Jessica Kingdon is in the running for Ascension, Stanley Nelson for Attica, Raoul Peck for Exterminate All The Brutes, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson for Summer Of Soul, and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin for The Rescue.

The Guild also unveiled nominees in a number of TV categories. Feature and first-time feature nominees will be announced on Thursday and the winners will be unveiled at...

The BBC’s Storyville strand, which sets out to showcase the world’s best international documentaries, has picked up a new slate of eight films.

They will be screened on BBC Four and iPlayer over eight weeks starting Jan. 26.

“We’re excited to offer U.K. audiences this eclectic range of documentaries from around the globe,” Philippa Kowarsky, commissioning editor of Storyville, said in a statement.

“These stories deal with the issues of our times, from mistrust of political systems to the challenges of educational attainment, and from class and racial discrimination to the fight for women’s rights. They shine a light on some truly inspirational, and some controversial, characters, as well as some appealing canines!”

Check out the full slate below:

“Final Account” [Pictured above]

About the last living generation of everyday people to participate in the Third Reich

Filmed and Directed by Luke Holland

Produced by John Battsek, Luke Holland,...

Anonymous Content has enlisted Nicholas Shumaker, a longtime producer and former talent agent at UTA, and Kimberly Carver, a veteran manager and TV producer, to join the company’s literary department. Both will work as managers and producers.

Anonymous Content CEO, Dawn Olmstead, said: “Kimberly and Nick have such an incredible passion and commitment to finding creators and artists that not only have authentic voices but that also are the meaningful voices of the future.”

Olmstead said both executives have “tremendous reputations in the entertainment industry, on a global scale,” and that “their fierce dedication to elevating their clients through authentic opportunities is both admirable and unshakeable.”

Shumaker spent the last six years at the UTA Independent Film Group working out of their New York office. During his tenure, Shumaker worked on packaging, financing, and the sales for a variety of international director-driven titles, including the Oscar-winning film “Call Me By Your Name,...

Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

China Lost and Found: Eight Films by Jia Zhangke

One of the greatest directors to emerge in this young century, Jia Zhangke has captured his native country like few others. The Criterion Channel is now spotlighting his stellar body of work, including the new restoration of his debut Xiao Wu (1997), along with Platform (2000), Unknown Pleasures (2002), The World (2004), Still Life (2006), 24 City (2008), A Touch of Sin (2013), and Mountains May Depart (2015). Also playing is the documentary Jia Zhangke, A Guy from Fenyang from 2014.

Where to Stream: The Criterion Channel

Irma Vep (Olivier Assayas)

In the quarter-century since its debut, Olivier Assayas’ hilarious, mischievous, altogether unclassifiable Irma Vep stands merrily uninterested in many things contemporary movies are meant to be interested in—not ultra-sophisticated narrative gimmickry...

Members of an all-girl robotics team from Afghanistan, the majority of whom narrowly fled the country following the Taliban’s brutal takeover of power, are the subjects of a new feature documentary depicting the group’s rise to become national heroes, Variety can reveal.

Directed by David Greenwald and produced by Beth Murphy, “Afghan Dreamers” — named after the original team of six girls — is in post-production, though currently on hold as the pair frantically works to ensure the young women and their families are safe and secure after escaping the Taliban.

Variety can confirm that most of the girls are now in Mexico, while one remains in Doha, Qatar.

“On the way from Herat to Kabul, we were very scared,” reads a tense message from one member of the team, shared with Variety, as she sought to escape. “Every hour, the Taliban would enter the car and check the inside of the car.

This touching film about the truffle hunters of Piedmont offers a glimpse into a timeless, secretive way of life – and the deep companionship at its core

“Teaching the audience to see again.” That’s how co-director Michael Dweck has described his award-winning documentary The Truffle Hunters – and it’s a description that fits. Set amid the hilly woodlands of the Piedmont region of Italy, this entrancingly low-key affair (whose numerous executive producers include Call Me By Your Name director Luca Guadagnino) leads us into a secretive world far removed from the globalised bustle of modern technology. Here, we meet a disparate group of men whose closest relationships seem to be with their dogs as they search for the rare and tasty white truffles that embody their disappearing way of life.

The tone is set by a lengthy opening long-shot – a slow zoom into rich green and yellow foliage amid which...