An unusually large number of awards will be presented, nine awards in all, at the closing festivities in Prague's Lucerna cinema on 12 March. Eight of them were decided by the festival jury and the ninth is based on audience voting. In addition to awards for best film and best director, the Grand Jury this year decided to grant two Special Mentions.
From 3 March 3 to 9 March, 26,170 people attended the film screenings, on a par with the 2013 festival which saw a 25% increase.
Twelve film competed in the main competition. The Grand Jury awarded the Best Film Award to Judgment in Hungary directed by Eszter Hajdú (Hungary).The director and the film producer Sándor Mester presented their film personally at the One World festival. “Set in a claustrophobic court-room, as 4 neo-Nazis stand trial for murder, this film bears witness to a riveting, and striking examination of an entire society. Small details are revealed through cinema vérité: the judge’s treatment of witnesses and survivors from the Romany community; the relationship between prison guards and the accused, subtle smiles of the lawyers, and the empty seats of courtroom,” the jury said in a statement.
The Best Director Award is presented to Forest of the Dancing Spirits directed by Linda Västrik (Sweden, Canada).
The Grand Jury decided to grant two Special Mentions:
The Blocher Experience directed by Jean-Stéphane Bron (Switzerland, France) and Stop-Over directed by Kaveh Bakhtiari (France).
The Václav Havel Jury is awarding the prize to a film that makes an exceptional contribution to the defense of human rights. They also decided to award a Special Mention. The jury was selecting from 12 documentaries featured in the Right to Know category.
The Award for a documentary that made an exceptional contribution to the defense of human rights goes to Miners Shot Down directed by Rehad Desai (South Africa).
“Using testimonies, live and archive footage of the tragic unfolding events the filmmaker tells the story through powerful images of miners' protest and the police response. The film manages to operate on a number of levels: it tells the tale of both individual struggle and tragedy, but also of the reality of life in the Rainbow nation, nearly 20 years after the end of apartheid, where old racial divisions are replaced or translated into dividing lines between rich and poor. The filmmaker leaves no stone unturned in documenting the existence of slavery and rampant capitalism which is corrupting the states' elites and undermining basic right,” the jury said in its statement.
The Special Mention is presented to No Fire Zone: The Killing Fields of Sri Lanka directed by Callum Macrae (Great Britain).
The Czech Radio Jury awards the innovative use of music and sound in the documentaries to Forest of the Dancing Spirits directed by Linda Västrik (Sweden, Canada).
Student Jury prize for a school film goes to Viva Cuba Libre: Rap is War directed by Jesse Acevedo (Cuba, USA).
The festival also hosted the East Doc Platform with a presentation of eight projects to the public, including seven projects in the new Doc Tank project of cross-media projects.
