The 2024 CPH:DOX prizes were handed out March 22 during the festival’s closing ceremony. Besides the main prize Dox:Award, prizes have been awarded in the categories F:ACT, NORDIC:DOX, NEW:VISION and NEXT:WAVE as well as the brand new Audience, Human Rights and INTER:ACTIVE Awards.
DOX:AWARD
The main prize went to the “witty, multi-layered, profound and provocative” The Flats by Alessandra Celesia(France/UK/Ireland/Belgium), together with a cash prize of €10,000 sponsored by DR.
On their motivation for choosing The Flats, the jury said: “Our main award recognises not only creative and conceptual daring, but a filmmaker with the humility to realise when the story outgrows its framework, and the confidence to follow where it, and its fantastically vivid characters lead. We live in a world of divisions, borders and locked gates. Coming like a conversation shouted through one of those locked gates, our winning film is a collective portrait of several proud, funny, resourceful individuals, who would be willing to die for their community but who choose each day the harder, braver and more hopeful option of living for it instead.’’
A Special Mention went to Two Strangers Trying Not to Kill Each Other by Jacob Perlmutter & Manon Ouimet (UK, DK & USA).
F:ACT AWARD
The award was won by to Black Snow by Alina Simone (US). The award comes with a cash prize of €5,000 and is supported by International Media Support and the Danish Journalist Union.
On their motivation for choosing ‘Black Snow’, the jury said: “In a world where a government is commiting environmental crimes against its citizens in the most corrupt cynical way, where communities are brutality neglected, an extraordinary courageous woman fights for justice against giant forces, where her life is at stake. She continues to imagine a society that puts people before profit, while being threatened by the totalitarian system. We were inspired by her strength and commitment for humanity. The director’s sensitivity for the protagonist’s safety and the intimate relationship they created greatly impressed us.’’
NORDIC:DOX AWARD
The €5,000 award was won by The Son and the Moon by Roja Pakari (DK).
The jury said: “With powerful cinematic language this film chronicles the fleeting nature of life while celebrating how fragments of memory make a lifetime. An emotional experience that transfers the filmmaker’s legacy onto the audience.”
A Special Mention went to G – 21 scenes from Gottsunda by Loran Batti (DK).
NEW:VISION AWARD
15 titles, both feature and short length, were in competition for the NEW:VISION Award delving into art films and boundary-pushing experiments. A €5,000 cash prize provided by the festival was handed out to Preemptive Listening by Aura Satz (UK/FI).
The jury said: “Elevating us into sensory abstraction, this film also takes us down into the underbelly of disorder and chaos, as well as the destruction and violence unleashed by human desires for order and certainty. An elegy for a listening lost, an awakening call for the siren inside each one of us. Artistically sophisticated yet socio-politically grounded, the New:Vision Award goes to Preemptive Listening, by Aura Satz.”
A Special Mention went to Lichens Are the Way by Ondřej Vavrečka (CZ / SK) and My Want of You Partakes of Me by Sasha Litvintseva & Beny Wagner (UK/NL).
NEXT:WAVE AWARD
The NEXT:WAVE award, which comes with a cash prize of €5,000 provided by the festival, was won by Grand Me by Atiye Zare Arandi (BE/IR).
On their motivation for choosing Grand Me, the jury said: “The film we chose to award skilfully materialises the in-between and uncertain space of an ongoing custody battle in which the nine year old Melina is caught between her parents and the consequent disillusioning confrontation with the real, as well as the chasm between the separate realities of Melina, her mother, and her grandparents. The film finds its merit in this intersection, drawing attention to questions of motherhood, transformation, and the notion of belonging, indirectly interrogating the unequal position and rights of women in contemporary Iranian society. The film is ultimately a testament to the resilience of Melina and her grandparents, but also to the inherent imperfection and shortcomings of what it is to be human.”
A Special Mention was given to G – 21 scenes from Gottsunda by Loran Batti (SE/DK).
HUMAN:RIGHTS AWARD
Sponsored by the Institute for Human Rights and valued at €5,000, the award went to Black Box Diaries by Shiori Ito (JP, US & UK).
The jury citation reads: “An extraordinary woman takes control of her narrative in a film that offers unique insight into an individual fight for womens’ rights in a country, and a world, that stigmatizes and denies rights to the survivors of sexual assault. We are honoured to present the HUMAN:RIGHTS Award to ‘Black Box Diaries’ directed by Shiori Ito.”
A Special Mention went to Marching in the Dark by Kinshuk Surjan (BE/NL/IN).
AUDIENCE AWARD
The Audience Award, with a prize of €5,000 provided by the festival, empowers festival-goers to vote for their favorite film, further enriching CPH:DOX’s commitment to engaging its audience across a spectrum of documentary filmmaking excellence.
The award went to No Other Land by Yuval Abraham, Basel Adra, Rachel Szor and Hamdan Ballal.
INTER:ACTIVE AWARD
17 pieces from VR and mixed reality to AI chatbots were in competition for a brand new award for the best immersive work. The winner received a winning package including two complimentary industry accreditations for Sunny Side of the Doc, two full access accreditations for the Industry Days of New Images Festival, 6 hours of legal consultation on European IP law and a cash prize of €1000. The award was handed to Intangible by Carl Emil Carlsen (DK).
On their motivation for choosing ‘Intangible’, the jury said: “This was not an easy decision for the jury. So many inspiring diverse works made using different mediums. There is one piece, though, that we believe fulfills all the provided criteria more than the rest. The criterias were Artistic Quality, Originality, Imagination, Intellectual quality and Stickiness.
The winner is…. an immersive experience that is a playful, physically convincing and instantly satisfying experience that challenges the expression of contemporary art and left the jury wanting to come back for more.
Overall, the fidelity of this piece is second to none. Normally you cannot touch a sculpture but here you are part of interacting with it and drawn into it. It has a natural adaption of the sound design created by Anna Fišere for the piece, and is a beginning of a new chapter of the future of art. Is it storytelling? Not in a traditional sense, but we like it’s none narrative but reminding us that technology can be organic in its nature. Intuitive, simple, yet powerful.”
