DURHAM -- The Full Frame Documentary Film Festival handed out its awards Sunday, ending four days of screenings and gatherings with a somewhat subdued ceremony as organizers acknowledged the deaths from Saturday's storms and tornadoes.
The investigative documentary "Scenes of a Crime" took the day's top honor, the Anne Dellinger Grand Jury Award. Concerning a New York infanticide case and an apparently coerced confession, the film took top honors for its "clear-eyed depiction of a stunning miscarriage of justice," said juror Amir Bar-Lev in presenting the award.
"There are a lot of fragile points in our legal system," said Grover Babcock, who shared the award with directing partner Blue Hadaegh. "We hope we've provided a perspective here on one of them."
This year's Full Frame Audience Award went to the film "Buck," the story of famed horse whisperer Buck Brannaman. Editor Toby Shimin accepted the award of behalf of director Cindy Meehl.
"I have to say this is absolutely my favorite film festival," Shimin said. "I also want to note that even though this is a film about a cowboy, aside from the camera and sound work, it was all made by women."
Local filmmaker Rodrigo Dorfman won the Full Frame Jury Award for Best Short, for his jazz-themed "One Night in Kernersville." The film profiles local jazz bassist John Brown and fellow musicians during an evening of recording in Kernersville.
After the awards ceremony, Dorfman and Brown stood side by side receiving a long line of local well-wishers. "It's surreal," Brown said, who had previously performed at Full Frame as a musician. "It's really an honor. I did not see this coming."
Director Dorfman, who has been attending the festival from its first year, appreciated the warm welcome from his hometown crowd. "This is a real filmmaker's festival," Dorfman said. "It's not about selling your film. It's about showing your film and sharing your film."
Among the festival's other winners, "How To Die in Oregon" - concerning physician-assisted suicide - won both the Duke Center For Documentary Studies Filmmaker Award and The Kathleen Bryan Edwards Award for Human Rights.
Mines near and far
The Ukrainian film "Pit No. 8," about child coal miners in Ukraine, won The Charles E. Guggenheim Emerging Artist Award and The Nicholas School of the Environment Award.
Special jury and honorable mention awards went to "The Interrupters," about Chicago gang violence, and "The Last Mountain," which chronicles environmentally devastating "mountaintop removal" mining in West Virginia.
Juror Clay Farland, in presenting the award to "The Last Mountain," said that North Carolina is the No. 1 consumer of mountaintop removal coal in the United States.
"And we want to note that Duke Energy has just announced that they are moving away from using mountaintop removal coal," Farland said
The Full Frame President's Award, for student filmmaking, was presented to Scottish director Jane McAllister for her profile of a Glasgow church, "Caretaker for the Lord."
Surveying the diverse list of winners after the event, "Scenes of a Crime" director Babcock reflected on the nature of the Full Frame festival.
"It's a big bet on the sophistication of an audience to program a festival of just documentaries," Babcock said. "And it pays off big time. People show up for this festival."
