‘Minding The Gap’ Wins Three IDA Documentary Awards
Rookie filmmaker Bing Liu’s “Minding The Gap” beat out the competition to win top honors at the 34th Annual IDA Documentary Awards at the Paramount Theatre on Saturday night. The portrait of a group of skateboarders took home Best Feature, Emerging Filmmaker and Best Editing. Liu had accepted a Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Filmmaking at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, where the POV film was acquired by Hulu.
Other winners include Floyd Russ’s “Zion” (Best Short), Netflix’s “Wild Wild Country” (Best Limited Series), HBO’s “John McCain: For Whom the Bell Tolls” (the ABC News VideoSource Award), PBS’ POV (Best Curated Series), Showtime’s “The Trade” (Best Episodic Series), MEL Films (Best Short Form Series), and Jayisha Patel’s “Circle” (the David L. Wolper Student Documentary Award). Both Melissa Haizlip’s “Mr. SOUL!” and Steve Loveridge’s “MATANGI / MAYA / M.I.A.” won Best Music Documentary, while “Bisbee ’17” and “Hale County This Morning This Evening” were each awarded Best Music Score. The New York Times’ “Caliphate” won the inaugural Best Audio Documentary category.
The Career Achievement Award went to Julia Reichert, a three-time Academy-Award nominee and co-founder of New Day Films. The IDA’s coveted Courage Under Fire Award was presented by cinematographer-director Kirsten Johnson to director Stephen Maing and all the NYPD 12 whistleblowers of “Crime + Punishment,” several of whom were on hand.
Filmmaker Dawn Porter presented the Amicus Award to Chicken & Egg Pictures, which was founded in 2005 by Julie Parker-Benello, Judith Helfand, and Wendy Ettinger, and led by Executive Director Jenni Wolfson since 2013. The award recognized the organization for providing millions in grants and thousands of hours of creative mentorship to over 300 women filmmakers.
The complete list of winners is below:
2018 IDA Documentary Awards Best Feature Winner
“Minding the Gap” (Hulu/POV. Director/Producer: Bing Liu. Producer: Diane Quon)
2018 IDA Documentary Awards Best Short Winner
“Zion” (Netflix. Director/Producer: Floyd Russ. Producer: Carter Collins)
2018 IDA Documentary Awards Series Winners
Best Curated Series Winner
POV (POV/American Documentary. Executive Producers: Justine Nagan and Chris White)
Best Episodic Series Winner
“The Trade” (Showtime. Executive Producers: Matthew Heineman and Pagan Harleman)
Best Limited Series Winner
“Wild Wild Country” (Netflix. Directors: Chapman Way and Maclain Way. Producer: Juliana Lembi. Executive Producers: Mark Duplass, Jay Duplass, Josh Braun and Dan Braun)
Best Short Form Series Winner
MEL Films (Executive Producer: David Freid)
Best Music Documentary Winners
“MATANGI / MAYA / M.I.A.” (Abramorama. Director/Producer: Steve Loveridge. Producers: Lori Cheatle, Paul Mezey and Andrew Goldman)
“Mr. SOUL!” (Director/Producer: Melissa Haizlip. Co-Director: Samuel D. Pollard)
Best Audio Documentary Winner
“Caliphate” (The New York Times. Reporters: Rukmini Callimachi and Andy Mills. Producers: Andy Mills, Larissa Anderson, Wendy Dorr, and Asthaa Chaturvedi)
Creative Recognition Awards
Best Cinematography
“Distant Constellation” (Cinephil. Cinematographer: Shevaun Mizrahi)
Best Editing
“Minding the Gap” (Hulu. Editors: Bing Liu and Joshua Altman)
Best Writing
“The Other Side of Everything” (Writer: Mila Turajlić)
Best Music Score
“Bisbee ’17” (Composer: Keegan DeWitt)
“Hale County This Morning, This Evening” (Cinema Guild. Composers: Scott Alario, Forest Kelley, and Alex Somers)
2018 IDA Documentary Awards Sponsored Special Awards
ABC News VideoSource Award
“John McCain: For Whom the Bell Tolls” (HBO. Directors/Producers: Peter Kunhardt, George Kunhardt, and Teddy Kunhardt)
Pare Lorentz Award
“The Silence of Others” (Cinephil/POV. Directors/Producers: Almudena Carracedo and Robert Bahar)
Honorable Mention: “The Distant Barking of Dogs” (Cinephil. Director: Simon Lereng Wilmont. Producer: Monica Hellstrøm)
David L. Wolper Student Documentary Award
“Circle” (National Film and Television School. Director: Jayisha Patel)
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