16th Cinema Eye Honors (CEH) documentary awards: ‘All That Breathes,’ takes top prize; ‘Fire of Love’ wins three

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Cinema Eye Honors, the organization founded in 2007 to celebrate outstanding artistry and craft in nonfiction filmmaking, spread the wealth their winners its 16th Annual Awards ceremony this evening, where Shaunak Sen’s Cannes-winning feature, All That Breathes, which follows two brothers who run a bird hospital dedicated to rescuing injured black kites, won the top prize of the night, Outstanding Nonfiction Feature, along with Outstanding Cinematography.

Sara Dosa’s Fire of Love, about intrepid husband-and-wife volcanologists Katia and Maurice Krafft and led all films with seven nominations, won three awards: Outstanding Editing, Score and Visual Design (in a tie with Moonage Dream). The score was composed by Nicolas Godin of French electronic music duo Air.

Alex Pritz’s The Territory, the other nomination leader, earned a single win from its seven, for Debut Feature. Laura Poitras’ All the Beauty and the Bloodshed, winner of the Golden Lion at Venice, won Best Direction. This was Poitras’ third nomination and third win. She previously won the award for both The Oath (2010) and Citizenfour (2014). She is the only individual to have won the Directing award more than once.

Another top winner was Daniel Roher’s Navalny, a nonfiction film that follows the Russian opposition leader and former presidential candidate Alexei Navalny in real time as he recovers from an assassination attempt. Navalny‘s producing team won the Outstanding Achievement in Production award, and the film also took home the Audience Choice Prize, an award voted on by documentary fans around the world. This year, for the first time, voters from the general public selected this year’s Audience Choice Prize nominees from a 16-film Long List by Cinema Eye’s nominations committee, and they then voted for the winner. More than 50,000 votes were cast to determine this year’s award recipient.

In Broadcast Honors, a notable win came in the Outstanding Anthology Series category. How To with John Wilson (Season Two) won the award. It previously won the Broadcast Editing award at last year’s ceremony, marking the second consecutive win for the Cinema Eye-nominated series.

This year’s ceremony opened with an emotional tribute to documentary pioneer Julia Reichert, a Cinema Eye winner and godmother of American independent documentary, Reichert died in December. Her husband and filmmaking partner, Steven Bognar, talked about Julia’s passion for her beloved documentary community.

Whitney Museum Curator Chrissie Iles announced this year’s Legacy Award, which was given to Terry Zwigoff for Crumb, his 1994 landmark portrait of artist Robert Crumb. Zwigoff thanked his team and the documentary filmmakers in attendance in video remarks from San Francisco. Zwigoff will be presented the Legacy Award trophy in Los Angeles at a screening of Crumb at Vidiot Foundation’s newly-reopened Eagle Theatre later this year.

Brandy Burre, the centerpiece of Robert Greene’s previously nominated film Actress, spoke of the challenge many in the nonfiction filmmaking community are having in determining the role and title of those who are in front of the documentary camera. She also introduced videos celebrating this year’s Unforgettables, Cinema Eye’s category recognizing documentary subject/collaborators who have been particularly memorable this year.

In remarks later in the evening, Cinema Eye Founding Director AJ Schnack noted the continued imprisonment of filmmaker and Cinema Eye winner Jafar Panahi and encouraged those in attendance to be vigilant to attacks on filmmakers and journalists.

All That Breathes, Fire of Love, All the Beauty and the Bloodshed, Moonage Daydream and Navalny are all on the Documentary Feature shortlist for the upcoming Academy Awards. Also shortlisted is Alex Pritz’s The Territory, which won the Award for Debut Feature. Nuisance Bear won for Outstanding Nonfiction Short and is also on the Academy shortlist in that category.

Last year, Flee won Outstanding Nonfiction Feature at the CEH awards and went on to an Oscar nomination for Documentary Feature. Summer of Soul won the CEH award for editing and then won the Documentary Feature Oscar.

Here is the complete list of winners.

Outstanding Nonfiction Feature

• All That Breathes (Directed and Produced by Shaunak Sen, Produced by Aman Mann and Teddy Leifer) – WINNER
• All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Directed and Produced by Laura Poitras, Produced by Howard Gertler, John Lyons, Nan Goldin and Yoni Golijov)
• Fire of Love (Directed and Produced by Sara Dosa, Produced by Shane Boris and Ina Fichman)
• Navalny (Directed by Daniel Roher, Produced by Odessa Rae, Diane Becker, Melanie Miller and Shane Boris)
• A Night of Knowing Nothing (Directed by Payal Kapadia, Produced by Thomas Hakim, Julien Graff and Ranabir Das)
• The Territory (Directed and Produced by Alex Pritz, Produced by Darren Aronofsky, Gabriel Uchida, Sigrid Dyekjær, Lizzie Gillett and Will N. Miller)

Outstanding Direction

• All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen)
• All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Laura Poitras) – WINNER
• Beba (Rebeca Huntt)
• Descendant (Margaret Brown)
• Fire of Love (Sara Dosa)
• A Night of Knowing Nothing (Payal Kapadia)

Outstanding Editing

• All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Amy Foote, Joe Bini and Brian A. Kates)
• Fire of Love (Erin Casper and Jocelyne Chaput) – WINNER
• Moonage Daydream (Brett Morgen)
• Riotsville, USA (Nels Bangerter)
• Three Minutes: A Lengthening (Katharina Wartena)

Outstanding Production

• All That Breathes (Aman Mann, Shaunak Sen and Teddy Leifer)
• A House Made of Splinters (Monica Hellström)
• In Her Hands (Juan Camilo Cruz and Jonathan Schaerf)
• Navalny (Odessa Rae, Diane Becker, Melanie Miller and Shane Boris) – WINNER
• The Territory (Alex Pritz, Darren Aronofsky, Gabriel Uchida, Sigrid Dyekjær, Lizzie Gillett and Will N. Miller)

Outstanding Cinematography

• All That Breathes (Ben Bernhard) – WINNER
• Cow (Magda Kowalczyk)
• A House Made of Splinters (Simon Lereng Wilmont)
• A Night of Knowing Nothing (Ranabir Das)
• The Territory (Alex Pritz and Tangãi Uru-eu-wau-wau)
• Users (Bennett Cerf)

Outstanding Original Score

• All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Soundwalk Collective)
• Descendant (Ray Angry and Rhiannon Giddens/Dirk Powell)
• Fire of Love (Nicolas Godin) – WINNER
• Nothing Compares (Linda Buckley and Irene Buckley)
• The Territory (Katya Mihailova)
• Users (Dave Cerf)

Outstanding Sound Design

• All That Breathes (Niladri Shekhar Roy, Sound Designer, and Susmit “Bob” Nath, Sound Design Consultant)
• Fire of Love (Patrice LeBlanc, Sound Designer, and Gavin Fernandes, Re-recording Mixer)
• I Didn’t See You There (Tom Paul, Lead Sound Designer & Re-recording Mixer, and Andrés E. Marthe González, Supervising Sound Editor)
• Moonage Daydream (Samir Foco, John Warhurst and Nina Hartstone, Sound Designers) – WINNER
• The Territory (Rune Klausen and Peter Albrechtsen, Sound Designers)

Outstanding Visual Design (tie)

• Dear Mr. Brody (Gary Walker, Visual Effects; John Mark Lapham, Collages; Sam Klatt, Graphics & Compositing)
• Fire of Love (Lucy Munger, Animation; Kara Blake, Graphic Artist; and Rui Ting Ji, Hand-drawn animation & Illustrations) – WINNER
• Louis Armstrong’s Black & Blues (Hectah Arias, Animation and Graphics)
• Moonage Daydream (Stefan Nadelman, Animation) – WINNER
• My Old School (Rory Lowe, Animation Director, and Scott Morriss, Lead Animator)

Outstanding Debut

• Bad Axe (Directed by David Siev)
• Beba (Directed by Rebeca Huntt)
• I Didn’t See You There (Directed by Reid Davenport)
• A Night of Knowing Nothing (Directed by Payal Kapadia)
• Nothing Compares (Directed by Kathryn Ferguson)
• The Territory (Directed by Alex Pritz) – WINNER

Outstanding Nonfiction Short

• In Flow of Words (Directed by Eliane Esther Bots)
• Last Days of August (Directed by Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck and Robert Machoian)
• Long Line of Ladies (Directed by Rayka Zehtabchi and Shaandiin Tome)
• The Martha Mitchell Effect (Directed by Anne Alvergue and Debra McClutchy)
• Nuisance Bear (Directed by Jack Weisman and Gabriela Osio Vanden) – WINNER
• Shut Up and Paint (Directed by Alex Mallis and Titus Kaphar)

Audience Choice Prize

• All That Breathes (Directed by Shaunak Sen)
• The Balcony Movie (Directed by Paweł Łoziński)
• Fire of Love (Directed a by Sara Dosa)
• Last Flight Home (Directed by Ondi Timoner)
• Mija (Directed by Isabel Castro)
• My Old School (Directed by Jono McLeod)
• Navalny (Directed by Daniel Roher) – WINNER
• Nothing Compares (Directed by Kathryn Ferguson)
• Sr. (Directed by Chris Smith)
• The Territory (Directed by Alex Pritz)

Spotlight

• After Sherman (Directed by Jon-SesrieGoff)
• Brotherhood (Directed by Francesco Montagner)
• Hidden Letters (Directed by Violet Du Feng and Zhao Qing)
• Into the Ice (Directed by Lars Henrik Ostenfeld)
• Master of Light (Directed by Rosa Ruth Boesten) – WINNER

Heterodox

• Aftersun (Directed by Charlotte Wells) – WINNER
• Dry Ground Burning (Directed by Joana Pimenta and Adirley Queirós)
• Dos Estaciones (Directed by Juan Pablo González)
• Marcel the Shell with Shoes On (Directed by Dean Fleischer-Camp)
• The Rehearsal (Season One) (Directed by Nathan Fielder)

The Unforgettables (Non-Competitive Honor)

• All That Breathes (Mohammad Saud and Nadeem Shehzad
• All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Nan Goldin
• Bad Axe (Chun Siev)
• Beba (Rebeca Huntt)
• Fire of Love (Katia and Maurice Krafft)
• Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down (Gabby Giffords)
• I Didn’t See You There (Reid Davenport)
• In Her Hands (Zarifa Ghafari)
• Last Flight Home (Eli Timoner)
• Mija (Doris Muñoz)
• My Old School (Brandon Lee)
• Navalny (Alexei Navalny)
• Nothing Compares (Sinead O’Connor)
• Sr. (Robert Downey Sr.)
• The Territory (Bitaté Uru-eu-wau-wau and Neidinha Bandeira)

Broadcast Film Nominees

• Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes (Directed by James Jones | HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max) – WINNER
• Downfall: The Case Against Boeing (Directed by Rory Kennedy | Netflix)
• Four Hours at the Capitol (Directed by Jamie Roberts | HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max)
• George Carlin’s American Dream (Directed by Judd Apatow and Michael Bonfiglio | HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max)
• Playing With Sharks (Directed by Sally Aitken | Disney+)

Nonfiction Series Nominees

• The Beatles: Get Back (Directed by Peter Jackson | Disney+)
• Black and Missing (Directed by Geeta Gandbhir and Samantha Knowles | HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max) – WINNER
• Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey (Directed by Rachel Dretzin | Netflix)
• LuLaRich (Directed by Julia Willoughby Nason and Jenner Furst | Amazon Studios)
• Mind Over Murder (Directed by Nanfu Wang | HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max)
• We Need to Talk About Cosby (Directed by W. Kamau Bell | Showtime)

Anthology Series Nominees

• How To with John Wilson (Season Two) (Nathan Fielder, Michael Koman, Clark Reinking and John Wilson, Executive Producers | HBO) – WINNER
• Origins of Hip Hop (Peter Bittenbender, Mark Grande, Slane Hatch; Supervising Producers: Amira Lewally and Phoenix Skye Maulella, Executive Producers | A&E)
• Prehistoric Planet (Jon Favreau and Michael Gunton, Executive Producers; Tim Walker, Series Producer | Apple TV+)
• Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy (Season Two) (Tom Barry, Adam Hawkins, Eve Kay and Stanley Tucci, Executive Producers; Robin O’Sullivan, Series Producer | CNN)
• Women Who Rock (Jessica Hopper, Rachel Brill, John Varvatos, Derik Murray and Jesse James Miller, Executive Producers | EPIX)
• The World According to Jeff Goldblum (Season Two) (Jeff Goldblum, Jane Root, Sara Brailsford, Keith Addis and Arif Nurmohamed, Executive Producers, Ben Jessop, Series Producer | Disney+)

Broadcast Editing Nominees

• 37 Words (Jessica Congdon and Dave Marcus | ESPN)
• The Beatles: Get Back (Jabez Olssen | Disney+)
• Four Hours at the Capitol (Will Grayburn | HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max)
• How to Survive a Pandemic (Adam Evans and Tyler H. Walk | HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max)
• How To with John Wilson (Season Two) (Adam Locke-Norton | HBO)
• We Need to Talk About Cosby (Meg Ramsay | Showtime) – WINNER

Broadcast Cinematography Nominees

• Four Hours at the Capitol (Jamie Roberts | HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max)
• jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy (Coodie Simmons and Danny “DNA” Sorge | Netflix)
• Playing With Sharks (Michael Taylor, Judd Overton, Nathan Barlow and Toby Ralph | Disney+) – WINNER
• Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy (Season Two) (Andrew Muggleton | CNN)
• Tony Hawk: Until the Wheels Come Off (Sam Jones and Jesse Green | HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max)

Legacy Award

Crumb

Directed by Terry Zwigoff

Produced by Lynn O’Donnell and Terry Zwigoff

Edited by Victor Livingston

Cinematography by Maryse Alberti

Music by David Beddinghaus

Sound by Scott Breindell

Shorts List Films

• Anastasia (Directed by Sarah McCarthy)
• The Joys and Sorrows of Young Yuguo (Directed by Ilinca Călugăreanu)
• Keys to the City (Directed by Ian Moubayed)

Audience Choice Long List Films

• Good Night Oppy (Directed by Ryan White)
• Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song (Directed by Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfire
• In Her Hands (Directed by Tamana Ayazi and Marcel Mettelsiefen
• Louis Armstrong’s Black & Blues (Directed by Sacha Jenkins)
• Moonage Daydream (Directed by Brett Morgen)