‘Flee’ wins International Documentary Association (IDA) award for Best Feature

The riveting, animated LGBTQ refugee film Flee, from director Jonas Poher Rasmussen, won the top prize from the International Documentary Association (IDA). The film won Best Feature and is Oscar-nominated for the Documentary Feature Oscar. The film made Oscar history by also being nominated for Animated Feature and International Feature Film.

Leading with the most wins was Summer of Soul, which took home the Best Director prize for Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, Best Music Documentary and Best Editing. Summer of Soul is also Oscar-nominated for Documentary Feature.

Special awards were given to Roger Ross Williams (Career Achievement Award), Ronan Farrow (Truth to Power Award), Cecilia Aldarondo (Emerging Documentary Filmmaker Award), Jean Tsien (Pioneer Award) and Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghost (Courage Under Fire Award).

Here is the complete list of winners.

Best Feature

Flee (Denmark, France, Norway / NEON, Participant. Director: Jonas Poher Rasmussen. Producers: Monica Hellstrӧm,Signe Byrge Sørensen, Charlotte De La Gournerie)

Best Director

Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson — Summer of Soul (USA / Hulu, Searchlight Pictures/Onyx Collective)

Best Short

A Broken House (USA, Lebanon / Condé Nast Entertainment, The New Yorker, POV. Director/Producer: Jimmy Goldblum. Producer: Matt Weaver, former Representative Richard Gephardt and Harrison Nalevansky)

Best Curated Series

Independent Lens (USA / Independent Lens, PBS. Executive Producers: Lois Vossen, Sally Jo Fifer)

Best Episodic Series

My Love: Six Stories of True Love (USA / Netflix. Executive Producer: Mo-young Jin, Andrew Fried, Dane Lillegard and Jordan Wynn)

Best Multi-Part Documentary

Exterminate All the Brutes (USA, France / HBO, HBO Max. Director/Executive Producer: Raoul Peck. Producers: Daniel Delume. Executive Producers: Rémi Grellety, Nancy Abraham, Lisa Heller, Jamie Morris, Jack Oliver and Poppy Dixon)

Best Short-Form Series

Viral Dreams (Germany, Israel / ZDF Arte. Producer: Georg Tschurtschenthaler. Executive Producers: Christian Beetz)

Best Standalone Audio Documentary

VICE News Reports: Monaea, A 2020 Diary (USA / VICE News, iHeartRadio. Reporters: Monaea Upton and Jen Kinney. Producers: Jen Kinne, Ashley Cleek, Adizah Eghan and Adreanna Rodriguez. Executive Producer: Kate Osborn)

Best Multi-Part Audio Documentary or Series

Suave (USA / Futuro Studios, PRX. Reporters: Maggie Freleng and Julieta Martinelli. Producers: Maria Hinojosa, Maggie Freleng, Julieta Martinelli, Marlon Bishop, Audrey Quinn and Stephanie Lubow. Executive Producer: Maria Hinojosa)

Best Music Documentary

Summer of Soul (USA / Hulu, Searchlight Pictures/Onyx Collective. Director: Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson. Producers: Joseph Patel, Robert Fyvolent, David Dinerstein)

David L. Wolper Student Documentary Award

Seahorse (Germany / Film Academy Baden-Württemberg. Director/Producer: Nele Dehnenkamp. Producer: Christine Duttlinger)

Best Cinematography

Faya Dayi (Ethiopia, USA, Qatar / Janus Films. Cinematographer: Jessica Beshir)

Best Editing

Summer of Soul (USA / Hulu, Searchlight Pictures/Onyx Collective. Editor: Joshua L. Pearson)

Best Music Score

Eyes on the Prize: Hallowed Ground (USA / HBO Max. Composer: Roman GianArthur)

Best Writing 

North by Current (USA / POV, PBS. Writer: Angelo Madsen Minax)

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Critics Choice Association (CCA), San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle (SFBAFCC) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.

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