‘Sugarcane,’ ‘Soundtrack to A Coup d’Etat’ Lead 40th IDA Documentary Awards Nominations

Sugarcane earned a leading five nominations as the IDA Documentary Awards announced its nominees today, followed closely by Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat with four.

Black Box Diaries, My Sweet Land, and Queendom earned three nominations apiece. Also earning multiple nominations were Agent of Happiness, No Other Land, Seeking Mavis Beacon, and The Remarkable Life of Ibelin, each with two.

Recently, Cinema Eye Honors announced their documentary nominations where Sugarcane also led the field. The Sundance Film Festival-winning doc was the top nomination getter from the Critic Choice Documentary Awards, winning two, but losing the top bid to Super/Man: The Christoper Reeve Story and Will & Harper in a tie.

The IDA also announced that actor-comedian Adam Conover will host the IDA Documentary Awards, which will take place December 5 at the Orpheum Theater in downtown Los Angeles. The show will stream live on documentary.org and simultaneously on IDA YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram channels.

The IDA previously announced that filmmaker Dawn Porter will receive the Career Achievement Award; Shiori Ito (Black Box Diaries) will receive the Emerging Filmmaker Award; and the four directors of No Other Land, Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Rachel Szor, Yuval Abraham will be presented with the Courage Under Fire Award.

“IDA received 700+ entries in all categories from 77 countries, an increase over last year both in the total number of entries and the countries represented,” the group said. “IDA Documentary Awards entries were reviewed by blue-ribbon jurors consisting of 300 documentary professionals from 40+ countries.

Here is the complete list of nominations for the 40th International Documentary Association awards.

Best Feature Documentary

Agent of Happiness
Black Box Diaries
Dahomey
Ernest Cole: Lost and Found
No Other Land
Queendom
The Remarkable Life of Ibelin
Seeking Mavis Beacon
Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat
Sugarcane

Best Short Documentary

Amma ki Katha
Enchunkunoto (The Return)
Instruments of a Beating Heart
The Medallion
A Move
A Movement Against the Transparency of the Stars of the Seas
Modern Goose
Nine Easy Dances
The Poem We Sang
Until He’s Back

Best Director

Shiori Ito, Black Box Diaries
Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Rachel Szor & Yuval Abraham, No Other Land
Agniia Galdanova, Queendom
Johan Grimonprez, Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat
Julian Brave NoiseCat, Emily Kassie, Sugarcane

Best Cinematography

Arun Bhattarai, Agent of Happiness
Alix Blair, Helen and the Bear
Sareen Hairabedian, My Sweet Land
Ruslan Fedotov, Queendom
Christopher LaMarca and Emily Kassie, Sugarcane

Best Editing

Ema Ryan Yamazaki, Black Box Diaries
Katrina Taylor, Helen and the Bear
Raphaelle Martin-Holger and Sareen Hairabedian, My Sweet Land
Rik Chaubet, Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat
Nathan Punwar and Maya Daisy Hawke, Sugarcane

Best Original Music Score

Víctor Hernández Stumpfhauser, Frida
Maxwell Sterling, Life and Other Problems
Tigran Hamasyan, My Sweet Land
Uno Helmersson, The Remarkable Life of Ibelin
Mali Obomsawin, Sugarcane

Best Writing

Raoul Peck, Ernest Cole, Ernest Cole: Lost & Found
Hasan Oswald, Mediha
Lea Glob and Andreas Bøggild Monies, Piece by Piece
Morgan Neville, Jason Zeldes, Aaron Wickenden, & Oscar Vasquez, Piece by Piece
Jazmin Jones, Seeking Mavis Beacon
Johan Grimonprez, Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat

Best TV Feature Documentary

The Apartheid Killer
Madu
Night Is Not Eternal
Stolen Gold
Two American Families: 1991-2024

Best Curated Series

30 for 30
99 – We all share 99% of the same DNA
Independent Lens
The New York Times Op-Docs
POV

Best Episodic Series

Couples Therapy
The Negotiators
Queens
A Real Bug’s Life
We’re Here

Best Limited Series

Choir
Hitler and the Nazis: Evil on Trial
Murder in Boston: Roots, Rampage & Reckoning
STAX: Soulsville U.S.A.
A Town Called Victoria

Best Music Documentary

Any Other Way: The Jackie Shane Story
Beatles 64
Maestra
Omar & Cedric: If This Ever Gets Weird
Songs from the Hole

Best Audio Documentary

Long Shadow: In Guns We Trust
Pack One Bag
Shadowball: Rise of the Black Athlete
The Sunday Story: A Song for Grief in China
“What’s Up, Michael Freeman?”

David L. Wolper Student Documentary

The Anarchist and the Fridge
Her Name Was Zehava
Jerhy
Milk
The Waiter, the Scientist and Jenny

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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.

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