Despite being faced with serious financial adversity and some torrential downpours, the 15th edition of the Palm Beach International Film Festival ended on Monday in an optimistic spirit of independent film camaraderie as over 70 filmmakers from around the world enjoyed welcoming audiences, shared their experiences and attended fabulous parties. After a week of screenings, the jury votes were tallied to determine the winners for Best Feature Film, Best Documentary and Best Short Film, while audiences voted for their favorite in categories of features, documentaries and shorts.  Jury winners and Audience Choice Awards were announced at the Closing Night Awards Ceremony.

PBIFF AWARD WINNERS 

The Award for Best Feature Film went to Winter’s Bone, directed by Debra Granik, about a 17-year-old girl who must battle the Ozark wilderness and the local criminal underworld in order to track down her father and save her family's home. The film, which won similar top honors at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, will open theatrically later this summer via specialty distributor Roadside Attractions. While its subject matter is decidedly bleak at times, the film’s strong script and acting should attract passionate audiences around the world. A Special Mention went to Eli and Ben, directed by Ori Ravid about twelve-year-old Eli’s world that is turned upside down when his father, the City Architect, is charged with taking bribes.

The Award for Best Documentary Feature went to The Desert of Forbidden Art, directed by Amanda Pope and Tchavdar Georgiev.  Risking being denounced as an 'enemy of the people,' Igor Savitsky rescues 40,000 forbidden fellow artists' works and creates in a far desert of Soviet Uzbekistan a museum now worth millions. The film was praised by the competition jurors for telling an engaging story with great style, unearthing rare archival clips and bringing an urgency to the tale of personal and artistic survival.

The Award for Best Short Film went to A Curious Thing, directed by Alain R. Hain.  Jared is closeted.  Sam is straight.  They find a connection in each other that they’ve never experienced before, but where do they go from there?  Using documentary audio as narration for the film, A Curious Thing crosses many boundaries, both in form and subject. The jury noted the film’s visual beauty and strong direction.

The winner of the inaugural IndieFlix.com Online Short Film Competition is The Cemetery Club, directed by Yitz Brilliant.  Over 300 people logged in and watched the 8 short films nominated for the prize, all available for video streaming.  The online festival with IndieFlix was an opportunity to showcase the 'best of the fest' online, and give PBIFF a global presence in this year's festival circuit. It was also an opportunity for participating filmmakers to promote their film online for a brief interval during their festival circuit, and bring their film to untapped audiences around the world. 

The Audience Choice Award for Best Feature Film went “The Yankles,” directed by David R. Brooks.  The film tells the offbeat tale of a professional baseball player on parole after serving time in prison, who fills out his madatory community service by coaching baseball for a team of orthodox Jews, who form an upstart baseball team called The Yankles. The film mixes humor and sentimentality, while communicating a strong message of tolerance and forgiveness.

The Audience Choice Award for Best Documentary Feature went to The Legend of Pale Male, directed by Frederic Lillen.  When a young Belgian comes to New York City looking for his destiny, he finds a remarkable red-tailed hawk living on the ledge of a posh 5th Avenue building.  Inspired by this bold bird, he buys his first video camera and begins to follow the hawk.  And so begins a magnificent obsession that embraced the hearts of New Yorkers.

The Audience Choice Award for Best Short Film went to Cemetery Club, directed by Yitz Brilliant and starring Bernie Rachelle, Emily Mitchell, Larry Swansen, Tom Fenaughty, Thomas Crouch.  Edgar, recently deceased and enjoying his afterlife, discovers that his nagging widow Helen has bought the plot next to his own.  Now he must see to it that Helen doesn't die before he can find a way to prevent her from joining 'The  Club'-- and ruining his afterlife.

To get more information on these and other films in the program, visit: http://www.pbifilmfest.org

Sandy Mandelberger, Festival Dailies Editor