Indian auteur Nishtha Jain won the Best International Feature Documentary award for her film Farming the Revolution at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival on Friday night. It is produced by Jain (Raintree Films) and Valérie Montmartin (Little Big Story) and co-directed by cinematographer Akash Basumatari. The film follows the massive year-long gathering of Indian farmers protesting unjust new farm laws that they felt would impact their markets.
The jury said, “‘Farming the Revolution’ spotlights the power of ordinary people with an enduring cinematic sophistication and an indomitable lyrical presence.” The award comes with a Cnd. $10,000 cash prize.
The film distributed by Cinephil is a co-production between India and Norway. And now, with its recent win, it automatically qualifies for consideration in the Academy’s Best Documentary Feature category without the standard theatrical run, as long as it meets the Academy’s requirements.
Other winners at Hot Docs
Other winners of the International Documentary Festival included “Death of a Saint,” which received the special jury prize for international feature documentary. The documentary follows director Patricia Bbaale Bandak as she returns to her birthplace in Uganda after giving birth to her own daughter on the same day her mother was killed by two gunmen in that same country 24 years earlier.
Ismael Vasquez Bernabe, director of The Weavers’ Songs, picked up the Best Emerging International Filmmaker trophy. It’s a Mexican film about weavers in San Pedro Amuzgos, Oaxaca. Pablo Alvarez-Mesa won the Best Canadian Feature Documentary award for The Soldier’s Lagoon, which retraces Simón Bolívar’s campaign to liberate Colombia two centuries ago.
In other prize-giving, the special jury prize for a Canadian feature documentary was given to directors Michael Mabbott and Lucah Rosenberg-Lee for Any Other Way: The Jackie Shane Story, about a pioneering Black trans performer from Nashville who left the spotlight at the height of her fame.
The Best Social Impact documentary trophy went to Erin Lau and Amber Espinosa-Jones for Standing Above the Clouds. The film chronicles the journey of three Native Hawaiian families to defend their sacred mountain, where a telescope is set to be built on Mauna Kea.
The event also honored Haitian filmmaker Raoul Peck, who received an Outstanding Achievement award in Toronto.
The prize-giving concluded a tumultuous 2024 edition of Hot Docs, which saw the sudden departure of artistic director Hussain Currimbhoy and 10 programmers just before the festival’s start on April 25. According to Hot Docs organizers, A total of 15 awards were presented on Friday night at the Centre for Social Innovation in Toronto during a ceremony with no media invited due to limited capacity.
