IDA Announces its 35th Annual Shortlists for Features and Shorts

As usual, the pack of docs is insane. It will be extremely hard to reduce them to 5. I half wonder, as I do every year, if the Academy ought to give docs a bigger presence at the Oscars – a whole Oscars for DOCS, even, that honor things like writing and directing, etc. Either way, here are the films selected for the shortlist.

Apollo 11, Amazing Grace, American Factory, For Sama, Cunningham, Sea of Shadows, the Biggest Little Farm are a few that have made some noise already.

The 2019 Awards will be presented during a ceremony at Paramount Studios in Los Angeles on Saturday, December 7. Tickets are on sale now.

IDA Documentary Awards 2019 Features Shortlist

Advocate (Israel, Canada, Switzerland. Directors and Producers: Rachel Leah Jones and Philippe Bellaiche. Producers: Paul Cadieux and Joelle Bertossa)

Amazing Grace (USA / NEON. Producers: Alan Elliot, Tirrell D. Whittley, Sabrina V. Owens, Joe Boyd, Rob Johnson, Chiemi Karasawa, Spike Lee, Angie Seegers and Joseph Woolf)

American Factory (USA / Netflix. Directors and Producers: Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert. Producers: Jeff Reichert and Julie Parker Benello)

Apollo 11 (USA / NEON and CNN Films. Director and Producer: Todd Douglas Miller. Producers: Thomas Petersen and Evan Strauss)

Aquarela (UK, Germany, Denmark / Sony Pictures Classics. Director: Victor Kossakovsky. Producers: Aimara Reques, Heino Deckert and Sigrid Dyekjær)

Black Mother (USA / Grasshopper Film. Director and Producer: Khalik Allah. Producer: Leah Giblin)

Cunningham (USA, Germany / Magnolia Pictures. Director and Producer: Alla Kovgan. Producers: Helge Albers, Ilann Girard, Elizabeth Delude-Dix, Kelly Gilpatrick and Derrick Tseng)

Dark Suns (Canada / Dogwoof. Director and Producer: Julien Elie)

Diego Maradona (UK / HBO. Director: Asif Kapadia. Producers: James Gay-Rees and Paul Martin)

EARTH (Austria / KimStim. Director and Producer: Nikolaus Geyrhalter. Producers: Michael Kitzberger, Markus Glaser and Wolfgang Widerhofer)

For Sama (UK, Syria / PBS Distribution, FRONTLINE. Director and Producer: Waad al-Kateab. Director: Edward Watts)

Hail Satan? (USA, Sweden / Magnolia Pictures. Director: Penny Lane. Producer: Gabriel Sedgwick)

Honeyland (Macedonia / NEON. Director: Tamara Kotevska. Director and Producer: Ljubomir Stefanov. Producer: Atanas Georgiev)

Kabul, City in the Wind (Netherlands, Afghanistan, Germany. Director: Aboozar Amini. Producer: Jia Zhao)

Lemebel (Chile, Colombia / Compañía de Cine. Director and Producer: Joanna Reposi Garibaldi. Producer: Paula Sáenz-Laguna)

Midnight Family (Mexico, USA / 1091. Director and Producer: Luke Lorentzen. Producers: Kellen Quinn, Daniela Alatorre and Elena Fortes)

Midnight Traveler (USA, UK, Qatar / Oscilloscope Laboratories. Director: Hassan Fazili. Producers: Su Kim and Emelie Coleman Mahdavian)

One Child Nation (USA / Amazon Studios. Directors and Producers: Nanfu Wang and Jialing Zhang. Producers: Christoph Jörg, Julie Goldman, Christopher Clements and Carolyn Hepburn)

Our Time Machine (China / POV, Da Xiang. Directors and Producers: Yang Sun and S. Leo Chiang)

Present.Perfect. (USA, Hong Kong / Burn The Film. Director: Shengze Zhu. Producer: Zhengfan Yang)

Roll Red Roll (USA / POV. Director and Producer: Nancy Schwartzman. Producers: Steven Lake and Jessica Devaney)

Sea of Shadows (USA, Austria / National Geographic. Director: Richard Ladkani. Producers: Walter Kohler and Wolfgang Knopfler)

The Apollo (USA / HBO. Director and Producer: Roger Ross Williams. Producers: Lisa Cortés, Jeanne Elfant Festa and Cassidy Hartmann)

The Biggest Little Farm (USA / NEON, LD Entertainment. Director and Producer: John Chester. Producer: Sandra Keats)

The Cave (USA, Syria, Denmark / National Geographic. Director: Feras Fayyad. Producers: Kirstine Barfod and Sigrid Dyekjaer)

The Edge of Democracy (USA, Brazil / Netflix. Director and Producer: Petra Costa. Producers: Joanna Natasegara, Shane Boris and Tiago Pavan)

The Feeling of Being Watched (USA / POV. Director: Assia Boundaoui. Producer: Jessica Devaney)

The Hottest August (USA, Canada / Grasshopper Film. Director and Producer: Brett Story. Producer: Danielle Varga)

The Proposal (USA / Oscilloscope Laboratories. Director: Jill Magid. Producers: Charlotte Cook, Laura Coxson and Jarred Alterman)

This is Not a Movie (Germany, Canada / National Film Board of Canada. Director: Yung Chang. Producers: Anita Lee, Allyson Luchak, Nelofer Pazira and Ingmar Trost)

IDA Documentary Awards 2019 Shorts Shortlist

30 for 30 Shorts: Mack Wrestles (USA / ESPN. Directors and Producers: Taylor Hess and Erin Sanger. Producers: Erin Leyden and Gentry Kirby)

A Love Song for Latasha (USA. Director and Producer: Sophia Nahli Allison. Producers: Janice Duncan and Fam Udeorji)

After Maria (USA / Netflix. Director: Nadia Hallgren. Producer: Lauren Cioffi)

All Inclusive (Switzerland / Some Shorts. Director: Corina Schwingruber Ilić. Producer: Stella Händler)

America (USA / Aubin Pictures. Director: Garrett Bradley. Producers: Lauren Domino and Catherine Gund)

Black to Techno (USA / Frieze. Director: Jenn Nkiru)

Easter Snap (USA. Director and Producer: RaMell Ross. Producers: Joslyn Barnes and Su Kim)

In the Absence (USA, Korea / Field of Vision. Director: Yi Seung-Jun. Producer: Gary Byung-Seok Kam)

La Bala de Sandoval (Ecuador / Vtape. Director and Producer: Jean-Jacques Martinod)

Learning to Skateboard in a Warzone (if you’re a girl) (UK, USA, Afghanistan / Lifetime Films, A&E IndieFilms. Director: Carol Dysinger. Producer: Elena Andreicheva)

Lost and Found (USA, Myanmar / National Geographic. Director: Orlando von Einsiedel. Producers: Mark Bauch, Harri Grace and Dan Lin)

Marielle and Monica (Brazil, UK / The Guardian. Director: Fabio Erdos. Producer: Marina Costa)

Sam and the Plant Next Door (UK / The Guardian. Director and Producer: Omer Sami)

Scenes from a Dry City (USA / Field of Vision. Directors and Producers: Simon Wood and Francois Verster)

Show Me the Way (USA / Topic.com. Director and Producer: Kate Kunath)

St. Louis Superman (USA / MTV Documentary Films, Al Jazeera Witness and Meralta Films. Directors and Producers: Smriti Mundhra and Sami Khan. Producer: Poh Si Teng)

The Love Bugs (USA. Directors and Producers: Allison Otto and Maria Clinton)

The Nightcrawlers (USA, Philippines / National Geographic. Director: Alexander Mora. Producers: Joanna Natasekura, Doireann Maddock and Abigail Anketell-Jones)

The Separated (USA / The Atlantic. Director and Producer: Jeremy Raff)

The Unconditional (USA. Director and Producer: Dave Adams. Producers: Adam Soltis, Renee Woodruff Adams, Josie Swantek Heitz and Chris Tuss)

Valley of the Rulers (Serbia, Israel. Director: Efim Graboy. Producer: Dejan Petrovic)

The 35th Annual IDA Documentary Awards honorees, were announced earlier this week. The honorees are:

Academy Award and Primetime Emmy-winning filmmaker (and five time Academy Award nominee) Freida Lee Mock (Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision, Anita) who will receive the Career Achievement Award

Emmy nominated filmmaker Rachel Lears (Knock Down The House, The Hand That Feeds) who will receive the Emerging Doc Filmmaker Award

Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, which provides pro bono legal representation and other legal resources to protect First Amendment freedoms and the newsgathering rights of journalists, who will receive the Amicus Award

And the film foundation and production company Cinereach that will receive the Pioneer Award