The nominations for the prestigious Grierson 2013: British Documentary Awards have been announced, and we are proud that three projects we have supported, No Fire Zone, Why Poverty? and 5 Broken Cameras are in the running for awards.
We are particularly proud of No Fire Zone’s nomination for one of this year’s new categories, Best Documentary on Current Affairs. Dawn Airey, Chairman of the Grierson Trust said: “I’m delighted to announce the shortlist for the 2013 Griersons including our two new categories. This year in particular current affairs documentaries have shaken the world and our category shortlist reflects the films and the themes that have become some of the most talked about issues of the year. I anticipate that this new category will be one of the toughest for our jury to judge.”
The nomination categories are as follows:
Best Documentary on Current Affairs
No Fire Zone: the Killing Fields of Sri Lanka
A film revealing the true extent of crimes against humanity in the final weeks of the Sri Lankan civil war — told through eyewitness testimony and shocking video evidence recorded by both the victims and perpetrators. While the world looked away, as many as 40,000 civilians lost their lives in a few bloody months. It is both a call to the conscience of the world, a definitive film of record and an uncompromising indictment of the men responsible for the bloody crimes at the end of the Sri Lankan civil war.
Best Documentary Series
Why Poverty?
Worldview is an institutional partner of Why Poverty? a project consisting of eight one-hour and 33 short documentary films tackling various issues concerning poverty, including the effectiveness of global aid, education, and gender equality. WorldView supported three of the long-form films, Give Us the Money, Welcome to the World and Stealing Africa. All of the films can be viewed across our websites.
Best Cinema Documentary
A first-hand account of protests in Bil’in, a West Bank village affected by the Israeli West Bank barrier. When his son is born in 2005, Bil’in villager Emad Burnat gets his first camera. At the same time his fellow villagers begin to resist a separation barrier being built nearby. Burnat, a self-taught cameraman, begins to film this non-violent struggle. In the resulting conflicts one camera after another used to document these events is destroyed in the conflict, and each tells its own story.
See the full list of nominations
The winners will be announced at a star-studded awards ceremony in London on 4 November 2013.
Above: WorldView’s Phil Cox and team, receiving the award for Most Entertaining Documentary for The Bengali Detective from Grayson Perry last year. Image on home page from Native Voice, producers of The Bengali Detective