2018 Atlanta Film Festival Award Winners

The 42nd annual Atlanta Film Festival has officially come to an end, but what a great year it was! This years festival featured a record 208 film screenings after receiving more than 7,600 submissions from 56 different countries. Every year after the festival concludes, a collection of jury awards and specialty awards are announced.

In addition to taking home the Atlanta Film Festival awards, winners of the Narrative Short (For Nona Anna), Animated Short (Fundamentals) and Documentary Short (Zion) Jury Awards now qualify for the 2018 Oscar short list. ATLFF is one of only 14 festivals in the country that is Oscar qualifying in three or more categories.

The 2018 Atlanta Film Festival juried prize winners are:

• Narrative Feature Jury Award – Restos De Viento (Wind Traces)
• Narrative Feature Special Jury Prize – Disappearance
• Documentary Feature Jury Award – Man Made
• Documentary Feature Special Jury Award – Nos Llaman Guerreras (The Call Us Warriors)
• Narrative Short Jury Award – For Nona Anna
• Documentary Short Jury Award – Zion
• Animated Short Jury Award – 基石 (Fundamentals)

Additional 2018 ATLFF Awards:

• WonderFilm Award (presented by WonderRoot): Walls of Hope
• Georgia Film Award – Still
• Filmmaker-to-Watch Award – Connor Simpson (Kudzu)
• Innovator Award – Daveed Diggs (Blindspotting (2018))
• Rebel Award – Jason Reitman (Tully (2018) )
• Phoenix Award – Kiersey Clemons (Hearts Beat Loud (2018))

This year, the Atlanta Film Festival launched a new initiative to honor Originators, Innovators and Rebels in the film industry. On April 13, ATLFF awarded its inaugural Innovator Award, created to recognize visionaries and those forging their own path within the film industry, to Daveed Diggs for his work on Broadway’s “Hamilton” and ATLFF Opening Night film Blindspotting (2018).

Prior to the April 15 ATLFF Marquee screening of Tully (2018), the festival also awarded Academy Award-nominated director Jason Reitman with the ATLFF Rebel Award for writing and directing films like Thank You for Smoking (2006), Juno (2007) and Up in the Air (2009) about characters that defied expectations and cut against the grain.

Actress Kiersey Clemons, known for her roles in Flatliners (2017) and The Only Living Boy in New York (2017) and set to star in the upcoming DC Comics’ Flash movie, received the inaugural ATLFF Phoenix Award prior to the April 20 red carpet screening of Hearts Beat Loud (2018).