The South by Southwest Convention and Festivals tonight introduced its 2025 Jury and Particular Award winners.
Amy Wang‘s Slanted, which the jury known as an “unflinching satirical thriller” about identification, received the Narrative Characteristic competitors. Particular Jury awards went to director/author/actress Annapurna Sriram for Fucktoys and actress Amanda Peet for Fantasy Life.
Shuffle directed by Benjamin Flaherty received the Documentary Characteristic competitors, with Particular Jury Awards going to The Python Hunt directed by Xander Robin and Remaining Native directed by Paige Bethmann.
All 2025 movie & TV pageant initiatives shall be eligible for category-specific Viewers Awards that shall be licensed by the accounting agency of Maxwell Locke & Ritter. Viewers Award Voting will conclude on Saturday, March 15. Winners shall be introduced that week.
“The power at SXSW has been completely electrical this week! Our theaters have been filled with passionate audiences embracing the unimaginable range of tales in our lineup,” mentioned Claudette Godfrey, the pageant’s VP, Movie & TV. “I’m thrilled to have a good time our jury and particular award winners — they really symbolize what makes this pageant so particular!”
The SXSW 2025 Movie & TV Competition Award Winners:
FEATURE FILM GRAND JURY AWARDS
NARRATIVE FEATURE COMPETITION
Winner: Slanted directed by Amy Wang
“This unflinching satirical thriller examines racial identification in a daring and skin-tingling new manner. That includes simmering performances by the solid, this movie is each particular to the fractured identification of Asian People and universally relatable in its theme of desperately needing to belong. The director’s vulnerability in mining her private expertise mixed together with her delicate and daring filmmaking create a haunting piece that lingers lengthy after the credit roll.”
Particular Jury Award for a Multi-Hyphenate: Annapurna Sriram, Fucktoys
“Annapurna Sriram is a visionary pressure, a uncommon artist whose work is as daring as it’s singular. On this dynamic and revelatory comedic fantasy, she delivers an audacious cinematic expertise that defies conference. Because the movie’s director, author, govt producer, and star, she masterfully wields the facility of storytelling, immersing audiences in a world that feels each wildly authentic and deeply resonant.”
Particular Jury Award for Efficiency: Amanda Peet, Fantasy Life
“Ever an actor of unsparing comedian canniness, Amanda Peet brilliantly portrays a flailing actress with a stalled-out profession who will get a renewed joie de vivre because of a manny, performed by author/director Matthew Shear. Her frankness concerning the perils and pitfalls of the leisure business are on full show in a efficiency that boldly takes on a meta high quality whereas reminding us of why Peet has been so nice all alongside.”
Narrative Characteristic Competitors Jury: Clayton Davis, Senior Awards Editor, Selection;
Rebecca Ford, Senior Awards Correspondent, Self-importance Truthful; Ryan Lattanzio, Deputy Editor of Movie, IndieWire
DOCUMENTARY FEATURE COMPETITION
Winner: Shuffle directed by Benjamin Flaherty
“Wrought with measured fashion and humanity, this quietly searing exposé of exploitation and fraud within the dependancy therapy business is a deeply affecting work of cinematic memoir and alarm. The director illuminates the insidiousness of the profit-driven, billion-dollar restoration enterprise whilst he brings compassion and urgency to his topics, whose candid revelations are as heartbreaking as they’re hopeful.”
Particular Jury Award: The Python Hunt directed by Xander Robin
“The Python Hunt burrows deep into a captivating pocket of American life. This gorgeously shot, surprisingly touching movie continually subverts expectations whereas revealing the soul of those colourful contestants. With humor and compassion, Robin pushes previous clichés: We’ll by no means consider the much-mocked media picture of ‘Florida Man’ in the identical manner.”
Particular Jury Award: Remaining Native directed by Paige Bethmann
“Paige Bethmann magnetically examines North America’s abusive Indian boarding college applications by the eyes of her impassioned topic, Kutoven Stevens. The director’s vivid use of montage, searing archival imagery, and Stevens’s poetic narration builds a robust narrative round him. Stevens’ love of operating brings him nearer to his great-grandfather’s legacy whereas permitting him to make use of his voice as a pressure for good in his neighborhood.”
Documentary Characteristic Competitors Jury: Tim Grierson, Senior U.S. Critic, Display screen Worldwide; Aisha Harris, tradition critic and co-host of NPR’s “Pop Tradition Completely happy Hour”; Jen Yamato, freelance journalist and movie critic, beforehand workers author, Los Angeles Occasions
SHORT FILM COMPETITION GRAND JURY AWARDS Introduced by Vimeo
Thanks to our Brief Movie Jury Award sponsor, Vimeo: the world’s most progressive video expertise platform for creators and enterprises.
NARRATIVE SHORT COMPETITION
Winner: One Day This Child directed by Alexander Farah
“An intimate portrait that illustrates the needs and burdens we supply, providing an evocative glimpse into the lifetime of an Afghan Canadian. It’s each beautiful and soulful, effortlessly weaving within the cultural imprint of Islamic immigrant upbringing into the material of on a regular basis queer experiences. The director is a timeless visionary who’s reshaping the journey of what it means to say and settle for one’s personal identification.”
Particular Jury Award: I’m The Most Racist Particular person I Know directed by Leela Varghese
“Charming, up to date, and polished. This movie is a lyrical examine of magnificence and identification that balances the load of internalized disgrace with the frivolity of a burgeoning romance. The Particular Jury Award celebrates the director’s confidence of their examination of intersectional points by the curious lens of two queer South Asian girls.”
Narrative Shorts Competitors Jury: Amy Beecroft, Verve Ventures; Jaycie Luo, MRC; Sara Rastogi, EVP, Growth, HOORAE
DOCUMENTARY SHORT COMPETITION
Winner: Searching for a Donkey directed by Juan Vicente Manrique
“A subversive movie that speaks to bigger geopolitical realities. It tells a stranger-than-fiction story with endurance. The distinctive craft of this movie – from the narrative strategy to the cinematography – ends in a courageous and quiet movie that speaks volumes.”
Particular Jury Award: Welcome Dwelling Freckles directed by Huiju Park
“The movie creates a scripted narrative aesthetic by a deeply private documentary. The director composes every shot with clear intention, so her imaginative and prescient seeps by each body.”
Documentary Shorts Competitors Jury: Chloe Gbai, Unique Documentary Movies, Netflix; Corinne Gilliard Fisher, producer and growth govt; Amanda Spain, Head of Documentary, EverWonder Studio
ANIMATED SHORTS COMPETITION
Winner: Retirement Plan directed by John Kelly
“A deeply resonant and well-crafted movie, it’s a masterful mix of allure, humor, and existential reflection. With exceptional storytelling finesse, the filmmaker succeeds in reworking a seemingly extraordinary premise right into a profound meditation on life, goals, and the passage of time. It captures a common eager for success and explores heavy themes with levity and heat, making it each deeply private and universally relatable.”
Particular Jury Award: My Fantastic Life directed by Calleen Koh
“A throw down, relentless pageant jam positive to evoke laughter whereas packing an emotional punch. The central character’s household dynamic supplies agency grounding and relatability, releasing the filmmaker to make more and more daring, and hilarious, selections demonstrating the absurd lengths they’ll go to for only one. extra. day away from all of it. Skillful animation and complicated textures masterfully assist the work’s central message.”
Animated Shorts Competitors Jury: Brandon Bui, Affiliate Inventive Government at Walt Disney Animation Studios; Silvia Olivas, two-time EMMY® AWARD Successful Author; Adam Zehner, Funimation/Crunchyroll’s Japanese partnerships supervisor
MIDNIGHT SHORTS COMPETITION
Winner: Abdomen Bug directed by Matty Crawford
“A movie as wealthy in character growth and theme as it’s in technical prowess and execution. It was a recent tackle a father or mother coping with their baby spreading their wings and flourishing. A brilliantly-gut-wrenching efficiency by its lead and a seamless mix of sensible and visible impact ends in a really polished piece that everybody concerned must be immensely proud to have birthed.”
Particular Jury Award: Whitch directed by Hoku Uchiyama
“Crafting an efficient brief is extremely tough; doing so in below 5 minutes is extraordinary. This movie skillfully blends horror and humor and does so with out losing a second. The movie’s use of acquainted motifs lulls the viewers right into a false sense of realizing what’s to come back earlier than successfully pulling the rug out from below them a number of instances, whereas nonetheless delivering a whole story and evocative performances.”
Midnight Shorts Competitors Jury: Alayna Glasthal, Inventive Government, Atomic Monster; Emily Gotto,SVP of Acquisitions and Productions at AMC Networks Shudder; David Lawson, Jr’s options embrace Decision, One thing In The Filth, Synchronic, The Limitless, and She Dies Tomorrow.
TEXAS SHORTS COMPETITION
Winner: Harvester directed by Charlie Schwan
“This tightly centered horror movie proves that nice issues are available in small packages. Deftly commingling the tiniest, unheralded story particulars with huge, “speak on the display” ranges of horror and well-judged creature work, this movie completely delivers on the promise of the style wherein it lives, and goes that additional step additional to grow to be one thing really particular.”
Particular Jury Award: Newbies directed by Kimiko Matsuda-Lawrence and Megan Trufant Tillman
“This can be a movie that shimmers with magnificence, but additionally delivers highly effective emotions of heartbreak and disappointment, creating an expertise that so completely embodies visible storytelling that it nearly eradicates the necessity for phrases. The characters invite you into their inside landscapes, putting you on the heart of their richly shot and fantastically carried out emotional drama.”
Texas Shorts Competitors Jury: Megan Creydt, Texas Month-to-month govt producer for TV, movie, and podcasts; James Faust, Dallas Movie Society Creative Director; Michael Garcia, Producer and Government concerned in various highly-acclaimed, award-winning tv collection.
MUSIC VIDEO COMPETITION
Winner: BIJI – ‘ZIGIDI’ directed by Maceo Frost
“A excessive gear, zip-zooming piece of visible whiplash, this music video wowed us with its epic Kurdish setting and wholly unpredictable framework. The drifting and stunt work may be very spectacular, but it surely reaches subsequent degree heights with its narrative design and cultural reflections (to not point out the eagle cam). Concurrently playful and resonant, it’s a testomony to the grand potential of the music video medium.”
Particular Jury Award: Sarah Klang – ‘Different Ladies’ directed by Rose Bush and Kirsten Bode
“One of the crucial tough accomplishments of short-form filmmaking is making a convincing character arc. This video offers us an trustworthy, dynamic, and finally shocking take a look at its central character, all in lower than three and a half minutes. The spectacular shorthand is marked by poignant route and a pitch-perfect efficiency. Most characteristic movies can’t pull off characters this wealthy.”
Music Video Competitors Jury: Britt Daniel, co-foundeder Spoon; Alexis Hodoyán-Gastélum, music editor, Remezcla; Bryan Younce, producer and Government Vice President of Video & Content material Manufacturing, Columbia Information
INDEPENDENT TV PILOT COMPETITION
Winner: F*ckups Nameless from Showrunner Joe Tierney and director Kat Whalen
“Instantly pulls you in, constructing stress with care, whereas the teenager leads ship uncooked, compelling performances. Their struggles really feel actual and take care of exhausting hitting themes, however the present holds again simply sufficient, drawing us into the quiet complexities of their characters. The filmmaker subtly reveals the deeper fractures inside this therapeutic boarding college. This pilot retains its viewers hooked – leaving us unsettled, questioning, and desperate to see what’s subsequent.”
Particular Jury Award: Denim from showrunner and director Tedra Wilson
“This pilot defies conference, providing a documentary expertise that feels each intimate and avant-garde. A placing collage of stylized voices, every contributing to a bigger narrative about identification, creativity, and cultural evolution. Curated with sharp style and unwavering confidence, the filmmaker constructs a world the place artistry isn’t simply noticed however felt — the place each body, soundbite, and visible texture is deliberately positioned to problem, encourage, and provoke.”
TV Pilot Competitors Jury: Hannah Bang, filmmaker, with a love for tales about imperfect individuals; Claire Brooks,inventive producer, author, and advocate for rising filmmakers; Channing Godfrey Peoples, filmmaker, Miss Juneteenth
POSTER DESIGN COMPETITION
Winner: Decision: A Cinephonic Rhapsody for the Soul
Designers: the movie’s director Scott Berman, Anthony Francisco Schepperd, and Micah Buzan
“This design caught our consideration instantly. We love the excessive saturation of colour, consideration to element, and print high quality. It’s a should see in particular person to expertise the multidimensional depth of colour and texture. This piece takes you on a mesmerizing journey. A real murals!”
Particular Jury Award: Wonderful Summer time
Designer: Patryk Hardziej
“This poster artwork stood aside due to its daring design, use of unfavourable house, and placing imagery. We love how you could have two completely different experiences with the paintings, up shut and at a distance. Provocative work.”
Poster Design Competitors Jury: Phoebe Joynt (FEEBEE), artist, designer, and muralist; Yen Tan, graphic designer and filmmaker; Zuzu, visible artist and inventive entrepreneur.
XR EXPERIENCE COMPETITION
Agog Immersive Influence AwardThanks to our Sponsor: Designed to encourage creators and changemakers to make use of XR for good, the Agog Immersive Influence Award acknowledges initiatives that assist us all think about and work towards a extra simply and sustainable world.
Winner: Within the Present of Being created by Cameron Kostopoulos
Jury Award Winner: Reflections of Little Pink Dot created by Chloé Lee
“Deceptively humble and pleasant, this open-world documentary invitations us to freely discover a rustic in transition. Guided by a daring new expertise in XR storytelling, it confronts us with the vulnerability of on a regular basis life, evoking a common sense of place.”
Particular Jury Award: Proof As If Proof Had been Wanted created by Ting Tong Chang, Matt Adams
“Spoiler Alert! The Particular Jury Award Winner made us really feel misplaced, annoyed and disconnected from one another. What began as a sluggish burn, changed into an sudden connection and dance between house, story, know-how and human habits.”
XR Expertise Competitors Jury:Christina Lee Storm, award-winning producer and senior leisure govt; Caspar Sonnen, Head of New Media IDFA DocLab; Diana Williams, CEO & Co-founder of Kinetic Power Leisure
SXSW Particular Awards
Redbreast Unhidden
Redbreast—the world’s most awarded single pot nonetheless Irish whiskey—is devoted to celebrating the joys of discovery, whether or not it’s an unforgettable movie or that first easy sip of Redbreast. In collaboration with BAFTA winner, Golden Globes and SAG nominee Andrew Scott, Redbreast Irish Whiskey is championing daring and authentic storytelling by the Redbreast Unhidden Award, an honour recognising an unbiased brief filmmaker whose work brings recent views to the display. Chosen by Andrew Scott, this award goals to have a good time essentially the most thrilling expertise in brief movie on the SXSW Movie & TV Competition.
Redbreast Unhidden Award
Winner: Transient Somebodies directed by Andy Reid, produced by Alessandra Sconza
“I’m honoured to award Director Andy Reid for his movie, Transient Somebodies. What I cherished about this movie is how, in a really brief house of time, it drew a specific tone to a narrative that we don’t typically see explored on display. It’s extremely private but in addition assured, witty, with an attractive aesthetic. The director managed to make a really explicit expertise very accessible and intriguing. However as any person who’s hung out on movie units, I assumed it was very genuine. The director made it attention-grabbing and managed to seize the expertise in a manner that was true to life. I’m very excited to see what Andy does subsequent.” – Andrew Scott.
Vimeo Employees Choose Award
Winner: Acquainted directed by Marco Novoa
“This fascinating narrative weaves collectively themes of queerness, connection, and located household with a splash of blood-sucking drag queens. In a storytelling panorama the place vampire tales typically recycle acquainted tropes, this placing movie affords a recent strategy with equal elements darkness and coronary heart.”
SXSW Better of Texas Award
Introduced to a characteristic movie world premiering at SXSW that was shot primarily in Texas or directed by a present resident of Texas. This 12 months’s award goes to The Gap Reality and Nothing Butt, captures the chaotic genius and psychedelic legacy of Texas’s most uncompromising musical outlaws with unflinching honesty and visible audacity.
SXSW Better of Texas Award
Winner: Butthole Surfers: The Gap Reality and Nothing Butt directed by Tom Stern
Janet Pierson Champion Award offered by Indiewire
To honor Janet Pierson, Director Emeritus of the SXSW Movie & TV Competition after 15 years of management, a prize was created in 2023 known as the Janet Pierson Champion Award. As a part of IndieWire’s dedication to elevating Movie & TV creators, IndieWire is proud to current the Janet Pierson Champion Award to Lindsey Dryden.
Janet Pierson Champion Award
Winner: Lindsey Dryden
“This 12 months’s winner exemplifies the spirit of a real movie champion by her spectacular physique of labor spanning award-winning productions like Unrest and Trans In America, whereas concurrently advocating for better inclusion by her management with FWD-Doc and dedication to incapacity illustration. Her multifaceted profession as a director, producer, and advocate demonstrates distinctive creativity and resilience, making her a robust voice for marginalized communities and an influential catalyst for change inside the broader unbiased movie ecosystem worldwide.”
NEON Auteur Award for Uncompromising Visionary within the Visions Part
As an award-winning champion of not simply movies, however filmmakers and movie festivals, NEON is a guiding pressure in unbiased cinema.
Winner: Grace Glowicki, director, author, and Star, Lifeless Lover
“This 12 months’s Auteur Award goes to a tremendously authentic movie that might solely come from this explicit filmmaker’s curious, inventive and thrilling thoughts. We merely can’t think about anybody else pulling it off — and even being daring sufficient to attempt it within the first place.”
In 2022 SXSW offered Nicolas Cage with the 40 Years of Large Expertise Award. This 12 months we created one other particular award, for an unforgettable methodology efficiency.
Howl of Fame Award
Winner: Indy from Good Boy, directed by Ben Leonberg and produced by Kari Fischer, his people
“By way of a uniquely genuine perspective within the horror style, this goodest boy delivers a efficiency that’s each pure and chilling. His responses to unseen phenomena remodel on a regular basis home areas into realms of suspense and terror. Indy and his people remind us even when darkness threatens to devour us, a trustworthy canine’s love is aware of no bounds.”
