this year’s sculptures.

Hello friends and greetings from 100 feet above Seattle Center. It’s the final day of SIFF, and remarkably, everyone is still standing. By now, you’ve voted more than 60,000 times and surpassed attendance goals despite the rain free weather that graced the 25 day festival.

When all of the ballots were tallied, your favorite narrative feature was BLACK DYNAMITE and your favorite documentary was THE COVE. These and several other awards for the 35th Seattle International Film Festival were presented at an emotion-packed brunch this morning at the Space Needle, complete with mimosas, glass artwork, and a few great acceptance speeches (most notably, the kids from MY SUICIDE who enlivened the 35 Club party claiming their Youth Jury Award for Best FutureWave Feature fresh from a night spent in the park).

Stay tuned … once I get back to a real computer (with copy and pasting powers) I’ll update this post with the full list of awardees.

Best Director: Kathryn Bigelow, for The Hurt Locker (USA, 2008)
Best Actor: Sam Rockwell for Moon (United Kingdom, 2009)
Best Actress: Yolande Moreau for Séraphine (France/Belgium, 2008)Best Short Film: Wallace and Gromit: A Matter of Loaf and Death, directed by Nick Park, (UK)
Lena Sharpe Award for Persistence of Vision: Sweet Crude, directed by Sandy Cioffi (USA, 2008)

Grand Jury Prize Winners

New Directors Showcase: The Other Bank, directed by George Ovashvili (Georgia/Kazakhstan, 2009)Documentary (grand): talhotblond, directed by Barbara Schroeder (USA, 2009)
Documentry (special): Manhole Children, directed by Yoshio Harada (Japan, 2008)
Short Film (Narrative/Grand): Short Term 12, directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, USA
Short Film (Narrative/special): Lowland Fell, directed by Michael Kinirons, Ireland; Next Floor, directed by Denis Villeuneuve, Canada
Short Film (Animation/Grand ): Photograph of Jesus, directed by Laurie Hill, United Kingdom
Short Film (Documentary/Grand ): The Herd, directed by Ken Wardrop, Ireland

WaveMaker Award for Excellence in Youth Filmmaking:  A Generation of Consolidation, directed by Samantha Muilenberg

WaveMaker (Special): If U Want 2 Get Technical, directed by Riaebia Robinson

FutureWave Shorts Audience Award: A Generation of Consolidation, directed by Samantha Muilenberg

SIFF 2009 Youth Jury Award for Best FutureWave Feature: My Suicide, directed by David Lee Miller.
Youth Jury (Special): Sounds Like Teen Spirit, directed by Jamie J. Johnson

The full listing of awards, jury statements, and worthy runners up can be found online. [siff]