02/10/2012 - Nominated for four News and Documentary Emmy Awards, Danish director Janus Metz's Armadillo received the prize for Best Editing at the ceremony in New York

Danish director Janus Metz's documentary Armadillo [+see also:
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interview: Janus Metz, director of Arm…
film profile], following a group of Danish soldiers at an army base in the southern Afghan province of Helmand, cashed in on one of the four nominations at the 33rd Annual News and Documentary Emmy Awards, presented yesterday (October 1) in New York by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.

Considered for Best Documentary, Outstanding Continuing Coverage of a News Story (Long form), Outstanding Individual Achievements in a Craft (Documentary, Cinematography-Long Form) and (Documentary, Editing-Long form), the Academy awarded Per K. Kirkegaard the prize for Best Editing.

It is the first time that a Danish film has received so many Emmy nominations. Armadillo was selected for the Critics Week at the Cannes International Film Festival in 2010, where it won the Grand Prix, and it has since received both Danish national film awards, the Bodil and the Robert, for Best Documentary.

When first time aired domestically by Danish commercial broadcaster TV2 in 2011, it drew 1.1 million viewers and sold 120,000 tickets in theatrical release (56 screens). The Ronnie Fridthjof-Sara Stockmann production for Fridthjof Film a/s was premiered in the US in Channel PBS' POV series of documentaries.

The film was shot in 2009, when Metz and his photographer Lars Skree spent six months in Camp Armadillo depicting the lives of the Danish troopers stationed less than a kilometre from Taleban positions: "An upfront account of growing cynicism and adrenaline addiction in young soldiers at war."