Last week, Park City, the hometown of the Sundance Film Festival, greeted hundreds of filmmakers, including a strong contingent from Europe. Ten out of the 12 films presented in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition were either European productions or co-productions, while in the World Cinema Documentary Competition, the number was even higher, as all 12 movies hailed from the Continent. Both the jury and the festival audience were clearly enamoured by Europe, as a huge share of their awards went to European titles. The Grand Jury Prize in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition was presented to the UK’s The Souvenir [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Joanna Hogg, starring Tilda Swinton and Honor Swinton Byrne, while Macedonia’s Honeyland [+lee también:
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entrevista: Ljubomir Stefanov, Tamara …
entrevista: Tamara Kotevska, Ljubomir …
ficha de la película] by Tamara Kotevska and Ljubomir Stefanov took home the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize (as well as the Special Jury Prize for Impact for Change). The Sundance audience chose their favourites as well: Denmark’s Queen of Hearts [+lee también:
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entrevista: Gustav Lindh
entrevista: May el-Toukhy
ficha de la película] by May el-Toukhy was voted the best fiction (“dramatic”) film, while Austria’s Sea of Shadows [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Richard Ladkani was considered the best non-fiction title. The World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for No Borders was given to Midnight Traveler [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Hassan Fazzili, which was produced by the USA, Qatar, the UK and Canada. The other special trophy (World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award) went to Monos [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Alejandro Landes, a joint effort between Colombia, Argentina, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden and Uruguay.

Individual awards were presented to helmers Mads Brügger (Directing Award: World Cinema Documentary) for Cold Case Hammarskjöld [+lee también:
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entrevista: Mads Brügger
entrevista: Mads Brügger
ficha de la película], a Danish-Norwegian-Swedish-Belgian film, and Lucia Garibaldi (Directing Award: World Cinema Dramatic) for The Sharks [+lee también:
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ficha de la película], which was co-produced by Uruguay, Argentina and Spain. DoPs Fejmi Daut and Samir Ljuma, who worked on Honeyland, received the World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Cinematography. Finally, Polish acting legend Krystyna Janda was presented with the World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award for Acting for her superb performance in Jacek Borcuch’s Dolce Fine Giornata [+lee también:
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entrevista: Jacek Borcuch
ficha de la película].

The motto of this year’s Sundance Film Festival was “risk independence”, as the programming team favoured bold and original works. On the other hand, the primary theme of the event was inclusion – of all the feature films and episodic content (one of the festival’s sidebars) accepted for Sundance in 2019, 41% were helmed by a female director, while the figure for shorts stood at 52%, making for a combined total of 45%. 55% of the accepted short films and 38% of the dramatic features had a black director. 

Here is the full list of the Sundance World Cinema Dramatic/Documentary Competition winners:

World Cinema Dramatic Competition

Grand Jury Prize
The Souvenir [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] - Joanna Hogg (UK/USA)

Directing Award
Lucía Garibaldi - The Sharks [+lee también:
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Special Jury Award
Monos [+lee también:
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Special Jury Award for Originality
We Are Little Zombies - Makoto Nagahisa (Japan)

Special Jury Award for Acting 
Krystyna Janda - Dolce Fine Giornata [+lee también:
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entrevista: Jacek Borcuch
ficha de la película] (Poland)

Audience Award
Queen of Hearts [+lee también:
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entrevista: Gustav Lindh
entrevista: May el-Toukhy
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World Cinema Documentary Competition

Grand Jury Prize
Honeyland [+lee también:
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entrevista: Ljubomir Stefanov, Tamara …
entrevista: Tamara Kotevska, Ljubomir …
ficha de la película] - Tamara Kotevska and Ljubomir Stefanov (Macedonia)

Directing Award 
Mads Brügger - Cold Case Hammarskjöld [+lee también:
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entrevista: Mads Brügger
entrevista: Mads Brügger
ficha de la película] (Denmark/Norway/Sweden/Belgium)

Special Jury Award for No Borders
Midnight Traveler [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] - Hassan Fazzili (USA/Qatar/UK/Canada)

Special Jury Award for Impact for Change 
Honeyland - Tamara Kotevska and Ljubomir Stefanov

Special Jury Award for Cinematography
Fejmi Daut and Samir Ljuma - Honeyland  

Audience Award
Sea of Shadows [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] - Richard Ladkani (Austria)