Nominations for the 2019 Critics’ Choice Documentary Awards have been announced. Familiar titles dominate the fourth edition of the awards, with festival winners such as “One Child Nation,” “Knock Down the House,” and “American Factory” receiving multiple nods.
Of 11 features competing in the Best Documentary category, five are women-directed or co-directed, amounting to about 45 percent overall. Titles competing for the prize include “American Factory,” Julia Reichert and Steven Bognar’s look inside what happens when a Chinese billionaire buys a former GM plant in Ohio, and “Honeyland,” Tamara Kotevska and Ljubo Stefanov’s portrait of the last woman working as a wild beekeeper in Europe. Also up for the prize are political docs “The Kingmaker” and “Knock Down the House.” The former, directed by Lauren Greenfield, tells the story Imelda Marcos, the former first Lady of the Philippines, as she fights to bring her disgraced family back to power, and the latter, directed by Rachel Lears, sees four working-class, progressive women entering the world of politics. “One Child Nation” made the cut as well: Nanfu Wang and Jialing Zhang explore the untold history of China’s controversial one-child policy and its impact on generations of families in the highly celebrated doc.
The Best Director category recognizes the directors of seven docs, and three of the nominees are or include women, amounting to 43 percent. Reichert and Bognar are up for “American Factory,” Wang and Zhang for “One Child Nation,” and Waad Al-Kateab and Edward Watts for “For Sama,” a message to al-Kateab’s daughter, and the story of her life in Aleppo through five years of the Syrian revolution.
“As the film and television industry constantly evolves, documentaries remain a vibrant creative art form that entertains as well as informs,” said CCA CEO Joey Berlin.”The CCA has the privilege to publicly support and celebrate the outstanding work of these artists, while at the same time providing media consumers with help in making informed and smart choices as they face more decisions about ‘what to watch’ than ever before. We are proud that our awards event has become a valuable way to help people ‘find the good stuff’ and to help filmmakers find their audiences.”
Head over to The Hollywood Reporter to check out all of the nominees up for honors at the Critics’ Choice Documentary Awards, which will be held November 10 in Brooklyn. Other women-directed or co-directed docs nominated for awards include Petra Costa’s “The Edge of Democracy” (Best Political Documentary, Best Narration) and Victoria Stone and Mark Deeble’s “The Elephant Queen” (Best Science/Nature Documentary, Best Narration).
