2014 SXSW Film Festival Announces Audience Awards

The 2014 SXSW Film Festival comes to a close today and just a few days after the awards presentation of their jury prizes, they’ve announced this year’s Audience Awards, selected by those who attended screenings in the festival’s 10 venues across the Austin, Texas area.

Shawn Christensen’s Before I Disappear, expanded from his Oscar-winning short “Curfew,” won the Audience Award in the Narrative Feature Competition, while Diana Whitten’s Vessel won the same award in the Documentary Feature Competition. The jury gave their awards in those respective categories to Sarah-Violet Bliss & Charles Rogers’ Fort Tilden and Margaret Brown’s documentary The Great Invisible. This was a departure from last year when both the jury and audience awards went to Destin Daniel Cretton’s Short Term 12.

The soon-to-be released Cesar Chavez, starring Michael Peña and directed by Diego Luna, won the Audience Award in the Narrative Spotlight before its release by Pantelion Films on March 28. Ben Knight and Travis Rummel’s DamNation won the Audience Award in the Documentary Spotlight while Eduardo Sanchez’s Exists as SXSW audiences’ favorite movie in the Midnighters series.

You can read the official press release and the full list of winners, including some of the more esoteric categories, below. If you’re in the Austin area, you can catch all of the winners at special screenings over the course of the day, also listed below:

The South by Southwest (SXSW) Film Conference and Festival announced Audience Award-winners today from the Narrative Feature Competition, Documentary Feature Competition, Narrative Spotlight, Documentary Spotlight, Visions, Midnighters, Episodic, SXGlobal, Festival Favorites and Design Award categories. The 24 Beats Per Second category will be announced via sxsw.com on Monday, March 17 due to first screenings still remaining for later today. Audience Award results for all categories were certified by the accounting firm of Maxwell Locke & Ritter.

The Audience Awards follow the previously announced 2014 Jury Awards, which included Grand Jury Winners Sarah-Violet Bliss & Charles Rogers’ Fort Tilden for Narrative Feature, and Margaret Brown’s The Great Invisible for Documentary Feature. For the complete list of 2014 Award Winners, visit sxsw.com/film.

Over the course of nine days, the 2014 SXSW Film Festival will host a total of 133 features, consisting of 89 World Premieres, 11 North American Premieres and 8 U.S. Premieres, with 70 first-time directors. 113 shorts will screen as part of 11 overall shorts programs. The 246 films were selected from a record number of overall submissions, nearly 6,500, comprised of approximately 2,200 features and 4,300 shorts, with an overall increase of 14% over 2013.

2014 SXSW Film Festival Audience Award Winners:

NARRATIVE FEATURE COMPETITION

Audience Award Winner: Before I Disappear

Director: Shawn Christensen

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE COMPETITION

Audience Award Winner: Vessel

Director: Diana Whitten

DOCUMENTARY SPOTLIGHT

Audience Award Winner: DamNation

Director: Ben Knight & Travis Rummel

NARRATIVE SPOTLIGHT

Audience Award Winner: CESAR CHAVEZ

Directors: Diego Luna

VISIONS

Audience Award Winner: Yakona

Director: Anlo Sepulveda & Paul Collins

MIDNIGHTERS

Audience Award Winner: Exists

Director: Eduardo Sánchez

EPISODIC

Audience Award Winner: Silicon Valley

Director: Mike Judge

SXGLOBAL

Audience Award Winner: The Special Need

Directors: Carlo Zoratti

FESTIVAL FAVORITES

Audience Award Winner: The Case Against 8

Director: Ben Cotner & Ryan White

SXSW Film Design Awards

EXCELLENCE IN POSTER DESIGN

Audience Award Winner: Big Significant Things

Designer: Corey Holmes

EXCELLENCE IN TITLE DESIGN

Audience Award Winner: True Detective

Designer: Patrick Clair for Elastic

As today is the final day of SXSW Film, additional screenings have been scheduled for this evening for all Audience Award-winners:

Audience Award: Narrative Feature Competition

Before I Disappear

03/15/2014, Stateside Theatre, 6:30 PM

Audience Award: Documentary Feature Competition

Vessel

03/15/2014, Stateside Theatre, 9:15 PM

Audience Award: Narrative Spotlight

CESAR CHAVEZ

03/15/2014, Topfer Theatre at ZACH, 9:30 PM

Audience Award: Documentary Spotlight

DamNation

03/15/2014, Topfer Theatre at ZACH, 7:00 PM

Audience Award: Visions

Yakona

03/15/2014, Alamo Ritz 1 & 2, 9:30 PM

Audience Award: Midnighters

Exists

03/15/2014, Alamo Ritz 1 & 2, Midnight

Audience Award: Episodic

Silicon Valley

03/15/2014, Vimeo Theater, 7:00 PM

Audience Award: SXGlobal

The Special Need

03/15/2014, Alamo Ritz 2, 7:00 PM

Audience Award: Festival Favorites

The Case Against 8

03/15/2014, Vimeo Theater, 9:30 PM

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