Vail Film Festival announces 2016 award winners

VAIL — The 13th annual Vail Film Festival, which took place Thursday through Sunday in Vail, recently announced the official award recipients for this year’s festival.

“We are tremendously proud of this year’s film program, which received rave reviews from attending guests and filmmakers. We’d like to congratulate the 2016 award winners and all of our filmmakers for their outstanding work,” said Scott Cross, Vail Film Festival co-director. “The 2016 Vail Film Festival was a great success. We are thankful to the filmmakers, patrons, volunteers, staff and sponsors for their generous support.”

Award winners

During the Vail Film Festival Awards Ceremony on Saturday evening, closing night of this year’s festival, two achievement awards were given. Madison Davenport, one of Hollywood’s leading young stars, was honored with the Rising Star Award.

Davenport is already an industry veteran, having begun building her resume at the age of 7. This past holiday season, she was seen in the Universal comedy “Sisters” opposite Tina Fey and Amy Phoehler. Also in 2015, she had the lead role opposite Taryn Manning (“Orange is the New Black”) in the indie feature “A Light Beneath Their Feet,” directed by Valerie Weiss.

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Actress Karen Allen was honored with The Vanguard Award. Allen stars in “Year By The Sea,” which made its world premiere at the Vail Film Festival and was given the Audience Award. Allen is a highly acclaimed screen and stage actor and director whose vast film repertoire includes such blockbusters as “Animal House,” “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” “The Glass Menagerie,” “The Sandlot,” “The Perfect Storm,” “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” and more.

Film winners

The 2016 Vail Film Festival jurors recognized outstanding films in the following categories:

• Best Narrative Feature: “The Rainbow Kid” (Colorado premiere). Directed by Kire Paputts and starring Dylan Harman, Krystal Nausbaum, Julian Richings and Nicholas Campbell, “The Rainbow Kid” follows Eugene, a young man with Down syndrome who embarks on a life-altering journey to find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

• Best Documentary: “Speed Sisters.” This Palestinian film, directed by Amber Fares, documents the first all-women racecar driving team in the Middle East, a group of women who are bold, fearless and tearing up tracks all over Palestine.

• Best Short: “My Enemy, My Brother.” “My Enemy, My Brother,” directed by Ann Shin, follows Zahed and Najah, two former enemies from the Iran-Iraq War who become blood brothers for life. Twenty-five years after one saves the other’s life on the battlefield, they meet again by sheer chance in Canada.

• Best Student: “Manoman.” Directed by Simon Cartwright, “Manoman” follows Glen, who in a desperate attempt to tap into his masculinity attends a primal scream therapy session, where even surrounded by wailing men he cannot make a sound. When he finally lets out a miniature version of himself, it does whatever it wants, regardless of the consequences.

• Audience Award: “Year By The Sea.” “Year By The Sea” follows an empty-nester (Allen) who retreats to Cape Cod hoping to reclaim who she was before marriage and children. Directed by Alexander Janko, the film is based on author Joan Anderson’s New York Times best-selling memoir of the same name.

For more information about the Vail Film Festival, visit http://www.vailfilm festival.com.