Sundance 2011: ‘Like Crazy’ the big winner at festival prizes
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The jury at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival has given its grand jury U.S. dramatic prize to Drake Doremus’ ‘Like Crazy,’ a story of a long-distance romance starring Anton Yelchin and Felicity Jones.
The prize, the festival’s highest honor, was the second for the film this evening; the jury previously handed a special prize to Jones.
It also awarded the grand jury U.S. documentary prize to Peter D. Richardson’s ‘How to Die in Oregon,’ a story of the first state to legalize physician-assisted suicide.
In accepting the dramatic prize, Doremus said that ‘this movie is about love, and love never dying and being with you for the rest of your life.’ Then he thanked his agent. ‘Oh, and Paramount Pictures -- thanks for buying the movie.’ (The studio acquired rights to the film a week ago and will release it later this year.)
Matt Groening presented the grand jury documentary prize and thanked the festival for inviting him to participate despite a ‘Simpsons’ episode that once mocked the festival for the presence of ‘Parker Posey’ and ‘Parka poseurs.’
The audience at the festival gave its top U.S. dramatic prize to Maryam Keshavarz’s ‘Circumstance,’ a Farsi-language look at a pair of teenage lesbians in contemporary Iran, and its top U.S. documentary prize to Cindy Meehl’s ‘Buck,’ the story of a real-life horse whisperer.
Four films won a pair of jury prizes: in addition to ‘Like Crazy,’ Paddy Considine’s ‘Tyrannosaur,’ Mike Cahill’s ‘Another Earth’ and Danfung Dennis’ doc ‘Hell and Back Again’ each were given two prizes.
For more details, see our sister blog, Awards Tracker.
-- Steven Zeitchik and Mark Olsen in Park City, Utah
