Montclair Film has announced the winners of the festival’s 2025 Montclair Film Festival’s competitions. This year’s festival featured three competitive categories: Fiction, Documentary, and Future/ Now. Additionally, the Fiction and Documentary juries also awarded films for the festival’s Short Film competitions. The MFF also announced the festival’s 2025 Audience Awards and Junior Jury prizes.
Feature Film Jury Awards
SIRÂT directed by Oliver Laxe, was awarded the festival’s Fiction Feature Prize.
The Fiction Feature Competition featured A POET directed by Simón Mesa Soto, SENTIMENTAL VALUE directed by Joachim Trier, SIRÂT directed by Oliver Laxe, SOUND OF FALLING directed by Mascha Schilinski, and TWO PROSECUTORSdirected by Sergei Loznitsa.
The Fiction jury was composed of Bill Curran (Producer, Sundance Film Festival and Public Programming), Kameron Austin Collins (Film Critic and Programmer), and Ryan Lattanzio (Executive Editor, IndieWire)
****
BLKNWS: TERMS & CONDITIONS directed by Kahlil Joseph and SEEDS directed by Brittany Shyne shared the festival’s Bruce Sinofsky Award for the Documentary Feature Competition, the festival’s top documentary competition prize.
In a joint statement, members of the jury said, “We believe that sharing this award aligns with the spirit of these two films, which reject hierarchy and are infused with anarchic documentary filmmaking traditions. BLKNWS: TERMS & CONDITIONS and SEEDS push the form by treating the archives as a fugitive space and restoring faith in the image. In a time when the past is being violently contested, directors who approach its preservation with ingenuity and creativity deserve to be recognized equally.”
The Documentary Feature Competition featured BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions directed by Kahlil Joseph, COVER-UP directed by Laura Poitras and Mark Obenhaus, CUTTING THROUGH ROCKS directed by Sara Khaki and Mohammadreza Eyni, LOVE+WAR directed by Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, and SEEDS directed by Brittany Shyne.
The Documentary Feature Competition Jury was composed of Giselle Bailey (Director and Producer), Lovia Gyarkye (Editor at Hammer & Hope, a magazine of Black politics and culture), and Nicolas Rapold (Critic, Podcaster The Last Thing I Saw, and Author, The Worlds of Hayao Miyazaki)
****
MAD BILLS TO PAY: (OR DESTINY, DILE QUE NO SOY MALO) directed by Joel Alfonso Vargas won the Future/Now Competition and the $5000 The Mark Urman Award For Fiction Filmmaking, honoring early career filmmakers. This award was established in 2019 in memory of the film distribution executive Mark Urman, a longtime Montclair resident, and funded through Montclair Film’s Mark Urman Award Fund. The Future/Now Jury also awarded a Special Jury Prize for Performance to John Magaro for OMAHA.
The Future/Now Competition featured BLUE FILM directed by Elliot Tuttle, FANTASY LIFE directed by Matthew Shear, MAD BILLS TO PAY: (OR DESTINY, DILE QUE NO SOY MALO) directed by Joel Alfonso Vargas, OMAHA directed by Cole Webley, and REBUILDING directed by Max Walker-Silverman.
The Future/Now jury was composed of Amanda Trokan (SVP Acquisitions, 1-2 Special), Matthew Jackett (Programmer and Programming Manager, Hamptons International Film Festival), and Tony Maglio (TV Editor, The Hollywood Reporter)
****
Audience Awards
The Audience Award for Fiction Feature was awarded to SENTIMENTAL VALUE directed by Joachim Trier
The Audience Award for Documentary Feature was awarded to COME SEE ME IN THE GOOD LIGHT directed by Ryan White
The Audience Award for World Cinema was awarded to IT WAS JUST AN ACCIDENT directed by Jafar Panahi
The Audience Award for Short Film was awarded to ALL THE EMPTY ROOMS directed by Joshua Seftel.
****
Short Film Jury Awards
THE SENTRY directed by Jake Wachtel, won the festival’s Fiction Short Film Competition.
OH WHALE directed by Winslow Crane-Murdoch, won the festival’s Documentary Short Film Competition, with a Special Jury Prize awarded to THE LONG VALLEY directed by Robert Machoian, Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck.
STANDBY directed by Robert Gomes, won the festival’s New Jersey Shorts Competition, with a Special Jury Prize awarded to BRENDA directed by Jasmine Wang, Danny Monico. The Competition featured films in the fiction and non-fiction categories from New Jersey.
The Shorts jury was composed of: Addie Morfoot (Contributing Reporter for The New York Times and Variety), Kathleen Chalfant (Actor), and Rachel Martens (co-host of the Lost in Jersey podcast)
****
Junior Jury
The 2025 Montclair Film Festival’s Junior Jury included fifteen area high school students representing twelve area schools. The Junior Jury awarded their top prize to BUGONIA directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, with a Special Jury Prize for Debut Feature to Akinola Davies Jr. for MY FATHER’S SHADOW.
In a statement the Junior Jury said “We would like to recognize BUGONIA for its visual, emotional, and social impact on audiences. This film stood out with its unique execution of important themes relating to today’s climate and humanitarian crisis. The Junior Jury is thrilled to bestow BUGONIA with the Best Film Award.
We are also proud to present a Special Jury Award for Debut Feature to Akinola Davies Jr. for MY FATHER’S SHADOW, which captures a tumultuous time in Nigerian history through a lens that is heartfelt and authentic to the viewer. Davies guides us through the streets of Lagos and presents a childlike sense of wonder with each performance. Congratulations and we wish you all the best in your future endeavors.”
The 2025 Montclair Film Festival Junior Jury participants were Luca Almeida (Montclair High), Olivia Bayuelo (Mount Saint Dominic Academy), Isabella Chen (Madison High), William Craig (Hackensack High), Nicolas Dauzier (Seton Hall Prep), Rho Epstein (Newark Academy), Benjamin Fertig (Glen Ridge High), Mekhi Freeman (North Star Academy), Layla Gifted (Woodbridge High), Stephanie Liao (Princeton High), Freddie Muston (Summit High), Alec Potolsky (New Providence High), Jayla Rubio (Bloomfield High), Maxwell Talbot (Seton Hall Prep), Nour Tanta (Passaic County Tech).
****
“We are honored to have had the opportunity to share the work of these incredible artists at the Montclair Film Festival,” said Montclair Film Artistic Director Tom Hall. “We thank our amazing jurors for their passionate engagement with our program, congratulate our award winning filmmakers, and celebrate the work of every filmmaker in the festival, each of whom has made a critically important contribution to the art of film. We look forward to continuing to build community and connection throughout the year in our cinemas, supporting these films, and the work of filmmakers from around the world.”
