Cinema Eye, the organization behind the annual Cinema Eye Honors recognizing artistic excellence in documentary, announced today that they will present a new award for Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Filmmaking for Television at their 7th Annual awards in January 2014.
“It’s wonderful to be able to open up the awards to more documentaries,” said Charlotte Cook, the Chair of the Cinema Eye Nominations Committee and the Director of Programming at the Hot Docs Film Festival in Toronto. “Recognizing the huge role television plays, and has always played, in the ability for people to see this incredible work means we can continue to honor the best filmmakers working in this art form today.”
To be eligible, films must be longer than 31 minutes and have aired for the first time on a television network between September 1, 2012 and August 31, 2013. The film must have been funded, supported and overseen by a television network during the film’s development, production or post-production. Films acquired after after a completed cut are ineligible for this award. Films do not need to be eligible for Cinema Eye’s long-standing craft awards (see list here) to be eligible for the new television award. Film submissions for this new award close on Friday, August 2, 2013.
“Some of our best filmmakers have been creating exceptional nonfiction work for television, but previously, many of those films have been ineligible for our awards, as our process relied on festival and theatrical screenings to qualify,” said Cinema Eye Founding Director AJ Schnack. “We’re incredibly excited to take this step toward acknowledging the incredible work being created and the networks that support these artists.”
The Cinema Eye Honors were launched in 2007 as the first international award to recognize the various crafts involved in creating nonfiction film, including direction, production, editing, cinematography, composing and graphic design/animation. The new award for work made for television will jointly recognize the director(s), producer(s) and network executive(s) responsible the nominated films.
Nominations for the new television award will be made by a jury of film and television critics and will be announced along with Cinema Eye’s regular slate of nominees in a number of artistic craft categories this fall.