Todd Douglas Miller’s critically acclaimed Apollo 11 and Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert’s vérité film American Factory lead the non-fiction nominations for the 13th annual Cinema Eye Honors.
The Cinema Eye Honors celebrate outstanding artistry and craft in non-fiction film. The majority of this year’s honorees are nominated for the first time, and female filmmakers and craftspersons make up 40% of this year’s nominees.
Miller’s 93-minute Apollo 11 (pictured), which held its world premiere at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, features never-before-seen, large-format film footage of mission commander Neil Armstrong and pilots Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins’ 1969 moon landing. The doc was developed primarily from newly-discovered 70mm footage and more than 11,000 hours of audio recordings.
Bognar and Reichert’s 115-minute American Factory, meanwhile, looks at the opening of a General Motors factory in Ohio by a Chinese billionaire, and the culture clash that ensues as working-class America comes into contact with Chinese industry. The film also enjoyed its world premiere at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the U.S. documentary directing award and was acquired by Netflix and Higher Ground Productions, the prodco founded by former President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama.
The two films have picked up five nominations each, with both being nominated for Non-Fiction Feature, Editing, Original Score, and Audience Choice Prize categories. Apollo 11 has additionally been nominated for the Production prize, while American Factory has been named in the Direction category.
Competing alongside Apollo 11 and American Factory in the Non-Fiction Feature category are Waad al-Kateab and Edward Watt’s Syrian drama, For Sama; Ljubomir Stefanov and Tamara Kotevska’s Honeyland, a portrait of a Macedonian beekeeper; Luke Lorentzen’s MidnightFamily, about a private ambulance service in Mexico City; and Nanfu Wang and Jialing Zhang’s One Child Nation, an investigation of China’s one-child policy.
Netflix, meanwhile, led all distributors and broadcasters with a total of 17 nominations, the most in Cinema Eye history, led by the five nominations for American Factory and three for Beyonce’s Homecoming.
Neon followed closely behind with 10 nominations stemming from Apollo 11, Honeyland and The Biggest Little Farm. HBO scored nine nominations for eight of its films and series led by two nominations for its controversial Michael Jackson investigation, Leaving Neverland.
These nominees join previously announced nominees in the broadcast and ‘Shorts List’ categories.
Winners will be announced at the 2020 Awards Ceremony taking place on Jan. 6, 2020 during Cinema Eye Week at the Museum of the Moving Image in New York.
The full list of nominees follows below:
Outstanding Non-fiction Feature
American Factory
Directed and Produced by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert
Produced by Jeff Reichert and Julie Parker Benello
Apollo 11
Directed and Produced by Todd Douglas Miller
Produced by Thomas Petersen and Evan Krauss
For Sama
Directed by Waad al-Kateab and Edward Watts
Produced by Waad al-Kateab
Honeyland
Directed by Ljubomir Stefanov and Tamara Kotevska
Produced by Atanas Georgiev and Ljubomir Stefanov
Midnight Family
Directed and Produced by Luke Lorentzen
Produced by Kellen Quinn
One Child Nation
Directed and Produced by Nanfu Wang and Jialing Zhang
Produced by Christoph Jörg, Julie Goldman, Christopher Clements and Carolyn Hepburn
Outstanding Direction
American Factory
Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert
The Cave
Feras Fayyad
Cold Case Hammarskjöld
Mads Brügger
Honeyland
Ljubomir Stefanov and Tamara Kotevska
The Hottest August
Brett Story
One Child Nation
Nanfu Wang and Jialing Zhang
Outstanding Editing
17 Blocks
Jennifer Tiexiera
American Factory
Lindsay Utz
Apollo 11
Todd Douglas Miller
Letter to the Editor
Alan Berliner
Mike Wallace is Here
Billy McMillin
Outstanding Production
Aquarela
Aimara Reques, Sigrid Dyekjær and Heino Deckert
Apollo 11
Todd Douglas Miller, Thomas Petersen and Evan Krauss
The Cave
Kirstine Barfod and Sigrid Dyekjær
For Sama
Waad Al-Kateab
Midnight Family
Luke Lorentzen and Kellen Quinn
Midnight Traveler
Emelie Mahdavian and Su Kim
Outstanding Cinematography
Aquarela
Victor Kossokovsky
Anthropocene: The Human Epoch
Nicholas De Pencier
Honeyland
Fejmi Daut and Samir Ljuma
Midnight Family
Luke Lorentzen
What You Gonna Do When the World’s On Fire?
Diego Romero
Outstanding Original Score
American Factory
Chad Cannon
Anthropocene: The Human Epoch
Rose Bolton and Norah Lorway
Apollo 11
Matt Morton
Aquarela
Eicca Toppinen
Black Mother
4th Disciple
Symphony of the Ursus Factory
Dominik Strycharski
Outstanding Graphic Design or Animation
The Great Hack
Ash Thorp, Matthew Hornick and Patrick Cederberg
The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley
Hazel Baird
Moonlight Sonata: Deafness in Three Movements
Brian Kinkley and Ben Luce
Our Time Machine
Ryan Wehner
Outstanding Debut
The Disappearance of My Mother
Directed by Beniamino Barrese
Jawline
Directed by Liza Mandelup
Scheme Birds
Directed by Ellen Fiske and Ellinor Hallin
Searching Eva
Directed by Pia Hellenthal
Swarm Season
Directed by Sarah Christman
Symphony of the Ursus Factory
Directed by Jasmina Wójcik
Outstanding Non-fiction Short
Crannog
Directed by Isa Roa
Fast Horse
Directed by Alex Lazarowich
Ghosts of Sugar Land
Directed by Bassam Tariq
Lowland Kids
Directed by Sandra Winther
Stay Close
Directed by Luther Clement and Shuhan Fan
Subject to Review
Directed by Theo Anthony
Audience Choice Prize
17 Blocks
Directed by Davy Rothbart
The Amazing Johnathan Documentary
Directed by Ben Berman
American Factory
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert
Apollo 11
Directed by Todd Douglas Miller
Ask Dr. Ruth
Directed by Ryan White
The Biggest LIttle Farm
Directed by John Chester
The Cave
Directed by Feras Fayyad
For Sama
Directed by Waad Al-Kateab and Edward Watts
Knock Down the House
Directed by Rachel Lears
Maiden
Directed by Alex Holmes
Spotlight
Always in Season
Directed by Jacqueline Olive
Bellingcat: Truth in a Post-Truth World
Directed by Hans Pool
Dark Suns
Directed by Julien Elie
Present.Perfect
Directed by Shengze Zhu
The Raft
Directed by Marcus Lindeen