Sundance 2025 Awards: ‘Atropia’ and ‘Seeds’ Take Jury Prizes, Dylan O’Brien-Led ‘Twinless’ Wins Audience Award
Awards for the 2025 Sundance Film Festival were handed out on Friday morning, with the Dylan O’Brien-fronted dark comedy “Twinless” taking home the audience award in the U.S. Dramatic Competition category. The film, which received a warm response upon its debut at the beginning of the festival, hails from writer/director/co-star James Sweeney and follows two strangers who meet in a twin bereavement support group. O’Brien also won a special jury award for acting for his work in the film.
Writer/director Hailey Gates’ “Atropia” won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize in the Dramatic category, scoring top honors for a film that started life as a documentary. Produced by Luca Guadagnino, the film stars Alia Shawkat as an aspiring actress in a military role-playing facility who falls in love with a soldier cast as an insurgent. Callum Turner, Chloë Sevigny and Tim Heidecker co-star.
The U.S. Grand Jury Prize in the Documentary category went to Brittany Shyne’s “Seeds,” which explores Black generational farmers in the South. In her positive review, TheWrap critic Ronda Racha Penrice called the film a “visual love letter to the Black, rural South.”
The audience award for documentary went to “André Is an Idiot,” which follows a man who’s dying because he didn’t get a colonoscopy.
Elsewhere, “The Perfect Neighbor” filmmaker Geeta Gandbhir won the directing award in the U.S. Documentary category for her shocking film that uses police bodycam footage to tell the deadly story of Florida’s Stand Your Ground laws. “Ricky” filmmaker Rashad Frett won the directing award for U.S. Dramatic, while “Sorry, Baby” writer/director/star Eva Victor won the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award in U.S. Dramatic for her acclaimed feature debut.
The awards come as this year’s Sundance has been slower in acquisitions. Only two films have sold so far: Neon picked up the Midnight title “Together,” while Netflix acquired the Joel Edgerton drama “Train Dreams.”
This year’s Festival jury included: Reinaldo Marcus Green, Arian Moayed, and Celine Song for the U.S. Dramatic Competition; Steven Bognar, Vinnie Malhotra, and Marcia Smith for the U.S. Documentary Competition; Ava Cahen, Wanuri Kahiu, and Daniel Kaluuya for the World Cinema Dramatic Competition; Daniela Alatorre, Laura Kim, and Kevin Macdonald for the World Cinema Documentary Competition; Kaniehtiio Horn, Maggie Mackay, and Kibwe Tavares for the Short Film Program Competition; and Elijah Wood for the NEXT section.
The Audience Award: World Cinema Documentary, Presented by United Airlines was awarded to Prime Minister / U.S.A. (Directors: Michelle Walshe, Lindsay Utz, Producers: Cass Avery, Leon Kirkbeck, Gigi Pritzker, Rachel Shane, Katie Peck) — A view inside the life of former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, capturing her through five tumultuous years in power and beyond as she redefined leadership on the world stage. World Premiere. Available online for Public.
