2025 Festival Award Winners
Nwa (Black)
Nwa is a candid, emotional, coming-of-age film about Frantz, a first-generation Haitian-American boy, torn by the decision to get the haircut he knows his strict immigrant father would approve of, or a trendy cut connecting him to the Black American culture he’s warned him not to embrace.
Director: Hans Augustave
Director: Genesis Taina Luciano
The Silence After
After her mom’s death Debut is left with all her mom’s belongings leaving her to unpack her baggage.
Every year during Brazilian Carnaval, rival Samba Schools each spend millions of dollars and rely on over 3,000 team members to put on a parade that will blow the judges away and earn them a spot at the top. The Avenue opens the doors to a secretive world, exploring the intense rivalry between Samba School Barroca Zona Sul and its competitors.
Director: Michael Reichenberg, Flávia DarcieThe Avenue
Director: Jazmani Agualongo, Alexandra Garamendi, Val GutierrezEstar Aquí
Through the lens of a Latino migrant teenager in New York City, this documentary reveals his reflections on the struggle to survive and adapt to his new life.
Fear and Tremble
Director: Alci RengifoEl Salvador in 1964. The radical poet Roque Dalton (Oscar Torres), renowned for his wit and idealism, finds himself imprisoned by the secret police after returning from revolutionary Cuba. A CIA agent, Harold Swenson (Wayne Hodges), arrives to interrogate the reckless romantic with the hopes of turning him into an informant. Their standoff, surrounded by the bloody realities of an oppressive system, will be the ultimate test of the poet’s ideals and courage at a time when fear of change rules his homeland. Based on a true story.
Director: Pat Golden
I Married a Black Republican
On Election Day 2020, newly wed Grace- a staunch Bajan American Democrat - struggles with party loyalty and love when she finds out her husband is a Republican.