Irish Abroad: Room wins audience award at Hamptons International Film Festival

The 23rd Hamptons International Film Festival, which ran over the weekend in the Hamptons New York has announced its award winners, with Lenny Abrahamson’s Room receiving yet another audience award for Favourite Feature Film.

The Michael Moore-directed documentary Where To Invade Next won the audiences prize for Favourite Documentary Features, while there were wins in the competition categories for Iceland’s Oscar entry Rams in Narrative Feature, Jorn Threlfall’s Over in Narrative Short, with Documentary Shor going to Last Day of Freedom, from Dee Hibbert-Jones and Nomi Talisman.

Room sees writer Emma O’Donoghue adapt her own best-selling novel, which is told from the perspective of a five-year-old boy, Jack, who is being held captive in a small room along with his mother. To him the room is his world, but his mother knows different having been held there for 7 years.

The film stars Brie Larson (Short Term 12, The Spectacular Now), Jacob Tremblay (The Smurfs 2, Somnia), Joan Allen (The Bourne Supremacy, Nixon) and William H. Macy (Shameless, Magnolia). The film also features Sean Bridgers (Rectify), Tom McCamus (The Samaritan) and Megan Park (What If). Room is an Element Pictures and No Trace Camping production, in association with Telefilm Canada, Film4, and Bord Scannán na hÉireann/the Irish Film Board. It will be released in Irish cinemas on January 15th.

The Hamptons International Film Festival was founded to celebrate Independent film—long, short, fiction and documentary—and to introduce a unique and varied spectrum of international films and filmmakers to New York audiences. The festival has screened the eventual Best Picture Oscar winner in 6 of the last 7 years (including Birdman in 2014) and attracts over 25,000 visitors to theatres across the picturesque New York communities of East Hampton, Southampton, Montauk, and Sag Harbor.

full list of winners:

HIFF Award Winner for Best Narrative Feature sponsored by The Wall Street Journal
Rams – directed by Grimur Hákonarson

Honorable Mention for Narrative Feature
Embrace of the Serpent – directed by Ciro Guerra

HIFF Award Winner for Best Documentary Feature sponsored by ID Films
Missing People – directed by David Shapiro

Honorable Mention for Documentary Feature
Chuck Norris Vs. Communism – directed by Ilinca Calugareanu

Audience Award for Feature Film
Room – directed by Lenny Abrahamson

Audience Award for Documentary Film
Where To Invade Next – directed by Michael Moore

HIFF Award Winner for Best Narrative Short Film sponsored by The Wall Street Journal
Over – directed by Jörn Threlfall

Honorable Mention for Narrative Short Film
Patriot – directed by Eva Riley

HIFF Award Winner for Best Documentary Short Film sponsored by ID Films
Last Day of Freedom – directed by Dee Hibbert-Jones, Nomi Talisman

Victor Rabinowitz and Joanne Grant Award for Social Justice
The Uncondemned – directed by Michele Mitchell, Nick Louvel

Tangerine Entertainment Juice Fund Award
Suffragette – directed by Sarah Gavron

Suffolk County Film Commission Next Exposure Grant
When I Live My Life Over Again – directed by Robert Edwards

The 2015 Brizzolara Family Foundation Award for a Film of Conflict and Resolution
The Uncondemned – directed by Michele Mitchell, Nick Louvel

The Zelda Penzel “Giving Voice to the Voiceless” Award: Dedicated to Those Who Suffer in Silence
“The Champions,” directed by Darcy Dennett