PARK CITY — "Primer," an enigmatic feature that the filmmaker said was "shot for about the price of a used car," garnered prizes and cash during Saturday night's awards ceremony at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival.
Writer, director and co-star Shane Carruth won two prizes for his tale of four men who invent a machine with nearly limitless powers: the Grand Jury Prize for best dramatic feature and the Alfred P. Sloan Prize, an award designed to "increase the visibility of outstanding independent films on science and technology," which includes a $20,000 cash award.
Director Ondi Timmoner's "DIG!" which looks at a pair of Northwest rock acts — the Dandy Warhols and the Brian Jonestown Massacre — took home Sundance's documentary Grand Jury Prize.
Winning Audience Awards as the festival's most popular films were Ross Kauffman and Zana Brisky's documentary "Born Into Brothels" and Joshua Marston's drama "Maria Full of Grace."
Audience Awards for World Cinema went to the French-Canadian comedy "Seducing Doctor Lewis" and the documentary, "The Corporation."
Filmmaker Morgan Spurlock won the documentary-directing award for "Super Size Me," while Debra Granik won the dramatic-directing award for "Down to the Bone."
Cinematographers Ferne Pearlstein and Nancy Schreiber won the Excellence in Cinematography Award for their work on, respectively, the documentary "Imelda" and dramatic feature "November."
Receiving the festival's Freedom of Expression Award, given each year to a documentary that "informs and educates the public" on social and political issues, was the South Korean feature "Repatriation." The documentary "Farmingville" took home a Special Jury Prize.
Sundance's Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award went to screenwriter Larry Gross for the drama "We Don't Live Here Anymore." And in the dramatic competition, Special Jury Prizes also went to "Brother to Brother" and actress Vera Farmiga for her performance in "Down to the Bone."
Almost as important, several of the award winners also secured distribution deals during the festival, including "Maria Full of Grace," "Super Size Me" and "We Don't Live Here Anymore."
Actress Zooey Deschanel, who appeared in the festival selection "Eulogy," co-hosted the ceremony with actor Jake Gyllenhaal.
The Sundance awards event, which was held at the Park City Racquet Club, was tape-delayed broadcast Saturday night on the Sundance Channel (available to some pay-cable and satellite subscribers).
Audience Awards were voted on by those attending the 10-day festival, and jury awards were determined by five separate panels that included actors Danny Glover and Maggie Gyllenhaal, as well as filmmakers Chris Smith, Lisa Cholodenko and Neil Labute.
Special programs of some of the award-winning films are scheduled for this evening in Park City and on Monday at the Westates Trolley Corners Cinemas in Salt Lake City. Titles and show times had not been announced at press time but were to be posted early today on the festival Web site: www.sundance.org.
E-MAIL: jeff@desnews.com