Sundance 2024 Award Winners — ‘In the Summers’ and ‘Didi’

Ever since Tuesday, I’ve been catching up with all of the Sundance 2024 titles. I’ll post a recap by Sunday. All of this to say that the award winners were announced this afternoon.

The big winner this year is Alessandra Lacorazza’s “In the Summers” which won the Grand Jury Prize (U.S. Dramatic) and the Directing Award in that category. The film, a wise and enchantingly simple tale, spans the formative years of two sisters who navigate the relationship with their loving but volatile father during yearly summer visits to his home in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

Sean Wang’s “Didi,” took the much-coveted Audience Award in the U.S. Dramatic category and a special Jury Award for Best Ensemble. This was another worthy winner, and one of my favorite films of this year’s competition, so far.

Set in 2008, during the last month of summer, before high school begins, “Didi” tackles an impressionable 13-year-old Taiwanese American boy who learns what his family can’t teach him: how to skate, how to flirt, and how to navigate the most turbulent time in a boy’s life. It’s a sweet, real and incredibly resonant film — think Bo Burnham’s “Eighth Grade.” If you love that one then you’ll be taken by “Didi.”

Jesse Eisenberg won the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award for “A Real Pain,” which was this year’s critical favorite and went on to be bought by Searchlight for a cool $10 million. I’m finally watching it tonight. Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin star as mismatched cousins David and Benji. They reunite for a tour of Poland to honor their grandmother, but older tensions resurface against the backdrop of their family’s history.

“Daughters” won the U.S. Documentary Audience Award as well as the Festival Favorite Award. Brendan Bellomo and Slava LeontyevIn’s Ukraine-set “Porcelain War” won the U.S. Documentary Category. In the World Cinema Dramatic Category, Astrid Rondero and Fernanda Valadez’s “Sujo” took the Grand Jury Prize.

The Audience Award for NEXT went to Rich Peppiatt’s “Kneecap” and the Jury Prize went to Jules Rosskam’s “Desire Lines.”