Documentary on London surgeon wins award

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By Randall Mikkelsen

SILVER SPRING, Md (Reuters) - Films about a British neurosurgeon in Ukraine, a U.S. banjo player seeking the instrument’s African roots and a battle over a community garden in a poor Los Angeles neighbourhood were top winners at the Silverdocs documentary festival on Sunday.

"The Garden," by director Scott Hamilton Kennedy, won a Sterling award for best U.S. feature. It depicted the fight to save a 14-acre garden, which blossomed after the 1992 Los Angeles riots, from a developer who bought the land.

"The Garden has raw emotion, visceral energy, and nail-biting twists and turns. It unravels a complex and layered tale of the destruction of America’s largest urban farm that must not be forgotten," the jury citation said. The movie premiered at Silverdocs.

The festival, now in its sixth year, has become a major showcase of documentary films. It is sponsored by the American Film Institute and Discovery Communications. The winners were chosen from among 108 films from 63 countries.

Silverdocs also awarded a Sterling prize for best international feature to "The English Surgeon," by director Geoffrey Smith.

It follows South London neurosurgeon Henry Marsh, who spends several weeks each year working in Ukraine and teaching a local friend, Dr. Igor Kurilets. The two work under primitive conditions .....continued below

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The prize jury called the movie "the most poignant and inspiring film we saw, a film that profiles two human beings who dare to step outside the system to do something extraordinary."

"Throw Down Your Heart," featuring U.S. banjo player Bela Fleck, won the festival’s music documentary award. It chronicles Fleck’s trip to Uganda, Tanzania, Gambia and Mali to seek to origins of his instrument. It was directed by Fleck’s younger brother, Sascha Paladino.

In a year that featured several documentaries chronicling China’s rise, "The Red Race," depicting an athletic school where young gymnastics with gold-medal visions train relentlessly, won an honourable mention in the international category.

The legacy of Hurricane Katrina, which captured the interest of filmmakers including Spike Lee and Jonathan Demme, was the topic of the U.S. feature honourable mention film, "Trouble the Water."

Other prize winners included "Pray the Devil Back to Hell," about a Liberian women’s movement to end that country’s civil war, "Kassim the Dream," about a former Ugandan child soldier who became a U.S. boxer, and "The Elephant in the Living Room," about wild animals kept as pets in the United States.