"The Rocket" Australia's Oscar entry wins AFI Fest audience award

PanARMENIAN.Net - AFI Fest announced the winners for the audience and jury awards on Wednesday, November 14, The Hollywood Reporter said.

The Rocket, Australia's foreign film Oscar submission; The Selfish Giant, made in the U.K.; We Gotta Get Out of This Place, an American indie film directed by Zeke Hawkins and Simon Hawkins; and B for Boy, a Nigerian film, received audience awards.

Grand jury awards were presented to Butter Lamp in the live-action short category, and The Places Where We Lived in the animated short category.

Special jury award winners were Balcony and Syndromeda.

Some of the award-winning films will screen again Wednesday at the Chinese 6 Theatres.

"This year, some extraordinary new artists have burst onto the scene, and we hope that these awards from the audience and the jury will enable their films to reach a wider audience," said festival director Jacqueline Lyanga in a statement. "We hope that the enthusiasm and excitement that our audiences have had for all of the films that we've shown this past week – foreign, American, Independent, experimental, short and documentary – continues and spreads."