13 Feb Two Philly Filmmakers Take Home the Top Documentary Awards at Sundance

BY HANSEN BURSIC

As I braved the frigid temperatures and conservative policies of Utah last month as a Sundance Press Fellow, I saw much of what I experienced in years past—filmmakers and film lovers from all over the world descending on the tiny ski town of Park City to be among the first to watch some of the almost 150 films in the lineup, many bound to be the best independent movies of the year. As a journalist and filmmaker with Pennsylvania and Philadelphia roots, I’m always looking to celebrate Philly talent at this global film festival. Nearly every year the festival features at least one standout film from a Philly filmmaker, and this time the Philly contingent dominated in one category in particular: nonfiction.

Philly icon Questlove premiered his new Sly and the Family Stone documentary Sly Lives! (aka the Burden of Black Genius), a strong follow-up to his Oscar-winning debut feature Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised). Sly Lives! premieres on Hulu today, Thursday, February 13, 2025.

The festival also featured the premiere of the first two episodes of longtime documentary veteran Barry Levinson’s Bucks County, USA, a new five-part nonfiction series about two Bucks County teenagers on different sides of the political divide attempting to maintain a friendship through the last several years of political turmoil.

Among the biggest winners from this year’s festival, however, were Jess Devaney and Jess X. Snow, two Philadelphia-based filmmakers who helped craft the documentaries that ended up taking home some of the festival’s top prizes for nonfiction. 

Devaney served as an executive producer of Reid Davenport’s Life After, which tells the story of Elizabeth Bouvia, a disabled California woman who ignited a national debate in the 1980s over the “right to die.” The film was honored at the festival with the 2025 U.S. Documentary Special Jury Award for its “unflinching approach [which] forces us to examine our assumptions about a person’s right to die… and live,” the Sundance jury wrote in a statement. Devaney had a similar reaction when they were first pitched the film, leading to their decision to take on the project.

“ I was so moved and challenged by how [Davenport] was approaching [Bouvia’s story],” Devaney recalled, explaining that the film is so much more than a documentary on assisted dying. “Moving…to the point of really understanding the way that disabled folks are treated as second-class citizens, socially, economically, and in our medical system,  was a transformative process for me.”

Devaney moved to Philly several years ago with their partner, seeking an affordable, queer-friendly city to call home after living in New York City for many years. As the founder and president of Multitude Films, an independent production company dedicated to telling nonfiction stories by and about historically excluded and underrepresented communities, they bring some of the best nonfiction films of the year to audiences across the world, including documentaries like Power and Pray Away, streaming on Netflix, or How We Get Free and Through Our Eyes, streaming on Max.

Devaney’s endorsement of Life After led their company to take on the film, attaching producers and securing funding. Originally pitched as a short, the film quickly expanded in scope as the Multitude team worked with Davenport to create a film that didn’t do justice to only Bouvia’s story, but also to the larger movement galvanized in part by her battle for autonomy.

“ I hope it can offer an intervention and kind of paradigm shift around how we view and value disabled lives,” Devaney added.

Another standout award winner was Philly-based filmmaker Jess X. Snow, who kicked off their first Sundance with two documentary projects at the festival. They served as a cinematographer for Tadashi Nakamura’s moving personal documentary Third Act, which explores Nakamura’s relationship with his father, legendary Asian American media trailblazer Robert A. Nakamura, as he is diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease. Snow was also a producer and cinematographer for We Were The Scenery, a short documentary from Christopher Radcliff about two married Vietnamese war refugees reflecting on their experience being cast in Martin Scorsese’s Apocalypse Now.

We Were The Scenery ended up taking home the 2025 Short Film Jury Award: Nonfiction, Sundance’s top prize for documentary shorts. 

“We were in utter disbelief,” Snow said, sharing that they didn’t even have a speech prepared. They added that the film was inspired by Shuli Huang’s Will You Look at Me, which won the Short Film Jury Award for Nonfiction at Sundance in 2023. “It’s an honor to win the same award two years later.”

Snow is new to Philly, but has already gotten involved with the local independent film community. They debuted their film I Wanna Become the Sky at a collaborative cinéSPEAK and Philadelphia Asian American Film Festival event in November 2024, where they did a post-screening Q&A and vended some of their art, including stickers, shirts, and a children’s book. They are a multidisciplinary artist, and in addition to filmmaking, they work in murals, poetry, and illustration.

For Snow, We Were The Scenery was a tour de force of cinematography and producing, spanning several formats and three countries: the Philippines, Vietnam, and the United States. The result was a beautiful mesh of archival VHS footage, 2K video, and Super 8 that created the striking visuals that helped the film secure its award. 

Of course, the film was much more than just its cinematography. Snow was proud to share a nuanced documentary that offered a new take on both the refugee story and a classic film. “ Obviously, it does tell a story about survival and being war refugees, but the way [the protagonists] comment on Apocalypse Now is actually very, very humorous.” They chuckled, reflecting on the film.  “ It offers a really valuable, erased perspective on a very big part of film history.”

For both Devaney and Snow, bringing the Philly magic to Sundance is only the beginning. Snow is excited for We Were The Scenery and Third Act to continue their festival runs around the country and is looking forward to whatever is next. Devaney shares a similar goal for Life After with plans to screen the film in festivals and theaters before its broadcast debut on  Independent Lens later this year. Audiences should be on the lookout for all three of these films, which are likely to make their way back to Philadelphia sooner rather than later.

In the meantime, check out a local table reading from Jess X. Snow’s forthcoming debut feature film: When The River Split Open. This event is a fundraiser for the film, and is being co-produced by cinéSPEAK. It will take place on Wednesday, March 5, 2025 at 7 PM at The Rotunda. Make sure you follow cinéSPEAK on Instagram or subscribe to our newsletter to stay up to date with the details.

*Featured Image: Still of Gregory Dugan in Life After by Reid Davenport, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute. Photo credit: Reuters.

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Hansen Bursic is an award-winning filmmaker, journalist, and film festival programmer based between Los Angeles and Pennsylvania. A Temple University 30 Under 30 and DOC NYC Documentary New Leader, his work is focused on uplifting stories of LGBTQ+ and working-class people.