Full Frame Documentary Film Festival


The Full Frame Documentary Film Festival is an annual international event dedicated to the theatrical exhibition of non-fiction cinema.
The festival is a program of the Center for Documentary Studies, a non-profit, 501 at Duke University, and receives support from corporate sponsors, private foundations, and individual donors whose generosity provides the foundation that makes the event possible. The Presenting Sponsor of the Festival is Duke University. Additional sponsors include: A&E IndieFilms, Academy of Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences, National Endowment for the Arts, Merge Records, Whole Foods, ilili Hospitality Group, and the City of Durham.
The festival began in 1998 with no more than a few hundred patrons and has grown tremendously since then. Full Frame is now considered to be one of the premier documentary film festivals in the United States. The Festival was founded by Nancy Buirski, a Pulitzer Prize-winning photo editor of The New York Times and documentary filmmaker.
Full Frame became a qualifying festival for the Producers Guild of America Award for Best Documentary in 2012, and a qualifying festival for the Academy Award for Best Documentary in 2013.
Full Frame also presents documentary work in other venues both locally and nationally, partnering with organizations like the American Tobacco Historic District/Capitol Broadcasting Company, Des Moines Art Center, Duke University, the IFC Center, the International Affairs Council of North Carolina, the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, the National Association of Latino Independent Producers, PNC Financial Services, Rooftop Films, and the University of North Carolina School System.
Attendees have included Michael Moore, D. A. Pennebaker, Martin Scorsese, Danny DeVito, Ken Burns, Joan Allen, Al Franken, and Steve James.

Curated series

Each year the festival invites a member of the documentary filmmaking community to curate a series of films on a specific topic. The curated series have included:
From 1998 to 2011, the festival presented a filmmaker with the Full Frame Career Award. In 2012, this award was changed to the Full Frame Tribute. Past recipients include:
Occasionally, the festival honors an industry member who has made important contributions to the field with the Full Frame Industry Award. Past recipients include:
The festival offers a number of prizes at each festival.
The prizes awarded at the 2016 festival were:
Past Grand Jury Award winners are: