Sundance Winners: From 'Nanny', 'Navalny' to 'Cha Cha Real Smooth', Indie fest spreads the wealth

This year's Sundance Film Festival concluded with a virtual awards ceremony without a host, just a series of statements and videos posted via Twitter over two hours.

Nonetheless, it gave winners a chance to prepare polite, crew-inclusive acceptance speeches, reports Variety.com.

'Nanny' by first-time director Nikyatu Jusu won the top prize in the US Dramatic category

The story reveals around an undocumented immigrant struggle in caring for another mother's child to raise the funds needed to bring her son over from Senegal.

In the same category, the Audience Award went to "Cha Cha Real Smooth" featuring Cooper Raiff as an inexperienced party promoter who falls for a single mother attending many of his events (Dakota Johnson).

As the festival's top seller, 'Shithouse' was picked up for $15 million by Apple -- 1,000 times more than the debut album's budget.

The Festival Favourite was awarded to 'Navalny'.

This award, chosen by audiences throughout the festival, recognizes a late addition to the festival lineup, protected because of its political sensitivity. The documentary follows Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny as he recovers from an assassination attempt in Berlin.

As he accepted the honor, Daniel Roher said: "Navalny would be so thrilled if he knew he won the People's Choice award."

Although 'Navalny' may have been the popular choice, the US Documentary jury awarded co-directors Violet Columbus and Ben Klein's 'The Exiles,' a high-concept look at the Tiananmen Square massacre based on eyewitness testimony.

It marked a return to Sundance for veteran doc director Christine Choy.

World competition categories at the festival, once largely US-centric, have become a key launching pad for international films in recent years.

Other key international Indie winners include 'All That Breathes' and Amazon-based environmental doc 'The Territory', which paid off both with audience and jury prizes.

'Framing Agnes' won both the audience prize and the Jill Soloway Award for innovation in the next category.

Wheelchair-using filmmaker Reid Davenport, whose documentary 'I Didn't See You There' won US Documentary directing honors, said: "There are disabled artistes out there trying to get their stories heard, so I ask you -- filmmakers, industry leaders, funders, programmers, artistes -- to seek them out and to let them in."

The organizers of Sundance hoped to return this year with a hybrid virtual and in-person event after building a streaming platform in the past to host a Covid-safe version of the 2021 edition.

Sadly, they had to shift the program again due to a resurgence of infections caused by the Omicron variant -- which frustrated sponsors and filmmakers.

The festival was able to make the pivot smoothly, as the infrastructure was already in place, even if the pre-pandemic model generated little excitement or attention.