IDA Documentary Awards: ‘The Tale of Silyan’ Wins Best Feature

The Tale of Silyan clinched the top prize at Saturday’s International Documentary Association Awards ceremony.

The National Geographic title, which follows a North Macedonian immigrant who forms a relationship with an injured white stork as he adjusts to life in a new country, received the best feature documentary award. The film also won the best cinematography prize for Jean Dakar, who has previously worked on the feature The Walk and the television series Radius.

The film, directed by Oscar-nominated Honeyland director Tamara Kotevska, previously won the Cinema and Arts award at the Venice Film Festival. North Macedonia has selected the title as its best international feature Oscar submission.

Other winners at Saturday’s ceremony included Brittany Shyne, who won the best director prize for her portrait of Black farmers, Seeds. Apocalypse in the Tropics, an examination of the role that evangelism has played in Brazilian politics, received two prizes, for best production and best writing.

Other winners included Looking for a Donkey (best short documentary), WTO/99 (best editing),
The Sorcerer: Julio Zachrisson (best original score) and Only on Earth (best sound design). 99 won best curated series, Citizen Nation was awarded best episodic series and One to One: John & Yoko won best music documentary.

What a day, what a life out of the U.K.’s National Film and Television School, earned the best student documentary prize. Deaf President Now! won the ABC News Videosource Award and River of Grass was awarded the Pare Lorentz Award.

The 2025 IDA Awards took place over three days but concluded with the ceremony on early Saturday at the Los Angeles Athletic Club in downtown L.A. The ceremony was hosted by former Sundance Film Festival director Tabitha Jackson.

See the full list of winners below.

BEST FEATURE DOCUMENTARY

The Tale of Silyan (Republic of North Macedonia, United States, United Kingdom)

BEST SHORT DOCUMENTARY

Looking for a Donkey (Mexico, Venezuela)

BEST DIRECTOR

Brittany Shyne, Seeds (United States)

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

Jean Dakar,The Tale of Silyan (Republic of North Macedonia, United States, United Kingdom)

BEST EDITING

Alex Megaro, Ian Bell, WTO/99 (United States)

BEST ORIGINAL MUSIC SCORE