Verzió’s awards are divided into four categories: Best Human Rights Film, Best International Documentary, Doc Future Award, Best Hungarian Documentary, plus an Audience Award.
The Best Human Rights Film was “Cutting Through Rocks” (directed by Sara Khaki and Mohammadreza Eyni), which received the prestigious Sundance Grand Jury Prize.
The film portrays a woman’s struggle against the Iranian patriarchy. As the first elected councilwoman of her Iranian village, Sara Shahverdi aims to break long-held traditions by training teenage girls to ride motorcycles and stopping child marriages. When accusations arise questioning Sara’s intentions to empower the girls, her identity is put in turmoil.
In the international competition, “9-month Contract” (directed by Ketevan Vashagashvili) was voted best film. Zhana is a single Georgian mother whose only chance to give her teenage daughter Elene a better life is to become a surrogate, renting her womb for USD 14,000 to childless foreign couples as her health deteriorates and the future for her and her daughter is threatened.
Giving the award, Verzió’s jury said, “With unobtrusive cinematography and finely balanced editing, the film allows gestures, silences, and the tender bond between a mother and her daughter to carry the emotional weight of the story.”
Directed by Danial Shah, an independent documentary photographer and filmmaker from Pakistan based in Brussels, “Make It Look Real” won in the Doc Future category. “We would like to award a film that shows us how to reimagine ourselves and reality through the lens of a camera,” the jury said.
Set in a Pakistani photo studio that serves as a vibrant cultural hub where personal dreams and community connections are brought to life through photography, the film explores the aesthetics and economics of image-making.
Lea Podhradská is the director of “My Father’s Daughter,” which will appear in local cinemas soon and won the prize for Best Hungarian Documentary. Podhradská describes the film to me as “an intimate, family-focused psychological journey, in which I search for my sister who disappeared 27 years ago, while trying to find an answer to the question of why no one ever looked for her.”
The jury awarded “My Father’s Daughter” the prize “for its elegant blend of personal investigation, poetic and raw emotions.”
Podhradská tells me she had never planned to become a director, but had been writing since she was a child.
“I was always drawn to the interplay of story, character, and conflict. I loved observing how people behave and how they respond to one another. Only later did I realize that this way of thinking is essentially the same mindset that filmmaking draws upon,” she says.
“Film speaks the language of everyday life. For me, filmmaking is the most organic way to understand the world and connect with others, to try to understand and convey questions like why do things happen, and what moves people,” Podhradská continues.
Speaking about the award, Podhradská says she and her crew felt truly honored and deeply moved. However, she also admitted, “At the same time, an interesting question arose: what does it even mean to choose one film among so many strong,diverse voices, each so different in subject and execution?”
Among Podhradská’s next projects, she’s keen to highlight “Goats and Other Sacred Things,” a political satire inspired by the Czechoslovak New Wave, for which she received a screenwriting grant. The story is based on the legend of a village that moved its church to protect it when the Danube burst its banks.
The winner of the Audience Award, “Don’t Worry, Sári!” by Sára Haragonics, uses present-day footage, family archives, voice messages, and dreams to tell the story of Haragonics’ attempts to keep her family together six years after her mother’s death.
In the 1980s, Haragonics’ mother was obsessed with VHS cameras. As she takes on her mother’s role, she realizes she’s inherited not just her filmmaking ambitions but her compulsion to solve other people’s problems.
Haragonics believes her autobiographical documentary reflects a love of movies inherited from her mom, who wanted to be a filmmaker. She made her first documentary as part of a high school project aged 18. Studying in the United Kingdom afterwards, two of her teachers inspired her to think more seriously about making documentaries.
“Of course, the cherry on top came at the University of Theater and Film Arts, Budapest and becoming a real filmmaker,” Haragonics tells me.
Her favorite part of documentary making is what she calls “creative challenges.” Overcoming these is when real filmmaking begins. Judging by the audience reaction at the Verzió screening, Haragonics overcame whatever obstacles she faced.
“Even though the film talks about difficult things and the starting point is grief and dealing with life after that, it stays light,” Haragonics explains.
“Because it’s about a family, people recognize themselves and identify with us. The audience laughed and cried at the same time. We knew there was humor in the film, but never hoped that people would resonate with it so much. I’m very happy about receiving the award, as it is the best feedback.”
For Verzió, festival director Enikő Gyureskó said, “We’re truly happy that audiences once again embraced the opportunity for interaction. The 8,000 participants who attended screenings and accompanying events in Budapest and across the country show the strength of Verzió.”
This article was first published in the Budapest Business Journal print issue of January 16, 2026.
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