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The Shine Global Resilience Awards recognize and celebrate the films and filmmakers that highlight the resilience and strength of children in the face of adversity. Winning films showcase children overcoming challenges, such as poverty, violence, illness, and discrimination, and demonstrate their resilience, courage, and determination. Shine Global has partnered with several festivals to award prizes throughout the year and will also present a grand prize of $10,000 at our 20th Anniversary Celebration in New York City this September. For 2025, Shine Global has paused the grand prize open call process and is reviewing a curated group of films.
2025 Shine Global Resilience Award Winners
Savages
*Winner of the Unstoppable Kids Prize for family-friendly films at the 2025 New York International Children’s Film Festival*
The film follows 11-year-old Keria who lives on the edge of Borneo’s tropical rainforest with her father, where deforestation is rampant. Her life is upended when she adopts an orphaned baby orangutan and her Penan cousin, Selaï, comes to stay.
Directed by Claude Barras | Screenwriters: Claude Barras, Catherine Paille, Nancy Huston, Morgan Navarro | Producer: Nicolas Burlet | 87 min | Switzerland, France, Belgium | 2024
DJ Ahmet
*Winner of Children’s Resilience in Screenwriting Award at 2025 Nantucket Film Festival*
DJ Ahmet follows Ahmet, a 15-year-old boy from a remote Yuruk village in North Macedonia, who finds refuge in music while navigating his father’s expectations, a conservative community, and his first experience with love — a girl already promised to someone else.
Written and Directed by Georgi Unkovski | Produced by Ivan Unkovski, Ivana Shekutkoska | 99 min | Croatia, Czech Republic, North Macedonia, Serbia | 2025
Laurie J. Gardiner
*Winner Children’s Resilience in Disability Stories Screenwriting Award at 2025 ReelAbilities Film Festival*
The script for proposal for Remedial follows Will, a young boy struggling in the aftermath of his father’s accident. At his new school, Will’s behavior spirals, plagued by memories of the accident and a crippling fear of drowning. While his mother battles her own grief, she fails to see Will’s PTSD. As his grip on reality slips, Will’s frantic need to preserve his father’s memory leads to violent outbursts, leaving his teacher to wrongly diagnose him with ADHD.
Comparsa
*Winner Children’s Resilience in Documentary Prize at 2025 Sheffield DocFest*
Comparsa is a stirring portrait of two teen sisters in Ciudad Peronia, Guatemala who, in the wake of their friends murder and a backdrop of unchecked violence against women and girls, stage a carnival street parade and public performance as a protest. Through their courageous, art-driven resistance, they fight for the safety and freedom of women and girls and a new way for their community to come together.
Directed by Vickie Curtis and Doug Anderson | Producers Olivia Ahnemann, Anna Hadingham, Vickie Curtis, Doug Anderson| 79 min | USA, Guatemala | 2025
In Case You Forgot
*Winner of the Shine Global Resilience Award for Young Filmmakers at Montclair Film*
In “In Case You Forgot,” a high school senior receives a letter from his fifth-grade self, offering a poignant and heartfelt look at growing up—the challenges of changing friendships, college and academic pressures, shifting dreams, and struggles with mental health as the world’s complexities are more felt.
Directed, written, and produced by Jackson Provan and Henry Slater | 4 min | USA | 2025
Ebony Blanding
*2025 Shine Global Children’s Resilience Flaherty Seminar Fellow*
Ebony Blanding is a writer and director with deep Southern roots and a passion for telling the stories of Black people navigating the world and internal discoveries. She explores the complexities and possibilities of Blackness and female relationships on screen through narrative, experimental and documentary film.
Jury Members
Previous Resilience Award Jury Members include:
Jill Burkhart, VP of Unscripted Programming for MGM+
Maria Perez Brown, Head of Kids & Family, TIME Studios
Anita Chandra, VP and Director of Social and Economic Well-Being, RAND Corporation
Tyler Coates, Awards Editor at The Hollywood Reporter
Scott Feinberg, Executive Editor of Awards Coverage at The Hollywood Reporter
Amy Kennedy, child rights activist and Democratic congressional candidate
Anita Raswant, Lead Programmer at Nantucket Film Festival
Jana Sue Memel, Academy-Award winning producer
Eden Sapir, Campaign and Grassroots Partnership Manager at Picture Motion
Greg Sorvig, Artistic Director of Heartland Film
Amanda Spain, VP Longform Acquisitions at MSNBC Films
Kay Wilson Stallings, Executive Vice President, Chief Creative Development and Production Officer for Sesame Workshop
Brian Walker, CEO Picture Motion
In the Words of Attendees and Filmmakers
Film Festival and Organization Partnerships
Shine Global and Heartland Film have partnered to present the Spotlight: Children’s Resilience program at the Indy Shorts International Film Festival and award the $2,500 Short Film Prize.
All short film submissions should be submitted directly to Indy Shorts International Film Festival: https://filmfreeway.com/HeartlandFilmIndyShorts
Reel Abilities is dedicated to promoting awareness and appreciation of the lives, stories, and artistic expressions of people with disabilities. Shine Global is presenting a $2,500 prize for a project demonstrating the resilience of children withdisabiltieis
Montclair Film and Shine Global are presenting two prizes for student filmmakers participating in Montclair Film Education’s annual Emerging Filmmaker Competition (EFC). An award of $500 will be granted to the winning film in a new filmmaking category focused on resilience, and another cash prize of $500 will be awarded to the EFC’s Grand Prize winning film.
This prize is given to a film with outstanding storytelling that effectively portrays the resilience and strength of children and young people.
This collaboration establishes a special prize for filmmakers participating in the New York International Children’s Film Festival, with an Unstoppable Kids Prize award of $2,500 to the winning film, intended for youth audiences, that highlights children’s resilience.
This collaboration establishes a documentary prize for filmmakers participating in the Sheffield DocFest.
The Shine Global Flaherty Fellowship, provides funding for one filmmaker working in fiction and/or nonfiction form to attend the 70th Flaherty Fellowship. The Shine Global Fellowship applicants must be working on or have worked on a film centering on children’s voices and aiming to improve children’s lives.
