Germany takes gold at Student Oscars

Fifteen student winners from colleges and universities around the world were honoured at the 41st Student Academy Awards ceremony, held at the Directors Guild of America Theater in Hollywood on 7 June. The gold, silver and bronze medals were announced and presented by actors Adrian Grenier, Nate Parker and Oscar nominee Demian Bichir, as well as the Oscar-winning directing/producing team from the animated feature Frozen: Jennifer Lee, Chris Buck and Peter Del Vecho.

In the Best Foreign Film category, Germany took the top spot with Nocebo, Lennart Ruff’s 38-minute thriller about a man joining forces with his sister to expose the fatal side effects of a medical trial before running into danger himself. The work is Ruff’s graduation film from the HFF Munich. Germany also triumphed with a Bronze Medal for Border Patrol, German-born director Peter Baumann's black comedy about two guards who discover a corpse on the Bavarian border. The movie is his graduation film from the Northern Film School in Leeds, UK. It is the first time that this school has been represented at the awards.

The Silver Medal in the Foreign Film category went to Paris on the Water, directed by Hadas Ayalon from the Tel Aviv University in Israel.

The Academy established the Student Academy Awards in 1972 to support and encourage excellence in filmmaking at the collegiate level. 

The full 2014 Student Academy Award winners are:

Alternative
Gold Medal: Person, Drew Brown, The Art Institute of Jacksonville, Florida
Silver Medal: Oscillate, Daniel Sierra, School of Visual Arts, New York

Animation
Gold Medal: Owned, Daniel Clark and Wesley Tippetts, Brigham Young University, Utah
Silver Medal: Higher Sky, Teng Cheng, University of Southern California
Bronze Medal: Yamashita, Hayley Foster, Loyola Marymount University, California

Documentary
Gold Medal: The Apothecary, Helen Hood Scheer, Stanford University
Silver Medal: White Earth, J Christian Jensen, Stanford University
Bronze Medal: One Child, Zijian Mu, New York University

Narrative
Gold Medal: Above the Sea, Keola Racela, Columbia University, New York
Silver Medal: Door God, Yulin Liu, New York University
Bronze Medal: Interstate, Camille Stochitch, American Film Institute, California

Foreign Film
Gold Medal: Nocebo, Lennart Ruff, University of Television and Film Munich, Germany
Silver Medal: Paris on the Water, Hadas Ayalon, Tel Aviv University, Israel
Bronze Medal: Border Patrol, Peter Baumann, the Northern Film School, United Kingdom