The Banff World Media Festival has announced the contenders for its Rockie Awards, and Canadian producers have nabbed 37 nominations.
A total of 132 nominees, from more than 20 countries, are up for awards, which recognize quality television and digital content internationally.
Canadians in contention include Sinking Ship Entertainment’s Annedroids and Giver in the Children and Youth Fiction category. Also competing in that category is Breakthrough Entertainment’s Science Max: Experiment’s at Large, and Hank Zipzer, which is produced by U.K.-based Kindle Entertainment in association with Toronto’s DHX and Walker Productions.
In the Drama Series category, Aetios Productions’ Blue Moon will take on the Canada-Ireland copro Vikings, produced by An Octagon and Take 5 Productions in association with MGM. Competing in the Science Fiction, Fantasy and Action category is the U.K.-Canada copro Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, produced by Cuba Pictures and coproduced by BBC America in association with Feel Films, Far Moor, Screen Yorkshire, Bell Media and Montreal-based Cité-Amérique.
There are four Canadian productions nominated in the Environmental and Wildlife category: Hadwin’s Judgement, produced by True West Films, in association with Passion Planet and the NFB; How to Change the World, produced by Met Film, Insight Productions and Daniel Film, in association with BFI, SKY, Impact Partners, Shark Island Productions and Bell Media; The Oka Legacy, produced by Rezolution Pictures in association with the CBC; and The Wanted 18, produced by Intuitive Pictures in association with the NFB, Bellota Films and DAR Films.
Doozers, from The Jim Henson Company and DHX Media, in association with the CBC, is nominated alongside Guru Studio’s Justin Time, and Nelvana’s Trucktown in the Pre-School category. Octonauts, produced by Vampire Squid Productions Limited, in association with Irish animation studio Brown Bag Films was also nominated in the category; Toronto-based 9 Story acquired Brown Bag in August of 2015.
Other highlights include a nom for Highway Thru Hell, produced by Great Pacific Television in association with Discovery Channel Canada, in the Reality category; and a nod for Incendo’s TV movie Kept Woman; and a nomination for The Curse of Clara: A Holiday Tale, produced by Smiley Guy Studios in association with CBC Television and the CMF, in the Animation category.
The awards will be presented at the Banff World Media Festival Program Competition Ceremony on June 13 at the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel.
A full list of Rockie award nominees is available here.