Last night, in the Church of San Carlo in Modena, the prize-giving ceremony - conducted by Valerio Bassan, vice-president of DIG, and journalist Silvia Boccardi - of the DIG Awards 2022: the prizes for the best documentaries, investigations, reports and podcasts selected from over 400 applications collected during a months-long selection process.
Since its inception, in fact, DIG Festival rewards the best documentaries and podcast of investigative journalism: the film competition has established itself over the years as an international benchmark, rewarding and enhancing the work of freelancers, but also of major international broadcasters such as Guardian, BBC, Al Jazeera, Le Monde and many others.
To award the prizes of “DIG Festival 2022: Stay Gold”two video juries, chaired by Danish investigative journalist Mads Brügger, and audio. The board of the DIG association awarded the Watchdog Award 2022, annual award to those who fight in defence of the quality and independence of information, to the collective Bellingcat, one of the most celebrated in the field of open source investigations, “for having expanded the boundaries of investigative journalism, reinforcing it with new practices, languages and technologies”, as stated in the motivations.
Here, then, are the names of the winning entries in each category, including the DIG Pitch, a €15,000 prize to finance a video project in the development and production phase, awarded for the first time with the support of the Matteo Scanni Foundation.
🏆 DIG Award 2022: Best Investigative Long
"Wagner, Putin's Shadow Army'.
Alexandra Jousset, Ksenia Bolchakova
2022, FR, 79’
France TV
Original title: “Wagner, l'armée de l'ombre de Poutine”.”
This hugely important story effectively reveals the modus operandi of the Wagner groups and exposes the close links with Russia, which have always been hidden and denied by Moscow. It is an ambitious, complex and dangerous investigation that includes stories from three continents and follows the flow of money. The result is a compelling and highly visual documentary, which also reveals an opaque financial structure, sustained with the complicity of companies and states. This film investigates the past and gives us a chilling vision of the future.
🏆 DIG Award 2022: Best Reportage Long
'Erasmus in Gaza'
Matteo Delbò, Chiara Avesani
2022, EN/SP, 88’
Arpa Films, Effe TV - Feltrinelli Real Cinema, Al Jazeera International
The jury is happy to see a previous DIG Pitch nominee win in this category. The film exceeded our expectations and won us over with its truthfulness. The honesty of the characters emerged in all its strength: Riccardo, the Italian who got much more than he bargained for when he went to study in the Gaza Strip, and the Palestinians who took him under their wing. This documentary is an unexpected combination of a coming-of-age story and an account of daily life in Gaza.
🏆 DIG Award 2022: Best Investigative Medium
“Nemtsov's Shadow”
Christo Grozev, Yordan Tsalov, Roman Dobrokhotov
2022, UK, 21’
Bellingcat, The Insider, BBC Eye Investigations
This highly topical investigation explores the darker sides of the Putin regime, revealing murder with a strong, bold narrative and creative use of evidence. A well-constructed and compelling story that translates data and evidence into graphic images and combines them with a very human narrative.
🏆 DIG Award 2022: Best Reportage Medium
"Galaxionauts"
Anna Roch, Stéphane Rybojad
2022, FR, 24’
ARTE
Original title: “Les Galaxionautes"
A surprising and entertaining film with unexpected and compelling characters. At a time when many reports focus on conflict and oppression, it is important for the jury to show that reporting that focuses on stories of hope, community and the ability to dream has a chance of winning. The jury would like to see a second part and the actual take-off!
🏆 DIG Award 2022: Best Short
"The Dictator's Last Calls".
Emir Nader
2022, UK, 15'
BBC News Arabic
This work extraordinarily captures a particular and crucial moment in human history: the intimate portrait of a disgraced dictator. The story, perfect for the short format, reveals important information with dramatic implications. The forensic use of audio and animation do justice to the investigative creativity. The jury appreciates the transparency about the difficulty in verifying facts.
🏆 DIG Award 2022: Best Audio
'In Dark Waters'
Adèle Humbert, Emilie Denêtre
2022, FR, 160'
Insider Podcast, Spotify
Original title: En Eaux Troubles
This investigative podcast unveils new elements to a faked truth. The jury unanimously appreciated the care taken with the sound, the live broadcasting and the use of the soundtrack, which enhanced the great investigative work. This work allows the listener to fully empathise with the authors as events unfold.
🏆 DIG Pitch 2022
'Mirage: Mesopotamia is in Danger'.
Daham Alasaad, Guillaume Perrier
Prize of €15,000 with the support of the Matteo Scanni Foundation
An important and little-known story by a journalist and filmmaker with a strong personal connection to Mesopotamia. The idea of making a boat movie has great narrative and cinematic potential, and the Turkish strand of the story lends itself to becoming an original investigation. The jury believes it is crucial to support a project at an early stage, and chose this one because it has the potential to reveal an environmental disaster in one of the world's oldest civilisations.
🏆 DIG Watchdog Award 2022
Bellingcat
Awarded by the DIG board: Alberto Nerazzini, Valerio Bassan, Philip di Salvo, Davide Fonda, Francesca Coin
This year's DIG Watchdog Award goes to an organisation that has pioneered a number of investigative techniques that are now fundamental to investigative journalism and are among the most effective in proving the existence of events that would otherwise remain buried or unreported. At a time like this, when even the Internet has become a ground for geopolitical confrontation and propaganda, the work of this organisation has shown, on the contrary, how digital tools are among the best allies of truth and journalism. Although it has been active for less than ten years, it has already made a decisive contribution to reporting crucial events and news such as the Syrian crisis and the war in Yemen and, above all, the escalation of tension that led to the Russian invasion of Ukraine this year. Using the techniques of open source investigations, geolocation and social media content verification, this year's Watchdog Award winners have expanded the boundaries of investigative journalism, reinforcing it with new practices, languages and technologies.
