Slamdance fetes 'Girls'

Dicke Madchen's "Heavy Women" has won some Slamdance honours -- a distinctive Jury Award for Bold Originality together with a Spirit of Slamdance Sparky Award.The kudos were introduced Thursday evening following a 18th annual fest -- a small-budget choice to Sundance in the ceremony within the Treasure Mountain Motel in Park City, Utah."What a powerful way to finish Slamdance's 18th festival - by praising the movies our excellent jurors and incredible audiences have granted these emerging filmmakers," mentioned Peter Baxter, Co-Founder and Leader of Slamdance. "The 2011 narrative and documentary competitions tend to be more effective than in the past, which filmmakers represent the vanguard of true independent filmmaking."Audience Award for feature documentary visited "Escaping . Of Mattress" by Caskey Ebeling while Andrew Edison's "Bindlestiffs" won everyone else Award for feature narrative.Grand Jury Sparky Award for Feature Narrative visited "Thank you for going to Pine Hill" by Keith Burns.Grand Jury Sparky Award for Feature Documentary visited "No Ashes, No Phoenix" by Jens Pfeifer.Grand Jury Sparky Award in short Documentary visited Skylar Neilsen.Grand Jury Sparky Award for Animation visited "Venus" by Tor Fruergaard.Grand Jury Sparky Award in short Film visited "I am John Wayne" by Christina Choe.Special Jury Prize for Experimental Short visited "Solipist" by Andrew Huang.Honorable Mention to find the best Ensemble visited "I'm Coming Over" by Mike Handel. Contact Dork McNary at dork.mcnary@variety.com