The Stockfish Film & Industry Festival in Reykjavík, Iceland, has created an award for short films to honor the legacy of late local filmmaker Eva Maria Daniels, it was announced Thursday.
Daniels, who produced such indie dramas as What Maisie Knew, Hold the Dark and Joe Bell, died in June after a battle with cancer. She was just 43.
With the support of Daniels’ husband, Moritz Diller, and son, Henry, one standout producer or director in the festival’s Shortfish (Sprettfiskur) competition will receive the inaugural Eva Maria Daniels Award for Vital Filmmaking. The winner will receive 1.5 million Icelandic króna (about $11,000) for their next project.
The 10th annual festival takes place April 4-14. Twenty short films will participate in the competition in the categories of best short narrative, best short documentary, best music video and best short experimental. The jury will be chaired by Daniels’ longtime producing partner, Riva Marker.
“Eva’s approach to producing was to listen and support undeniable talent,” Marker said in a statement. “We will never know all the beautiful stories she would bring to audiences, but we’re honored to create an inaugural award endowed to storytellers that we believe Eva would have championed.”
The Reykjavík-born Daniels also executive produced Time Out of Mind (2014) and The Dinner (2017), both directed and co-written by Oren Moverman and starring Richard Gere, and the Sydney Sweeney-starring Reality, which screened at the 2023 Berlin Film Festival.
