WOFFF25 Audience Choice Award Winners Announced
Each year, the WOFFF Audience Choice Awards give our global community a voice. Viewers near and far cast their votes online, championing the films that resonated with them long after the credits rolled. This year’s selection spans continents, genres and storytelling traditions – a reminder of how powerful and varied the perspectives of women over 50 and their collaborators can be.
Winner: Pegs & Bacon, Sarah Mason
This year’s winning film is Pegs & Bacon, Sarah Mason’s gentle documentary about May, an 84-year-old shopkeeper who has been a constant presence in her Yorkshire village for more than fifty years. Her small farm shop sits along the Pennine Way and has become woven into the fabric of everyday local life.
The film follows May as she delivers goods in her Subaru, chats with neighbours, and keeps the rhythms of village life going with her trademark warmth.
She has no plans to retire, and the film captures her steady, unfussy commitment to her community. Viewers connected strongly with its quiet observation, its affection for May, and its sense of a life lived with purpose.
2nd Place: A Four-Way Tie
This year, audiences placed four films in joint second place, each offering something distinct.
Remar, dir. Adán Aguilar
A documentary with a fictional thread running through it.
The film follows a group of Spanish rowers who train more than four times a week.
They are strong in teamwork, friendship and determination, yet competition success continues to slip out of reach.
The film explores what keeps them pushing for medals and trophies.
Symptoms, dir. Eliza Gibson, Todd Eric Valcourt
Eleanor is determined to secure the support of a key investor for her mindfulness app company, but brain fog, an erratic period and perimenopausal hormones send her day sideways.
This off-beat comedy looks at the pitfalls and possibilities of middle age, complete with a marching band.
The Removed, dir. Rebecca Rose
A woman searches the woods for something she has lost. She encounters a stranger whittling a piece of wood, and the two talk about the forest, about treasures misplaced and rediscovered, about pain.
As their conversation unfolds, secrets surface and a quiet connection forms.
Bird Woman, dir. Tokio Oohara
Set in Tokyo during the pandemic, the film follows Toki as she confronts a rise in masked men assaulting women on trains. She puts on a bird mask and takes action, and her defiant stance quickly spreads across social media.
Her message gathers momentum and begins to shift the landscape around her.
3rd Place
Two films placed third this year, each with its own distinctive perspective:
Milk Lady, dir. Sachiko Miyase
Akemi has been delivering milk for 30 years for a small, family-owned company in rural Japan. Her colleague Tomoko handles the accounts. Both feel trapped in their dead-end roles.
The film follows Akemi’s after-work sports routine and asks whether it might open a door to something new.
Old Girl in a Tutu: Susan Rennie Disrupts Art History, dir. Cheri Gaulke
Feminist scholar Susan Rennie picks up her iPhone and inserts her queer, octogenarian body into great works of art.
With humour and wit, her photographic interventions challenge the conventions of the male gaze and offer a feminist critique of the traditional art-historical canon.
Commended Films
Breaking Plates, dir. Karen Pearlman
A lively blend of archive and modern film celebrating the bold, unruly women of the silent era and the need for new ways of storytelling.
Freckles, dir. Nevena Nikolova
In a Bulgarian village, an unexpected bond forms between three isolated lives, bringing a subtle but irreversible shift.
Olga’s Eyes, dir. Sarah Carlot Jaber
Olga, a reluctant vampire with low spirits, is encouraged into a care home where new company may rekindle her appetite for life.
Early Morning Run, dir. Rosa Crompton
Lorraine steals a rare early-morning moment for herself, running through quiet streets, fields and shoreline.
Visible Mending, dir. Samantha Moore
A portrait of people who use knitting to navigate grief, recovery, anxiety and the search for connection.
Do You Have Kids? dir. Tom Gentle
A simple question forces Lee to articulate a complicated inner landscape where difficult and beautiful memories coexist.
Journey Back to Alcedo, dir. Gianna Haro Vallazza
Two 70-year-old friends return to a Galápagos volcano to revisit the giant tortoises they first encountered more than forty years ago.
Somber Tides, dir. Chantal Caron
A dance film shaped by the St. Lawrence River, following two beings battling ice, storms and a threatened ecosystem.
Through Thin Ice, dir. Gabrielle Kardon & Arthur Veenema
A scientist’s twilight run turns dangerous when her dog falls through rare lake ice, triggering a series of remarkable events told from two perspectives.
RISA, dir. Kate Weare & Jack Flame Sorokin
An intimate portrait of dancer and teacher Risa Steinberg, moving through her New York home while reflecting on her long creative life.