
BUCK premiered at Sundance Film Festival in 2011 where it won the Audience Award and continued to go on to win many awards including the 2011 Academy Award shortlist and recognition by the National Board of Review as one of the year’s top 5 picks. Other honors and awards include:
- Zurich International Film Festival – Best International Documentary
- Crossroads Film Festival – Best Documentary
- Christopher Awards – Feature Film Winner
- Bergen International Film Festival – Best Documentary
- Full Frame Doc Festival – Audience Award
- Hot Docs Toronto – Top Audience Favorite
- Seattle International Film Festival – Best Documentary Runner up & Golden Space Needle Award
- Provincetown International Film Festival – HBO Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature
- Nantucket Film Festival – Best of Fest
- DocuWest Film Festival – Best Feature Length Documentary
- Canberra Film Festival – Audience Award & Best Documentary
Some of Our Favorite BUCK Reviews

Kenneth Turan
Sundance gets real: More memorable documentaries come from this festival than anywhere else. This year’s group included “Buck,” “If a Tree Falls,” “The Interrupters,” “Project Nim,” “The Redemption of General Butt Naked,” “Senna” and “We Were Here.” Mention should also be made of non-Sundance docs “Circo” and “Nostalgia for the Light.”
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David Carr
You Can Also Lead a Horse to Nirvana. LAST Sunday evening, Buck Brannaman strolled the High Line, two stories above the streets of Manhattan and hundreds of miles from his native habitat, the ranch country where he runs clinics in enlightened horsemanship. The documentary “Buck,” which won a Sundance audience award this year and will open on Friday in New York and Los Angeles, details his shaman-like skills around horses and the people who ride them.
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Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times
The best documentaries of 2011
One of the big documentary hits of the year. Buck Brannaman was the original “horse whisperer,” the character who Nicholas Evans based his novel on and Robert Redford used as the on-set consultant for his film. He has a way with horses, and Cindy Meehl’s documentary is moving as he shows them engaged in dances of understanding.
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2011 | Festival | Location | Award/Acknowledgement | |
Sundance Film Festival | Park City, UT | Audience Award | ||
True/False Film Festival | Columbia, MO | Official Selection | ||
SXSW | Austin, TX | Official Selection | ||
Sarasota Film Festival | Sarasota, FL | Official Selection | ||
Full Frame Doc Film Festival | Durham NC | Audience Award | ||
Nashville Film Festival | Nashville, TN | Official Selection | ||
Independent Film Festival | Boston, MA | Official Selection | ||
HOT DOCS | Toronto, ON CANADA |
Official Selection & Top Audience Favorite | ||
Berkshires Film Festival | Pittsfield, MA | Official Selection | ||
Seattle Int’l Film Festival | Seattle, WA | Official Selection 2nd runner up for Best Documentary Golden Space Needle Award |
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Provincetown Int’l Film Festival | Provincetown, MA | HBO Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature | ||
SilverDocs | Washington, DC | Official Selection | ||
Nantucket Film Festival | Nantucket, MA | Official Selection/Best of Fest | ||
Martha’s Vineyard Film Festival | Chilmark, MA | Official Selection | ||
Melbourne Int’l Film Festival | Melbourne, Australia | Official Selection | ||
New Zealand Int’l Film Festival | Official Selection | |||
DocuWest Film Festival | Golden, CO | Best Feature Length Documentary | ||
Zurich Int’l Film Festival | Switzerland | Best International Documentary Film | ||
Reykjavik Int’l Film Festival | Iceland | Official Selection | ||
Rio Film Festival | Brazil | Official Selection | ||
Warsaw Film Festival | Poland | Documentary Feature Competition Special Mention |
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Abu Dhabi Film Festival | United Arab Emirates | Official Selection | ||
Bergen Int’l Film Festival | Norway | Best Documentary | ||
Bermuda Docs | Bermuda | Official Selection | ||
Canberra Film Festival | Australia | Audience Award Best Documentary |
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Halls Gap Film Festival | Halls Gap, Australia | Official Selection | ||
Rosebud Film Festival | Official Selection | |||
Rocky Mountain Women’s Film Festival | Colorado Springs, CO | Official Selection | ||
Stockholm | Sweden | Official Selection | ||
Rockport Film Festival | Rockport, TX | Best Documentary Feature | ||
Int’l Doc Film Festival Amsterdam | The Netherlands | Official Selection | ||
Gotham Independent Film Awards | New York, New York | Audience Award Nominee | ||
National Board of Review | New York, New York | 2011 Top 5 Documentaries | ||
True West Magazine | Readers Choice Award Editors Choice Award |
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2012 | Festival | Location | Award/Acknowledgement | |
Perth Arts Festival | Perth, Australia | Official Selection | ||
Cinema Eye Honors 2012 | New York, New York | Audience Choice Award | ||
Princeton Environmenal Film Festival | Princeton, NJ | Audience Favorite | ||
Spur Award | Encampment, WY | Documentary Script Category | ||
EcoFocus Film Festival | Athens, GA | Official Selection | ||
DocAviv | Tel Aviv, Israel | Official Selection | ||
Christopher Awards | New York, New York | Feature Film Winner | ||
SAMHSA Voice Awards | Hollywood, CA | Nominated for Voice Award | ||
Humanitas Prize | Beverly Hills, CA | Humanitas Prize Finalist | ||