Marathi filmmaker Rohan Kanawade’s Sabar Bonda has won the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival, emerging as the only Indian feature to receive the prestigious award this year.
The announcement was made on Friday evening through the festival’s official social media handles.
Starring Bhushaan Manoj and Suraaj Suman, Sabar Bonda follows the story of two men who reconnect in a Maharashtra village and rediscover their love for each other. “Anand, a 30-something city dweller compelled to spend a 10-day mourning period for his father in the rugged countryside of western India, tenderly bonds with a local farmer struggling to stay unmarried. As the mourning ends, forcing his return, Anand must decide the fate of his relationship born under duress,” the official synopsis reads.
Sabar Bonda, an India-UK-Canada co-production, marks Jim Sarbh’s debut as producer.
Sabar Bonda’s win continues India’s strong run at Sundance following last year’s victories for Shuchi Talati’s Girls Will Be Girls, which won The Audience Award in the World Cinema: Dramatic category and a Special Jury Award for Acting for Preeti Panigrahi. Anirban Dutta and Anupama Srinivasan’s Nocturnes also won the World Cinema: Documentary Special Jury Award for Craft in 2024.
Previous Indian winners at Sundance include Writing with Fire (2021), All That Breathes (2022), and Against The Tide (2023).
Full list of winners at Sundance Film Festival 2025:
- U.S. Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic: Atropia
- US Dramatic Special Jury Award for Ensemble Cast: Plainclothes
- US Dramatic Special Jury Award for Acting: Dylan O’Brien, Twinless
- Screenwriting Award: US Dramatic: Eva Victor, Sorry, Baby
- Directing Award: US Dramatic: Rashad Frett, Ricky
- U.S. Grand Jury Prize: Documentary: Seeds, Brittany Shyne
- Directing Award: U.S. Documentary: Geeta Gandbhir, The Perfect Neighbor
- Jonathan Oppenheim Editing Award: U.S. Documentary: Parker Laramie, André is an Idiot
- U.S. Documentary Special Jury Award: Life After
- U.S. Documentary Special Jury Award for Archival Storytelling: Selena y Los Dinos, Isabel Castro
- Audience Award: U.S. Dramatic: Twinless
- Audience Award: U.S. Documentary: André is an Idiot
- Audience Award: World Cinema Dramatic: DJ Ahmet
- Audience Award: World Cinema Documentary: Prime Minster
- Next: Special Jury Award for Ensemble Cast: Mad Bills to Pay (or Destiny, dile que no soy malo)
- Next: Innovator Award: Zodiac Killer Project
- Short Film Grand Jury Prize: The Flowers Stand Silently, Witnessing, Theo Panagopoulos
- Short Film Jury Award: U.S. Fiction: Trokas Duras, Jazmin Garcia
- World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic: Sabar Bonda
- World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award: Mr. Nobody Against Putin
- World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Freedom of Expression: Coexistence, My Ass!
- Directing Award: World Cinema Documentary: Mstyslav Chernov, 2000 Meters to Andriivka
- World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Documentary: Cutting Through Rocks
- World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award for Creative Vision: Georgi M. Unkovski, DJ Ahmet
- World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award for Writing: Two Women, Chloé Robichaud and Catherine Léger