The Ruth Landfield Award honors movies celebrating women of courage, conviction, and compassion.

The Ruth Landfield Award was established by the Fargo Film Festival in 2003. Two movies, Nancy Burggraf: Power and Stride and Searching for Wooden Watermelons, received the honor that year.

Recipients of the Ruth Landfield Award:

2024: Show Her the Money (Ky Dickens)
2023: The Panola Project (Rachael DeCruz and Jeremy S. Levine)
2022: We Burn Like This (Alana Waksman)
2021: Alina (Rami Kodeih)
2020: The Garden Left Behind (Flavio Alves)

2019: Divulge (Haven Nutt)
2018: JessZilla (Emily Sheskin)
2017: The Search (Melina Tupa)
2016: Black and Blue (Ciara “Cc” Allen)
2015: Not Anymore: A Story of Revolution (Matthew VanDyke)
2014: Brave Miss World (Cecilia Peck)
2013: Throat Song (Miranda de Pencier)
2012: Top Secret Rosies (LeAnn Erickson)
2011: Made in India (Rebecca Haimowitz and Vaishali Sinha)
2010: The Lost Girl (Elizabeth Chatelain)

2009: Sita Sings the Blues (Nina Paley)
2008: Plain Art (Mary Trunk)
2007: Cine Manifest (Judy Irola)
2006: A Life Without Pain (Melody Gilbert)
2005: Speak Out: I Had an Abortion (Gillian Aldrich)
2004: Jumping for Joy (Timothy J. Nelson)
2003: Nancy Burggraf: Power and Stride (Sarah McCurdy)
2003: Searching for Wooden Watermelons (Bryan Goldsworthy)