'Planet of Snails' tops IDFA honours

''Planet of Snails,'' South Korean helmer Seung-Jun Yi's feature docu concerning the daily existence and passion for a hard of hearing and blind guy, has won the VPRO IDFA award for the best feature in the 24th annual Worldwide Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), it had been introduced in a ceremony Friday evening. IDFA's top prize has a ?12,500 (U.S.$16,546) cash prize. ''Snails,'' which received its worldwide preem here, is created by CreativEast. Paris-based CATandDocs is handling world sales. IDFA's five-person feature competish jury also gave its special award to Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi's world-preeming ''5 Damaged Cameras,'' a portrait of the Palestinian village fighting off encroaching Jewish pay outs over many years. Pic also nabbed IDFA's aud award and $6,619 cash. The earth's biggest docu fest and mart, which opened up November. 16 with ''The Ambassador'' from helmer Mads Brugger (''The Red-colored Chapel'') and concludes Sunday, saw an archive public aud of the believed 200,000+, up from 2010's count of 180,000. Other IDFA competish those who win include Jorge Gaggero's ''Montenegro'' (best mid-length docu), Xun Yu's 'The Disappearing Spring Light (best first film) and Jessica Gorter's ''900 Days'' (best Nederlander docu). Micha X. Peled's feature ''Bitter Seed products,'' concerning the plight of Indian cotton maqui berry farmers and also the third inside a trilogy about globalization, won best Eco-friendly Screen (environment) docu along with the Oxfam Global Justice award. Last week ''Last Days Here,'' from Phillie's Don Argott and Demian Fenton, won best music documentary. Pic was tested in IDFA PLAY, the fest's first music docu sidebar. IDFA presented 340 film and trans-media docus to public and industry auds this season. The outlet weekend was mostly about preems and parties, but a posse from ''Focus Forward''-the innovation-designed number of three-minute paperwork released last September by video writer Cinelan together with General electric-required happens to announce it's added seven filmmakers to the roster. On Monday IDFA moved into full-on biz mode with the beginning of the 3-day Forum. The prestige worldwide co-financing event has modified recently to mirror changes on the market (less home windows, tight budgets), the emergence of third-sector funders and new methods for telling and viewing non-fiction tales. The 2010 slate incorporated 57 projects (features, series, trans-media) searching for funding partners or future purchasers as a whole-tables and individual meets. This season IDFA reviews 2,670 local and worldwide visitors (producers, purchasers, filmmakers etc.) , the increase from 2010's headcount of two,477. A lot more than 200 U.S. visitors attended IDFA 2011. Contact the range newsroom at news@variety.com