"Padre Nuestro" wins top Sundance Festival

Sundance Film Festival's grand-jury prize for best U.S. drama went to "Padre Nuestro," an immigrant saga about a Mexican teen's heartbreaking search for his father in America.

"Manda Bala (Send a Bullet)," another Latin American story recounting government corruption and kidnapping in Brazil, earned the grand-jury award Saturday in the U.S. documentary competition at the festival, the nation's top showcase for independent film.

"Grace Is Gone," a tear-jerker starring John Cusack as a father who takes his young daughters on a road trip to postpone breaking the news that their Army sergeant mother has been killed in Iraq, won the audience award for favorite U.S. drama as chosen by balloting among Sundance movie-goers.

Writer-director James C. Strouse won the Waldo Salt screenwriting award for "Grace Is Gone."

The U.S. audience award for documentaries went to Irene Taylor Brodsky's "Hear and Now," a portrait of her aging, deaf parents as they undergo risky surgery that could allow them to hear.