Chris Eska's August Evening won the Target Film-maker Award for best narrative feature at the 2007 Los Angeles Film Festival, while Jennifer Venditti's Billy The Kid won the Target Documentary Award for best documentary feature. Each film was awarded an unrestricted cash prize of $50,000 funded by Target.

The awards, presented by Terrence Howard and Aidan Quinn, were announced at the Spirit Of Independence event honouring Clint Eastwood on Thursday evening. The festival's audience award winners will be announced on the closing night of the festival on Sunday.

The narrative feature competition jury, composed of Karyn Kusama, Rob Nelson and Tom Quinn, gave the award to August Evening, the story of an undocumented worker traveling across Texas with his widowed daughter-in-law. Produced by Connie Hill and Jason Wehling, the film stars Pedro Castaneda and Veronica Loren.

Billy The Kid, which was named best documentary feature at South By Southwest, follows a 15 year-old boy called Billy P who has a history of behavioural problems, institutionalization and medical treatments.

The documentary competition jury was comprised of Patrick Creadon, Rob Epstein and Lisa Schwarzbaum.