‘Bully’ Honored With ‘Stanley Kramer Award’ From PGA

"Bully" examines five high schoolers who are ridiculed and tormented

The Producers Guild of America will honor the documentary "Bully" with the 2013 Stanley Kramer Award at its January awards ceremony, the organization said Tuesday. 

Director Lee Hirsch and producer Cynthia Lowen will accept the award. "Bully" follows five high school students as they are subjected to taunts and ridicule and examines the impact their mistreatment has on their lives and their families.

“'Bully' is a powerful and inspiring film that brought much-needed attention to an issue that just about everyone can relate to at one point or another in their life,” said 2013 PGA Awards Chair Michael De Luca in a statement.

Released last spring, the film became embroiled in a heated battle with the Motion Picture Association of America's ratings board after receiving an R-rating for language. After its distributor, the Weinstein Company, initially threatened to release the film unrated, it ultimately agreed to tone down some language in order to receive a PG-13 rating.

The award was established in 2002 and is named for producer and director Stanley Kramer, who was the driving force between a number of movies such as "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" and "On the Beach" that took on social and political issues such as racism and nuclear war.  

Previous recipients of the Stanley Kramer Award include such films as "Hotel Rwanda," "Precious," "An Inconvenient Truth" and "In America."

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