I don't see how anyone can compare these films to the award winners from any category. Half-Empty was by far, one of the worst films at Cinequest and the Art of Travel was a misogynistic, womanizing romp thgrough South America, filled with cliche, heavy-handed dialog, and flat, unintersting characters. In fact, these two films were so bad, that we all walked out of the theater laughing at how silly they were. So did many others. I was there for the duration of the festival and heard absolutely no buzz regarding any of the three films you mentioned. Films don't win awards for having low budgets or for being able to aquire B-list names. If that were the case, all sorts of shitty films would be winning awaards left and right.

No one pulled strings to get the audience award, either. The fact is, people really liked The Village Barbershop. I personally didn't care for the film, but it certainly is crowd-pleasing. Amal was decent, but the films that won were better, at least in the minds of the jury. Films are an art, thus subject to interpretation. Liking or disliking a film is very subjective and the jury made their choices based on their knowledge and experience. Audiences did the same. You shouldn't be upset about certain films winning or losing, that's just the nature of the film festival world. You should be happy that indie films are even being made. Sounds to me like you might be a disgruntled filmmaker who expected to win something.