Ten finalists made it to the sixth round of San Francisco Film Society/Kenneth Rainin Foundation Filmmaking Grants of more than $305,000, to be given to one or more feature films that through plot, character, theme or setting significantly explore human and civil rights, discrimination, gender and sexual identity and other urgent social justice issues of our time. Winners of the fall 2011 SFFS/KRF Grants will be announced in mid-December.
Finalists:
Maris Curran
Five Nights in Maine, development
Unexpected tragedy brings an African American widower face-to-face with his estranged mother-in-law in rural Maine. For more information visit fivenightsinmaine.com.
Jenny Deller, Kristin Fairweather
Future Weather, postproduction
When her single mom runs away to California, a passionate young environmentalist clings to her rural home and a carbon sequestration experiment. Her grandmother, a caustic nurse on the verge of moving in with her long-distance boyfriend, has other plans. Thrust into each other’s lives, the two relatives must learn to trust each other and leap into the unknown. For more information visit futureweathermovie.com.
Lance Edmands, Kyle Martin
Bluebird, production
In the frozen woods of an isolated Maine logging town, one woman’s tragic mistake shatters the community balance, resulting in profound and unexpected consequences.
Eric Escobar
One Good Thing, development
A jaded and bitter locksmith spends his days locking families out of their foreclosed homes. When a morning lockout turns up the abandoned children of a long-lost friend, his cynicism is put in check as he races to find the missing parents. For more information visit kontentfilms.com.
Krisy Gosney
Manhandled, development
Set in the gritty, pre-dot-com Mission District of San Francisco, a lesbian couple’s world implodes as one of them transitions to male, testing the limits of unconditional love and their new identity as a straight couple.
Ian Hendrie, Jyson McLean
Mercy Road, screenwriting
Based on true events, Mercy Road traces the political and spiritual odyssey of a small town Christian housewife as she slowly turns from a peaceful pro-life activist to an underground militant willing to commit violence and murder in the name of God.
Chris Mason Johnson
Test, production
In 1985, while lurid newspaper headlines threaten a gay quarantine and antigay graffiti appears regularly, the naïve and frequently bullied new member of San Francisco’s contemporary ballet company begins a friendship with a brilliant lead dancer with a bad-boy reputation. The friends navigate a world alternately full of risk and promise. For more information visit thenewtwentymovie.com.
Oden Roberts, Azura Skye
Rosie Got Her Gun, production
Following a series of arrests, a troubled young woman struggling to avoid prison time is visited by an opportunistic Army recruiter. For more information visit odenroberts.com.
Alex Smith, Andrew Smith
Winter in the Blood, postproduction
Virgil First Raise embarks on a surreal and comedic odyssey to retrieve his renegade wife and the treasured rifle that she stole from him. For more information visit winterintheblood.com.
Jessica Tanzer Conroy, Marianna Cherry
Read My Lips, screenwriting
In 1989 in San Francisco, as the AIDS epidemic breeds a new generation of activists, a struggling young artist on a journey of self-discovery becomes an unwitting hero of the cause.