WHITEWASH

Austin Film Festival (AFF)  taking place this October 24th to 31st, 2013 will honor actress Susan Sarandon with the 2013 Extraordinary Contribution to Filmmaking – Actor.  The festival also added WHITEWASH, a comic thriller starring Thomas Haden Church and THE PRETTY ONE, starring Zoe Kazan, Jack Johnson, and Ron Livingston to the 20th Anniversary Film Schedule lineup.

Sarandon will accept the award at the Festival’s annual Awards Luncheon held on Saturday, October 26, 2013 at the Austin Club. The Inaugural Extraordinary Contribution to Filmmaking – Actor Award was presented to Johnny Depp in 2011. Sarandon will present a retrospective screening of John Turturro’s Romance and Cigarettes, and join a conversation on the art and craft of storytelling with the other 2013 Awardees, Vince Gilligan (Outstanding Television Writer), Jonathan Demme (Extraordinary Contribution to Filmmaking), Callie Khouri (Distinguished Screenwriter), and Barry Josephson (Heart of Film Award).

Austin Film Festival’s Opening Night will feature the US Premiere of Jonathan Sobel’s break-out Toronto heist hit THE ART OF THE STEAL starring Kurt Russell, Matt Dillon and Jay Baruchel, as well as the World Premiere of AFF success story COFFEE, KILL BOSS – a film that emerged from the Festival’s world-renowned Screenplay Competition in 2011. Coffee, Kill Boss stars Eddie Jemison (Ocean’s 11-13, Hung), Noureen DeWulf (Anger Management) and Robert Forster (Jackie Brown, Mulholland Drive). The comedy is about ten executives who meet in secret to sell off their company and end up the victims of a murder plot. 

AFF’s Closing Night film falls on Halloween and will feature the US Premiere of ALL CHEERLEADERS DIE, a horror comedy about a rebellious outsider who joins the cheerleading squad on a mission to take down the captain of the football team…. until a supernatural force changes everything. Lucky McKee and Chris Sivertson co-wrote and directed the film, hailed as a monster midnight sensation in Toronto.