Industry

  • “THE BABUSHKAS OF CHERNOBYL” “FREEDOM FIGHTERS” “TOMORROW WE DISAPPEAR” Win 2013 SFFS Documentary Film Fund award

    THE BABUSHKAS OF CHERNOBYLTHE BABUSHKAS OF CHERNOBYL

    Anne Bogart and Holly Morris’ THE BABUSHKAS OF CHERNOBYL, Jamie Meltzer’s FREEDOM FIGHTERS and Jimmy Goldblum and Adam Weber’s TOMORROW WE DISAPPEAR are the winners of the 2013 San Francisco Film Society SFFS Documentary Film Fund award. The awards totaling $100,000 support feature-length documentaries in postproduction.

    Previous DFF winners include Shaul Schwarz’s NARCO CULTURA, which premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival; Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson’s AMERICAN PROMISE, which also premiered at Sundance and won the festival’s Special Jury Prize in the documentary category; and Zachary Heinzerling’s CUTIE AND THE BOXER, which won Sundance’s Directing Award for documentary, has played at film festivals worldwide and will be distributed theatrically by Radius-TWC.

    2013 DOCUMENTARY FILM FUND WINNERS

    THE BABUSHKAS OF CHERNOBYL — $40,000
    Anne Bogart and Holly Morris, co-director/producers
    As Fukushima smolders, and the world grapples with a dangerous energy era, an unlikely human story emerges from Chernobyl to inform the debate. TheBabushkas of Chernobyl is the story of an extraordinary group of women who live in Chernobyl’s post-nuclear disaster “Dead Zone.” For more than 25 years they have survived — and even, oddly, thrived — on some of the most contaminated land on earth. For more information visit thebabushkasofchernobyl.com.

    Anne Bogart is a Los Angeles-based writer and documentary director/producer. For the past 12 years she has directed and produced numerous episodes for the Globe Trekker travel series. For 15 years she worked in Paris and London as a staff writer for Women’s Wear Daily and a freelance writer for numerous American magazines including Elle, Harper’s Bazaar, the New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times. While in Europe, Bogart also produced and directed documentary and entertainment programming for a variety of French and U.K. broadcasters.

    Holly Morris is the writer/director/creator of the award-winning eight-part PBS documentary series about extraordinary women around the world, Adventure Divas, and author of the book Adventure Divas: Searching the Globe for a New Kind of Heroine. Her award-winning story A Country of Women — on which The Babushkas of Chernobyl is based — was originally published in MOREmagazine, won Meredith’s “Editorial Excellence Award,” is featured in Best Travel Literature: 2013, and was republished in London’s Daily Telegraph andThe Week.

    FREEDOM FIGHTERS — $20,000
    Jamie Meltzer, director

    FREEDOM FIGHTERSFREEDOM FIGHTERS

    There’s a new detective agency in Dallas, Texas, started by a group of exonerated men who have all spent decades in prison for crimes they didn’t commit. They call themselves the Freedom Fighters, and they’ve recently started working their first cases. For more information visit freedomfightersfilm.com.

    Jamie Meltzer’s feature documentary films have been broadcast nationally on PBS and have screened at numerous film festivals worldwide. They include Off the Charts: The Song-Poem Story (Independent Lens, 2003), Welcome to Nollywood (PBS Broadcast, 2007), La Caminata (2009), and Informant, which won four best documentary/grand jury awards at film festivals in 2012 and is being released in theaters nationwide by Music Box Films. Meltzer teaches in the MFA Program in Documentary Film and Video at Stanford University.

    TOMORROW WE DISAPPEAR — $40,000
    Jimmy Goldblum and Adam Weber, co-director/producers

    TOMORROW WE DISAPPEARTOMORROW WE DISAPPEAR

    When their homes are illegally sold to real estate developers, the magicians, acrobats and puppeteers of Delhi’s Kathputli colony must unite — or splinter apart forever.

    Jimmy Goldblum is a Brooklyn-based writer, director, and interactive producer. In 2008 he won an Emmy for “New Approaches to Documentary” for Live Hope Love, a project he produced for the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Goldblum’s projects have won Emmy, FWA, Webby, and SXSW awards and have earned coverage from the New York Times, Wired magazine,USA Today, and CNN.

    Adam Weber is currently editing Is the Man Who Is Tall Happy?, Michel Gondry’s animated documentary about Noam Chomsky. He was the editor of Kanye West’s interactive film Cruel Winter, and assistant editor on Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds.

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  • Actress Rita Moreno to be Honored with SAG Life Achievement Award

    Rita Moreno Arriving for the Red Carpet at the West Side Story 50th Annivesary CelebrationRita Moreno Arriving for the Red Carpet at the West Side Story 50th Annivesary Celebration

    Actress Rita Moreno has been named the 50th recipient of SAG-AFTRA‘s highest tribute – the SAG Life Achievement Award for career achievement and humanitarian accomplishment. The SAG Life Achievement Award will join Moreno’s other industry and public honors, which includes an Oscar, two Emmys, a Tony, a Grammy, the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the National Medal of the Arts. Moreno will be presented the performers union’s top accolade at the 20th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards on Saturday, Jan. 18, 2014 

    At 81, Rita Moreno’s over nearly 70-year diverse career include film appearances in The Night of the Following Day, with Marlon Brando; Marlowe, with James Garner; Popi, in which she played Alan Arkin’s girlfriend; and in Mike Nichol’s production of Carnal Knowledge. She reprised the role of Googie Gomez in the film version of The Ritz, followed by Alan Alda’s The Four Seasons, the award-winning independent film I Like it Like That and the comedy-drama Angus, with George C. Scott and Kathy Bates. She starred opposite Ben Gazzara inBlue Moon and as an Italian widow in the indie feature Carlo’s Wake, with Christopher Meloni. She also appeared in the highly acclaimed movie Pinero, starring Benjamin Bratt, and in John Sayles’ Casa de los Babys. Still one of industry’s busiest stars, Moreno will next be seen in the film version of Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks.

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  • SHORT TERM 12 Director Destin Cretton Among Finalists for San Francisco Film Society SFFS/ Hearst Screenwriting Grant

    san--francisco--film--society

    The San Francisco Film Society today announced the eight finalists for the fifth annual $15,000 SFFS / Hearst Screenwriting Grant. The 2013 finalists include a number of writer-directors whose work has recently made waves on the international festival scene, including Destin Cretton (Short Term 12), Tom Gilroy (The Cold Lands) and Eliza Hittman (It Felt Like Love). The winner will be announced in mid-September.

    2013 SFFS / HEARST SCREENWRITING GRANT FINALISTS

    Eliza Hittman — A
    Skye, a teenage girl living in rural Pennsylvania, catches a Greyhound bus on a secret journey to New York City to do something for which she might never be forgiven. Hittman’s previous work includes It Felt Like Love (2013). For more information visit elizahittman.com.

    Tariq Tapa — THE BEST THAT TOMORROW WILL BRING
    A recently homeless widow drives cross-country on a parade float, hoping to meet the grandson she has never known before he is deployed to war overseas. Tapa’s previous work includes Zero Bridge (2008). For more information visit mongrelworks.com.

    Shaka King — LIQUID COURAGE
    In the 90’s, drugs and alcohol ruined Deuce Harding’s career. In 2013 they’ll make him a star. King’s previous work includes Newlyweeds (2013). 

    Destin Cretton — MA
    After being a mom for 30 years, Jan is forced to deal with the fact that her youngest son has finally left the nest. On a road-trip down the Oregon Coast, she begins to learn what it means to live life after motherhood. Cretton’s previous work includes Short Term 12 (2013) and I Am Not a Hipster (2012).

    Tom Gilroy — OUR LADY OF THE SNOW
    When a convent is threatened with dissolution, the elderly nuns begin to have ecstatic visions. When the atheist teenager who cooks for them begins to share in those visions, supernatural events come to the aid of the convent. Gilroy’s previous work includes The Cold Lands (2013).  

    Alistair Banks Griffin — SNOW THE JONES
    When teenage vagabond Lexi joins a traveling door-to-door sales crew, she discovers a world much darker than the one from which she was trying to escape. Griffin’s previous work includes Two Gates of Sleep (2010).

    Matthew Porterfield — SOLLERS POINT
    After serving a parole term detained in his father’s house, an ex-offender finds the adjustment to society and the workforce more difficult than the confines of home. Porterfield’s previous work includes I Used to Be Darker (2013) andPutty Hill (2010). For more information visit hamiltonfilmgroup.org.

    Jeremy Teicher and Alexi Pappas — STICK AND CHUB
    In a small American town obsessed with competitive running, 21-year-old star athlete Plumb Marigold rebels against her parents, coaches, agents, and teammates just weeks before the upcoming Olympic trials. Teicher and Pappas’ previous work includes Tall As the Baobab Tree (2013). For more information visit stickandchub.com

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  • Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Names 2013–2014 Board of Governors

     Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

    Ten first-time governors have been elected to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Board of Governors. In addition, eight incumbents have been reelected and one previous governor is returning to the board. This year’s election increases the Academy’s governing body from 43 to 48.

    The first-time governors are Judianna Makovsky and Deborah Nadoolman, representing the Costume Designers Branch; Rick Carter and Jan Pascale, Designers Branch; Alex Gibney, Documentary; Lynzee Klingman, Film Editors; Amy Pascal, Executives; Kathryn Blondell and Bill Corso, Makeup Artists and Hairstylists; and Nancy Utley, Public Relations.

    The reelected governors are Ed Begley, Jr., Actors Branch; John Bailey, Cinematographers; Kathryn Bigelow, Directors; Charles Fox, Music; Jon Bloom, Short Films and Feature Animation; Curt Behlmer, Sound; Richard Edlund, Visual Effects; and Robin Swicord, Writers.

    Mark Johnson, representing the Producers Branch, is returning to the board after a hiatus.

    The Academy’s 16 branches, including the recently created Costume Designers Branch, are each represented by three governors, who may serve up to three consecutive three-year terms. For the first time, the Makeup Artists and Hairstylists Branch is represented by three governors; the branch was previously represented by one.

    Governors who were not up for reelection and who continue on the board are Annette Bening and Tom Hanks, Actors Branch; Jim Bissell, Designers; Richard P. Crudo and Dante Spinotti, Cinematographers; Jeffrey Kurland, Costume Designers; Lisa Cholodenko and Michael Mann, Directors; Michael Apted and Rob Epstein, Documentary; Dick Cook and Robert Rehme, Executives; Mark L. Goldblatt and Michael Tronick, Film Editors; Leonard Engelman, Makeup Artists and Hairstylists; Arthur Hamilton and David L. Newman, Music; Gale Anne Hurd and Kathleen Kennedy, Producers; Cheryl Boone Isaacs and Rob Friedman, Public Relations; Bill Kroyer and John Lasseter, Short Films and Feature Animation; Don Hall and Scott Millan, Sound; Craig Barron and John Knoll, Visual Effects; and Bill Condon and Phil Robinson, Writers.

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  • 29 Documentary Films to Receive Grants from Sundance Institute

    sundance-institute1

    29 feature-length documentary films have been selected to receive more than $550,000 in grants from the Sundance Institute’s Documentary Film Program and Fund (DFP). Grantees were selected from 772 submissions from 88 countries and include filmmakers working in Chile, Libya, Cuba, Cambodia and Pakistan as well as a broad range of experience, from first-time feature documentary filmmakers to Academy Award nominee Arthur Dong and veteran filmmaker Ed Pincus working with Lucia Small.

    DEVELOPMENT

    Chicago Boys (Chile) 
    Director: Carola Fuentes
    The film tells how a group of Milton Friedman’s disciples – backed by a military dictatorship in the ‘70s – managed to turn Chile into the first and most extreme model of neoliberalism in the world.

    Children
    Director: Maite Alberdi
    Chilean support for people with Down Syndrome ends at 25, but life expectancy is now in the 50s. A group of friends are facing a stage they were never prepared for, because no one ever expected them to grow up or get old.

    Concerning Violence (Sweden) 
    Director: Goran Hugo Olsson
    From the depths of the Swedish film archive comes newly discovered, powerful footage of the most daring moments in Third World liberation movements. Accompanied by classic text from The Wretched of the Earth by Franz Fanon, the new film will offer timeless reflections on violence and liberation.        

    Eddie Adams: SAIGON ’68 (U.S.A.)
    Director: Douglas Sloan
    The most influential photograph to come out of the Vietnam War transformed the lives of both photographer Eddie Adams and General Loan, who summarily executed the prisoner. The film explores the surprising backstory and launches a broader inquiry into our perception and understanding of the visual image.

    Flickering Time Bomb (New Zealand) 
    Director: Pietra Brettkelly
    Three men align in a passionate campaign to save Afghanistan’s rapidly deteriorating Film Archive, in a country whose culture and history are once again under threat of an uncertain future.

    Freedom Fields (Libya)           
    Director: Naziha Arebi
    At the new dawn of a nation once cut off from the world, a dynamic group of women from fractured sides of the revolution come together with one hunger in common, to empower the women of Libya through sport. Their dream: to form the first national Libyan women’s football team.

    Hotel Nueva Isla (Cuba/Spain) 
    Directors: Irene Gutierrez and Javier Labrador
    Jorge lives with his four neighbors in the formerly luxurious Hotel Nueva Isla in Old Havana. Now in ruins, it is a shelter for people living on the fringes of society. Evacuation becomes imminent, but Jorge resists abandoning the building.

    School of Last Resort (U.S.A.) 
    Directors: Landon Van Soest and Jeremy Levine
    Three students at an experimental school for criminal youth struggle to fulfill their hopes in one of the most dangerous cities in the country.

    Simple Justice (U.S.A.) 
    Directors: Marion Lipschutz and Rose Rosenblatt
    After 435 days in prison, a Chinese immigrant in Indianapolis is free on bail. Can her attorney clear the charges of murder and attempted feticide, or will she go to jail for her crime – attempting suicide while pregnant?

    The Storm Makers (Cambodia / France) 
    Director: Guillaume Suon
    Filmmaker Guillaume Suon turns his cinematic lens on globalization and contemporary Cambodia.

    Southwest of Salem: The Story of the San Antonio Four (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Deborah S. Esquenazi
    Four Chicana lesbians languish in Texas prisons, found guilty of sexually assaulting two girls ages 7 and 9. Now, advocates and attorneys believe that a spurned suitor’s revenge, homophobia and ‘junk science’ were key factors in their conviction. The film also explores the tedious process of exonerating innocents in Texas.

    Untitled Colorado Documentary (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Eric Juhola
    The film follows a landmark case in Colorado, where a 6-year-old male-to-female transgender girl is banned from using the girls’ bathroom at her elementary school.

    PRODUCTION / POST-PRODUCTION

    Barring Race (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Noel Schwerin
    At an infamous prison in California, inmates and staff confront a U.S. Supreme Court ruling and a novel anti-violence program order, revealing America’s locked down racial order, and the hidden risks of transformative change.

    Chameleon
    Director: Ryan Mullins
    Chameleon is a chronicle of the extraordinary escapades of Anas Aremeyaw Anas, a deep-cover investigative journalist in Ghana.           

    Elephant in the Room (Working Title) (U.S.A.) 
    Directors: Lucia Small and Ed Pincus
    Two filmmakers of different generations turn the camera on each other to explore friendship, legacy and living with terminal illness. A film that spans the years of their friendship,Elephant in the Room (working title) offers a raw, personal glimpse into a creative partnership and the delicate process of capturing life’s precious moments.

    The Hand that Feeds (U.S.A.) 
    Directors: Rachel Lears and Robin Blotnick
    Twelve undocumented immigrant workers take on a well-known New York City restaurant chain owned by powerful investors. This David-and-Goliath story explores what it takes for ordinary people to stand up for their dignity, and win.

    The Killing Fields of Dr. Haing S. Ngor (U.S.A.)
    Director: Arthur Dong
    The periods before, during, and after the Khmer Rouge’s tyrannical rule over Cambodia are seen through the eyes of Dr. Haing S. Ngor, who escaped to America and recreated his experiences in The Killing Fields, winning an Oscar® for his first film. He became the de facto worldwide ambassador for truth and justice in his homeland, only to be gunned down in Chinatown Los Angeles – a case still muddled with transnational conspiracy theories.

    Marmato (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Mark Grieco
    If Colombia is the new El Dorado of the global gold rush then Marmato, a mining town with over 500 years of history, is the new frontier. In its mountain there are $20 billion in gold, but its 8,000 inhabitants are at risk of being displaced by an open-pit mining project planned by a Canadian mining company.

    Midway (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Chris Jordan
    Both elegy and warning, Midway explores the interconnectedness of species, with the albatross on Midway as a mirror of our humanity.

    The Overnighters (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Jesse Moss
    Moths to a flame, broken, desperate men chase their dreams and run from their demons in the North Dakota oil fields. A local Pastor risks everything to help them.

    Private Violence (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Cynthia Hill
    Have you ever wondered, “Why doesn’t she leave?” Private Violence follows domestic violence advocate Kit Gruelle as she accompanies women on the pathway from victim to survivor.

    Radical Love (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Hillevi Loven
    Cole, a transgender Christian teen in rural North Carolina, searches for love and a spiritual community to call home.

    Street Fighting Man (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Andrew James
    In a new America where the promise of education, safety and shelter are in jeopardy, three Detroit men fight to build something lasting for themselves and future generations.

    Untitled Project (Faroe Islands/UK) 
    Director: Mike Day
    The pilot whale hunters of the Nordic Faroe Islands believe that hunting is vital to their way of life, but when a local doctor makes a grim discovery about the effects of marine pollution, environmental changes threaten to end the controversial tradition and change the community forever.

    DISCRETIONARY

    The Dream of Shahrazad (South Africa) 
    Director: Francois Verster
    Weaving together music, politics and storytelling, this film explores recent Middle East events through the metaphor of The 1001 Nights.

    Out in The Night (formerly The Fire Next Time) (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Blair Doroshwalther
    A lifetime demanding self-defense. One night they fought back.

    AUDIENCE ENGAGEMENT

    25 To Life (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Mike Brown
    William “Reds” Brawner kept his HIV status a secret for over twenty years. Now Will seeks redemption from his nebulous and promiscuous past as he builds his own family. Audience Engagement support will be applied to the films’ outreach goals: to help decrease unsafe practices among the target population, reveal complexity in adult relationships, and dispel fear and misunderstandings surrounding the epidemic.

    A Fierce Green Fire (U.S.A.) 
    Director: Mark Kitchell
    Narrated by Robert Redford, Ashley Judd, Van Jones, Isabel Allende and Meryl Streep, this exploration of the environmental movement looks at fifty years of global activism and the battle for a living planet. The Audience Engagement award supports work with environmental groups large and small as they mobilize and build grassroots campaigns.

    Girl Model (U.S.A.) 
    Directors: Ashley Sabin and David Redmon
    Girl Model follows a 13-year-old Siberian girl and the American scout who discovers her through the complex, global human supply chain of the unregulated and often murky world of the international modeling industry. The Audience Engagement award supports a girl-fueled campaign to encourage the Department of Labor to extend child labor protections to under age models.

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  • Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Jason Schwartzman, Steve McQueen Among 276 Artists and Execs Invited to Join Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

    Joseph Gordon-Levitt  in Don Jons Addiction Joseph Gordon-Levitt in Don Jons Addiction

    The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has extended invitations to join the organization to 276 artists and executives who “have distinguished themselves by their contributions to theatrical motion pictures. Those who accept the invitations will be the only additions to the Academy’s membership in 2013.” “These individuals are among the best filmmakers working in the industry today,” said Academy President Hawk Koch. “Their talent and creativity have captured the imagination of audiences worldwide, and I am proud to welcome each of them to the Academy.”

    The 2013 invitees are:

    Actors
    Jason Bateman – “Up in the Air,” “Juno”
    Miriam Colon – “City of Hope,” “Scarface”
    Rosario Dawson – “Rent,” “Frank Miller’s Sin City”
    Kimberly Elise – “For Colored Girls,” “Beloved”
    Joseph Gordon-Levitt – “Lincoln,” “The Dark Knight Rises”
    Charles Grodin – “Midnight Run,” “The Heartbreak Kid”
    Rebecca Hall – “Iron Man 3,” “The Town”
    Lance Henriksen – “Aliens,” “The Terminator”
    Jack Huston – “Not Fade Away,” “Factory Girl”
    Milla Jovovich – “Resident Evil,” “Chaplin”
    Lucy Liu – “Kill Bill: Vol. 1,” “Chicago”
    Jennifer Lopez – “What to Expect When You’re Expecting,” “Selena”
    Alma Martinez – “Born in East L.A.,” “Under Fire”
    Emily Mortimer – “Hugo,” “Lars and the Real Girl”
    Sandra Oh – “Rabbit Hole,” “Sideways”
    Paula Patton – “Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol,” “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire”
    Michael Peña – “End of Watch,” “Crash”
    Emmanuelle Riva – “Amour,” “Hiroshima, Mon Amour”
    Jason Schwartzman – “Moonrise Kingdom,” “Rushmore”
    Geno Silva – “Mulholland Drive,” “Amistad”
    Danny Trejo – “Machete,” “Heat”
    Chris Tucker – “Silver Linings Playbook,” “Rush Hour”

    Cinematographers
    Luca Bigazzi – “This Must Be the Place,” “Certified Copy”
    Benoît Delhomme – “The Boy in the Striped Pajamas,” “The Proposition”
    Simon Duggan – “The Great Gatsby,” “Killer Elite”
    Greig Fraser – “Zero Dark Thirty,” “Snow White and the Huntsman”
    Jonathan Freeman – “Remember Me,” “Fifty Dead Men Walking”
    Greg Gardiner – “Race to Witch Mountain,” “Elf”
    Eric Gautier – “Into the Wild,” “The Motorcycle Diaries”
    Agnès Godard – “Sister,” “Beau Travail”
    Eduard Grau – “Buried,” “A Single Man”
    Jess Hall – “The Spectacular Now,” “Brideshead Revisited”
    Fred Kelemen – “The Turin Horse,” “The Man from London”
    Mark Lee Ping Bing – “Norwegian Wood,” “In the Mood for Love”
    Reed Morano – “Little Birds,” “Frozen River”
    Oleg Mutu – “Beyond the Hills,” “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days”
    Alex Nepomniaschy – “Narc,” “Safe” 
    Christian Sebaldt – “Resident Evil: Apocalypse,” “Race to Space”
    Ben Seresin – “World War Z,” “Unstoppable”
    Adam Stone – “Mud,” “Take Shelter”
    Checco Varese – “Girl in Progress,” “The Aura”
    Ken Zunder – “Bending the Rules,” “That’s What I Am”

    Costume Designers
    Paco Delgado – “Les Misérables,” “Biutiful”
    Sophie de Rakoff – “This Means War,” “Legally Blonde”
    Carlo Poggioli – “Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter,” “Cold Mountain”

    Designers
    Lori Balton – “Argo,” “The Dark Knight Rises”
    Judy Becker – “Silver Linings Playbook,” “The Fighter”
    Simon Bright – “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” “Avatar”
    Martin T. Charles – “Marvel’s The Avengers,” “The Artist”
    David M. Crank – “The Master,” “Lincoln”
    Stefan Paul Dechant – “Oz The Great and Powerful,” “True Grit”
    Tracey A. Doyle – “The Muppets,” “21”
    Anna Lynch-Robinson – “Les Misérables,” “An Education”
    Maria Nay – “Identity Thief,” “Ray”
    David Smith – “Crazy, Stupid, Love.,” “The Holiday”

    Directors
    Nikolaj Arcel – “A Royal Affair,” “Truth about Men”
    Ava DuVernay* – “Middle of Nowhere,” “I Will Follow” 
    Paul Feig – “The Heat,” “Bridesmaids”
    Catherine Hardwicke – “Twilight,” “Thirteen”
    Kirk Jones – “What to Expect When You’re Expecting,” “Waking Ned Devine”
    Ken Kwapis – “Big Miracle,” “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants”
    Pablo Larraín – “No,” “Tony Manero”
    Steve McQueen – “Shame,” “Hunger”
    Kim Nguyen – “War Witch (Rebelle),” “City of Shadows”
    Jafar Panahi* – “This Is Not a Film,” “The Circle” 
    Todd Phillips – “The Hangover,” “Old School”
    Joachim Rønning – “Kon-Tiki,” “Max Manus”
    Espen Sandberg – “Kon-Tiki,” “Max Manus”
    Tim Story – “Think Like a Man,” “Fantastic Four”
    Benh Zeitlin – “Beasts of the Southern Wild,” “Glory at Sea”

    Documentary
    Orlando Bagwell – “Citizen King,” “Malcolm X: Make It Plain”
    Rebecca Cammisa – “God Is the Bigger Elvis,” “Which Way Home”
    Yung Chang – “China Heavyweight,” “Up the Yangtze”
    Michael Chin – “Jonestown: The Life and Death of Peoples Temple,” “In the Shadow of the Stars”
    Christine Choy – “In the Name of the Emperor,” “Who Killed Vincent Chin?”
    Bonni Cohen – “The Island President,” “Wonders Are Many: The Making of Doctor Atomic”
    Eduardo Coutinho – “As Canções,” “Cabra Marcado Para Morrer (Twenty Years Later)”
    Miriam Cutler – “Kings Point,” “Ethel”
    Andrea Nix Fine – “Inocente,” “War/Dance”
    Sean Fine – “Inocente,” “War/Dance”
    Robert Frank – “Cocksucker Blues,” “Pull My Daisy”
    William Greaves – “Ralph Bunche: An American Odyssey,” “Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One”
    Lauren Greenfield – “The Queen of Versailles,” “Thin”
    Patricio Guzmán – “Nostalgia for the Light,” “The Battle of Chile”
    Vivien Hillgrove – “Symphony of the Soil,” “In the Matter of Cha Jung Hee”
    Heddy Honigmann – “El Olvido (Oblivion),” “Crazy”
    Vikram Jayanti – “The Agony and the Ecstasy of Phil Spector,” “Game Over: Kasparov and the Machine”
    Peter Kinoy – “Poverty Outlaw,” “When the Mountains Tremble”
    Claude Lanzmann – “Le Rapport Karski (The Karski Report),” “Shoah”
    Kim Longinotto – “Rough Aunties,” “Sisters in Law”
    Stanley Nelson – “Freedom Riders,” “Jonestown: The Life and Death of Peoples Temple”
    Jehane Noujaim – “Control Room,” “Startup.com”
    Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy – “Transgenders: Pakistan’s Open Secret,” “Saving Face”
    Marcel Ophuls – “Hotel Terminus: The Life and Times of Klaus Barbie,” “The Sorrow and the Pity”
    José Padilha – “Secrets of the Tribe,” “Bus 174 (Ônibus 174)”
    Jafar Panahi* – “This Is Not a Film,” “The Circle”
    Elise Pearlstein – “Last Call at the Oasis,” “Food, Inc.” 
    Raoul Peck – “Fatal Assistance (Assistance Mortelle),” “Lumumba: La Mort du Prophète”
    Kevin Rafferty – “Harvard Beats Yale 29-29,” “The Atomic Cafe” 
    J. Ralph* – “Chasing Ice,” “Man on Wire” 
    Bob Richman – “Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory,” “Waiting for ‘Superman'”
    T. Woody Richman – “How to Survive a Plague,” “Fahrenheit 9/11”
    Veronica Selver – “Berkeley in the Sixties,” “You Got to Move: Stories of Change in the South”
    Jon Shenk – “The Island President,” “Lost Boys of Sudan”
    Ricki Stern – “Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work,” “The Devil Came on Horseback”
    Robert Stone – “Earth Days,” “Radio Bikini”
    Annie Sundberg – “Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work,” “The Devil Came on Horseback”
    Renee Tajima-Pena – “Who Killed Vincent Chin?,” “My America (Or Honk If You Love Buddha)”
    Agnès Varda – “The Beaches of Agnès,” “The Gleaners and I”
    Roger Ross Williams – “God Loves Uganda,” “Music by Prudence”
    Pamela Yates – “Granito: How to Nail a Dictator,” “The Reckoning: The Battle for the International Criminal Court”
    Amy Ziering – “The Invisible War,” “Derrida”

    Executives
    Holly Bario
    Jeb Brody
    Eric d’Arbeloff
    Dean C. Hallett
    Lynn Harris
    Jeff Ivers
    Jonathan King
    Robert Kirby
    Dylan Leiner
    Nick Meyer
    Andrew Millstein
    Hannah Minghella
    Angela Morrison
    Brian Roberts
    Mark Roybal
    Tucker Tooley
    Kevin Tsujihara

    Film Editors
    Michael Berenbaum – “What to Expect When You’re Expecting,” “Sex and the City”
    Jeff Freeman – “Ted,” “Cruel Intentions”
    James Haygood – “Where the Wild Things Are,” “Fight Club”
    Stuart Levy – “Savages,” “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”
    Mary Jo Markey – “Star Trek Into Darkness,” “Super 8”

    Makeup Artists and Hairstylists
    Luisa Abel – “The Dark Knight Rises,” “Inception”
    Anne Aulenta-Spira – “The Place beyond the Pines,” “Drive”
    Terry Baliel – “The Dark Knight Rises,” “J. Edgar”
    Thomas Floutz – “The Call,” “Hellboy II: The Golden Army”
    Kay Georgiou – “Promised Land,” “Lincoln” 
    Bernadette Mazur – “Men in Black 3,” “The Campaign”
    Kim Santantonio – “Gangster Squad,” “Frost/Nixon”
    Lisa Tomblin – “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2,” “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1”
    Kelvin R. Trahan – “Argo,” “Memoirs of a Geisha”
    Lisa Westcott – “Les Misérables,” “Shakespeare in Love”

    Members-at-Large
    Victoria Alonso
    Fred Baron
    Ben Bray
    Pieter Jan Brugge
    Jackie Burch
    Leo Davis
    Susie Figgis
    Lori Furie
    Glenn S. Gainor
    Joe Gareri
    Lance Gilbert
    Andy Gill
    Mindy Marin
    Laray Mayfield
    Jeanne McCarthy
    Neil Meron
    Gary Powell
    Ned Price
    Michelle Satter
    Stefan Sonnenfeld
    Cindy Tolan
    Brent Woolsey

    Music
    Ramiro Belgardt – “Star Trek Into Darkness,” “Lincoln”
    Ramin Djawadi – “Safe House,” “Iron Man”
    Jennifer Dunnington – “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” “Hugo”
    Siedah Garrett – “Rio,” “Dreamgirls”
    Joe Hisaishi – “Ponyo,” “Spirited Away”
    Henry Jackman – “This Is the End,” “Wreck-It Ralph”
    Cliff Martinez – “Drive,” “Traffic”
    Prince – “Purple Rain,” “Happy Feet”
    J. Ralph* – “Chasing Ice,” “Man on Wire”
    Aaron Lael Zigman – “Peeples,” “Sex and the City”

    Producers
    Stefan Arndt – “Amour,” “The White Ribbon”
    Jason Blum – “The Purge,” “Paranormal Activity”
    Finola Dwyer – “Quartet,” “An Education”
    Jack Giarraputo – “Anger Management,” “The Wedding Singer”
    Veit Heiduschka – “Amour,” “The White Ribbon”
    Lloyd Levin – “Green Zone,” “Watchmen”
    Julie Lynn – “Albert Nobbs,” “Nine Lives”
    Margaret Menegoz – “Amour,” “The White Ribbon”
    Andrea Sperling – “Smashed,” “Like Crazy”

    Public Relations
    Rachel Cadden
    Theresa Cross
    Jeff S. Elefterion
    Julie Fontaine
    Jackson George
    Anne Globe
    Michael Lawson
    Dennis O’Connor
    Blair Rich
    John G. Sabel

    Short Films and Feature Animation
    Marc Bertrand – “Gloria Victoria,” “Hollow Land”
    Bryan Buckley – “Asad,” “The Wake-Up Caller”
    Shawn Christensen – “Curfew,” “Brink”
    Eric Darnell – “Madagascar,” “Shrek”
    John C. Donkin – “Ice Age Continental Drift,” “Gone Nutty”
    Ken Duncan – “9,” “Shark Tale”
    Danielle Feinberg – “Brave,” “WALL-E”
    Sam Fell – “ParaNorman,” “The Tale of Despereaux”
    Matt Groening – “Maggie Simpson in ‘The Longest Daycare,'” “The Simpsons Movie”
    Vicky Jenson – “Shark Tale,” “Shrek”
    Travis Knight – “ParaNorman,” “Coraline”
    Steve May – “Brave,” “Up”
    Rich Moore – “Wreck-It Ralph,” “Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who!”
    Robert Neuman – “Wreck-It Ralph,” “Tangled”
    Brandon Oldenburg – “Rise of the Guardians,” “The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore”
    PES – “Fresh Guacamole,” “Western Spaghetti” 
    Steve Pilcher – “Brave,” “Shrek the Third”
    Normand Roger – “Hollow Land,” “The Banquet of the Concubine”
    Clark Spencer – “Wreck-It Ralph,” “Bolt”

    Sound
    Bobbi Banks – “The Call,” “Hustle & Flow”
    Jose Antonio Garcia – “Argo,” “Babel” 
    Simon Hayes – “Les Misérables,” “X-Men: First Class”
    Edward J. Hernandez – “Real Steel,” “Basic Instinct”
    Daniel S. Irwin – “Prometheus,” “Little Children”
    Drew Kunin – “Life of Pi,” “Lost in Translation”
    Michael W. Mitchell – “The Dark Knight Rises,” “The Matrix Reloaded”
    Tom Ozanich – “Project X,” “Kill Bill: Vol. 2”
    Mark Paterson – “Les Misérables,” “The Pirates! Band of Misfits” 
    Richard Pryke – “127 Hours,” “Slumdog Millionaire”
    Erin Michael Rettig – “A Good Day to Die Hard,” “X-Men Origins: Wolverine”
    Ann Scibelli – “Prometheus,” “Inglourious Basterds”
    Brian T. Slack – “Chéri,” “Crossover”
    Bruce Tanis – “Gangster Squad,” “X-Men: First Class”
    F. Elmo Weber – “Identity Thief,” “The Kids Are All Right”
    Christopher T. Welch – “Silver Linings Playbook,” “(500) Days of Summer”
    Dave Whitehead – “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” “District 9”
    Stuart Wilson – “Skyfall,” “War Horse”

    Visual Effects
    Jason Bayever – “Life of Pi,” “The Wolfman”
    Mark Breakspear – “The Great Gatsby,” “Tropic Thunder”
    Philip Brennan – “Snow White and the Huntsman,” “Minority Report”
    Tony Clark – “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides,” “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” 
    David Clayton – “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” “Avatar”
    Michael Dawson – “Snow White and the Huntsman,” “The Devil’s Double”
    Erik-Jan De Boer – “Life of Pi,” “Night at the Museum”
    Donald R. Elliott – “Life of Pi,” “Seabiscuit”
    John Goodson – “Red Tails,” “Marvel’s The Avengers”
    Charley Henley – “Prometheus,” “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”
    John McLeod – “Django Unchained,” “The Aviator”
    Mark Noel – “Oz The Great and Powerful,” “Transformers”
    David Prescott – “Transformers,” “X-Men”
    Guillaume Rocheron – “Life of Pi,” “Sucker Punch”
    Wendy Rogers – “Puss in Boots,” “Shrek”
    David Alexander Smith – “The Amazing Spider-Man,” “The Matrix Reloaded”
    Wayne Stables – “The Adventures of Tintin,” “Avatar”
    Richard Stammers – “Prometheus,” “Angels & Demons”
    Richard Stutsman – “Zero Dark Thirty,” “Independence Day”
    Christopher Townsend – “Captain America: The First Avenger,” “The Day after Tomorrow”
    Stephan Trojansky – “Marvel’s The Avengers,” “Hereafter”
    David Watkins – “Ali,” “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” 
    Jeff White – “Marvel’s The Avengers,” “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull”
    Trevor Wood – “Prometheus,” “The Golden Compass”

    Writers
    Jessica Bendinger – “Aquamarine,” “Bring It On”
    Reggie Rock Bythewood – “Notorious,” “Get on the Bus”
    Tina Gordon Chism – “Peeples,” “Drumline”
    Julie Delpy – “Before Midnight,” “2 Days in Paris”
    Lena Dunham – “Nobody Walks,” “Tiny Furniture”
    Ava DuVernay* – “Middle of Nowhere,” “I Will Follow”
    John Gatins – “Flight,” “Coach Carter”
    John Hamburg – “I Love You, Man,” “Meet the Parents”
    John Lee Hancock – “Snow White and the Huntsman,” “The Blind Side”
    Rian Johnson – “Looper,” “Brick”
    Jeff Nichols – “Mud,” “Take Shelter”
    Sarah Polley – “Take This Waltz,” “Away from Her”
    Chris Terrio – “Argo,” “Heights”

    Associates
    Lorrie Bartlett
    Paul Bronfman
    Markham L. Goldstein
    Robert Harvey
    Gregory S. Laemmle
    Sandra Marsh
    Adam Schweitzer
    Kimberly Snyder
    Matthew L. Snyder
    Les Zellan

     

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  • Six Film Projects Awarded Tribeca Film Institute TFI New Media Fund Grants

    WHO IS DAYANI CRISTAL?WHO IS DAYANI CRISTAL?

    Six film projects have be selected as recipients for the 2013 Tribeca Film Institute (TFI) New Media Fund. The TFI New Media Fund was established in 2011 through a long-term partnership with the Ford Foundation’s  JustFilms Initiative to support non-fiction film projects that go beyond traditional screens, exploring storytelling that is interactive, cross-platform and participatory.

    The recipients of grants are:

    CHASING THE SUN
    Key participants:  Paul Shoebridge, Michael Simons (The Goggles)
    Description: Suppose we found a lost continent — impossible, but just imagine an opportunity to do things differently, to do anything besides business as usual. Chasing the Sun is an immersive online story about the Arctic.
    Location: Canada: Vancouver, BC

    THE YES MEN ARE REVOLTING
    Key participants: Andy Bichlbaum, Mike Bonanno, Laura Nix, Mary Notari, The Public Society, Glocal
    Description: The Yes Men Are Revolting ends with an urgent call to action—and with a tool, the Action Switchboard, that will help viewers answer that call. This human-moderated digital platform helps a global audience initiate and join direct actions that serve specific activist goals; it also provides training and other resources for carrying out media actions. Effectively, the Action Switchboard invites the film’s audience to join in the story the film and extend it in new and powerful ways.
    Location: New York, Los Angeles

    WHO IS DAYANI CRISTAL?
    Key participants: Gael Garcia Bernal, Marc Silver, Lina Srivastava
    Description: Deep in the scorching Sonoran desert beneath a cicada tree border patrol discovers a decomposing body. Lifting a t-shirt, they expose a tattoo that reads ‘Dayani Cristal.’ An anonymous body in the Arizona desert sparks the beginning of a search across a continent to seek out the people left behind and the meaning of a mysterious tattoo. “Who Is Dayani Cristal?” is a film and cross-platform exploration of stories underlying poverty, immigration, and the human rights of migrants who make journey across the US-Mexico border.|
    Location: Mexico: Mexico City, UK: London, United States: New York

    THIS IS MY BACKYARD (Logs of War)
    Key participants: Anjali Nayar, Jude Mwenda, Andrew Hill, Daniel Burwen, Leonardo Bonanni
    Description: Silas Siakor, winner of the Goldman Environmental Prize, risked everything to cut off warlord Charles Taylor from the illegal timber trade that was helping fund Liberia’s 14-year civil war. Now, Siakor tries to kick-start his country’s struggling economy through a sustainable logging industry.  “This is My Backyard” is a multi-platform project that crowd sources and disseminates information about land and resources in West Africa.
    Locations: Kenya: Nairobi; Liberia: Monrovia; United States: New York, Boston, San Francisco

    AMERICAN PROMISE
    Key participants: Michèle Stephenson & Joe Brewster
    Description: American Promise follows two African American boys and their families for 12 years as they navigate the terrain of race, privilege and opportunity at a rigorous New York City private school. To further the work of the film, the team are creating a web series and a goal-setting mobile app called “Promise Tracker”.
    Location: New York

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  • Director Paris Barclay Elected First African American President of the Directors Guild of America

    Paris Barclay

    Director Paris Barclay was elected President of the Directors Guild of America by acclamation at the Guild’s National Biennial Convention held over the weekend at DGA National Headquarters in Los Angeles.

    “I am profoundly honored to be elected President of the DGA,” said Barclay to the assembled delegates after the vote. “The DGA has worked for more than three-quarters of a century to advance the creative and economic rights of directors and their teams and I look forward to continuing this strong tradition of service. As the son of a glass blower and a tile maker from Chicago, I am extremely humbled to have the honor to serve in the footsteps of the legendary leaders of the DGA like Frank Capra, Robert Wise and Gil Cates.”

    Barclay has a deep history of service to the Guild, having most recently served four terms on the National Board as First Vice-President, beginning in 2005 and as Third Vice-President from 1999 to 2005. Barclay joined the Guild in 1992 and began his service as a member of the African American Steering Committee in 1993. He joined the Western Directors Council in 1997 as an alternate and was elected a full Council member in 1999 and has served on the Council for 16 years. In 2007, the Guild honored Barclay with the Robert B. Aldrich Achievement Award for extraordinary service to the DGA and its membership.

    Barclay has directed over 130 episodes of television during his directing career, including: Sons of AnarchyGleeSmashHouseCold Case, NCIS: Los Angeles, In Treatment, The Good Wife, CSI, Lost, The ShieldThe West Wing, ER and NYPD Blue. In addition to episodic directing, Barclay has been an active director-producer, currently serving in that role in Sons of Anarchy and previously for In Treatment, Cold Case, City of Angels and NYPD Blue.  

    Barclay has received 10 DGA Award nominations for Outstanding Direction in Comedy and Drama Television. He became the first Director in the history of the Guild to receive a comedy and a drama nomination in the same year, two years in a row (2008 In Treatment & Weeds and 2009 In Treatment & Glee). He won the 1998 DGA Dramatic Series Award for his NYPD Blue episode “Heart and Souls” featuring the death of Jimmy Smits’ character Bobby Simone. He has also won two Emmy Awards for his direction of NYPD Blue and received four additional Emmy nominations for producing and directing. Barclay has also received three NAACP Image Awards, four Peabody Awards, two Humanitas Prizes, and countless other recognitions. He also directed the HBO movie for television The Cherokee Kid and the Miramax feature Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood. He began his career in advertising working as a creative executive and then segued into directing commercials and music videos for artists including: Janet Jackson, Bob Dylan, and LL Cool J.

    Barclay, a graduate of Harvard College, is married to his husband, Christopher Barclay, and has two sons.

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  • 11 Artists and Filmmakers Selected for 2013 Sundance Institute | Time Warner Foundation Fellowship Program

     sundance-institute1

    11 artists and filmmakers have been selected for the 2013 Sundance Institute | Time Warner Foundation Fellowship Program. The Fellowship program promotes cultural, socio-economic and gender diversity as well as artistic collaboration and innovation among emerging film and theatre storytellers, documentary filmmakers and film composers.  Each Fellow was identified by one of the following core programs of the Institute: Documentary Film Program, Feature Film Program, Film Music Program, Native American & Indigenous Film Program and Theatre Program.  Time Warner Foundation has supported the Institute since 2007, enabling direct support of 37 film and theatre artists, including Ryan Coogler (Fruitvale Station), Aurora Guerrero (Mosquita y Mari) and Annie Baker (Circle Mirror Transformation).

    The 2013 Sundance Institute | Time Warner Foundation Fellows are:

    Johnny 
Symons and S. Leo Chiang, Out Run (Documentary Film Program and Fund)— A transgender pioneer fights hostility and discrimination as she campaigns for Congress in the Philippines, illuminating the challenges facing openly LGBT politicians emerging in traditional parts of the world.

    Johnny Symons (Co-Director) is an Emmy‐nominated documentary filmmaker based in San Francisco. Creating films since 1991, Johnny’s work primarily focuses on LGBT culture and politics. His film Daddy & Papa, about the personal, cultural and political impact of gay men raising kids, premiered at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival.

    S. Leo Chiang (Co-Director) is a Taiwan-born, San Francisco-based filmmaker. His current documentary Mr. Cao Goes to Washington, won the Inspiration Award at the 2012 Full Frame Documentary Film Festival. His other films include: A Village Called Versailles, To You Sweetheart, Aloha, One + One and Safe Journey.

    Chinaka Hodge, 700th & International (Feature Film Program) — A trash-talking hood track phenomenon named Tuka dies by an unexpected bullet; she awakes to find herself in a corrupt version of heaven where everyone has a job – namely, to decide the exact moment of death for someone still living on earth.

    Chinaka Hodge is a poet, educator and playwright from Oakland, California. She received her BA from NYU’s Gallatin School and her MFA from USC’s School of Cinematic Arts. After nearly a decade of performing her own words around the globe and on two seasons of Def Poetry, she made the transition to the screen and received her first credit for Brave New Voices on HBO.

    Yotam Silberstein (Film Music Program) — Since landing in New York, internationally-acclaimed guitarist Yotam has earned a well deserved spot among the Jazz elite by collaborating with legendary musicians such as James Moody, The Heath Brothers, Paquito D’Rivera, and the Dizzy Gillespie Alumni All-Stars. Yotam’s mastery of the guitar is featured on an array of hit albums, ranging from his recent releases Resonance and Brasil on the Jazz Legacy Productions label, to Monty Alexander’s Grammy-nominated Harlem-Kingston Express Live! The Sundance Institute | Time Warner Foundation Fellowship included support for Yotam to procure recording equipment needed to build a small home studio and usable recording rig at his residence in Brooklyn.

    Brooke Swaney, Circle (Native American & Indigenous Film Program) — Auralee, trapped in a dead-end job and a dead-end relationship, searches for her native roots while coping with a sudden onset of baby-mania. Frankie, a teenage Haida girl in Montana, acquaints herself with her new foster family while combating the after effects of abuse. Auralee wants a kid, Frankie wants love, and only one knows it is each other.

    Brooke Swaney (Blackfeet & Salish) received her MFA in Film and Television from NYU’s Tisch School of Arts. Her first film, The Indigenoid, was nominated for Best Live Short at the 2005 American Indian Film Festival in San Francisco. In 2011, Ok Breathe Auralee premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.

    Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, Appropriate (Theatre Program) — The Lafayette family patriarch (and compulsive hoarder) is long dead, and it’s time to deal with the deserted and heavily mortgaged Arkansan homestead. When his adult children descend upon the former plantation to liquidate the estate, a gruesome discovery among his many belongings become just the first in a serious of treacherous surprises. A play about family secrets, memory loss and the art of repression.

    Branden Jacobs-Jenkins is a Brooklyn-based playwright. He is Usual Suspect and a former New York Theatre Workshop Playwriting fellow, an alum of the Soho Rep Writers/Directors Lab, Public Theater Emerging Writers Group and Ars Nova Playgroup. His honors include a Princess Grace Award, the Dorothy Strelsin Playwriting Fellowship, the Paula Vogel Award, and a fellowship in playwriting from the New York Foundation for the Arts. He is the recipient of the first-ever Sundance Institute Tennessee Williams Award.

    Tanya Saracho, Song for the Disappeared (Theatre Program) — This new drama tells the story of a fractured family that comes together when the youngest son mysteriously disappears—presumably at the hands of the narcos that dominate the U.S./Mexico border. When their carefree (and sometimes careless) younger brother Javi disappears, the family is forced into their first reunion since their mother’s funeral as they search of the brother that no one—not the headstrong daughter nor the larger-than-life father—knows how to find.

    Tanya Saracho was born in Sinaloa, México. She’s a playwright, director and actor as well as a writer for the upcoming Lifetime series Devious Maids and for the untitled Michael Lannan project for HBO. Named “Best New Playwright of 2010” by Chicago Magazine, Saracho is a new ensemble member at Victory Gardens Theater, a resident playwright emerita at Chicago Dramatists and a Goodman Theatre Fellow. Song For The Disappearedis a Goodman commission.

    The Sundance Institute | Time Warner Foundation Native Producing Fellows are:

    Ross Chaney, I am Thy Weapon — Written by Razelle Benally, I am Thy Weapon is the hard-edged fictional account about a dispirited 17-year-old young woman and her precocious eight-year-old sister as they search for light in the heavy shadows of life cast by poverty and apathy on the San Carlos Reservation in Arizona.

    Ross Chaney (Osage & Cherokee Nations) is a multi-media artist who works in video, installation, painting, drawing and digital imagery. He has served as Executive Vice President of the Otoe-Missouria Tribal Economic Development Holding Company and as the COO and CFO of the Indian Affairs Cabinet of the State of New Mexico.

    Jonny Cournoyer, Across the Creek — A contemporary vision of the Rosebud and Pine Ridge Indian Reservations in South Dakota.

    Jonny Cournoyer (Rosebud Sioux) is a multi-disciplinary artist with a primary focus on filmmaking. He is currently in post-production on his debut documentary, Across the Creek, funded by VisionMaker Media. He is based in Los Angeles, California.

    Kasmira Kipp, Alaska is a Drag — Leo, a charismatic 17-year-old gay boy, lives in blue-collar Alaska while working at a fish cannery. His two options for getting out of Anchorage are to train to become a professional boxer or train to become a fabulous drag queen. His worlds collide when he is forced to scale fish, box in the ring, and perform on stage, all in one day. Written by Shaz Bennett.

    Kasmira Kipp (Nez Perce & Umatilla Tribes) has produced award-winning short films and also produced multimedia content featured on Comedy Central’s atom.com, IFC and the Sundance Channel. Kaz is a board member to Longhouse Media, an indigenous media arts organization that nurtures the expression and development of Native artists.

    Blackhorse Lowe, Walk in Beauty — This animated film set in the 1600s follows twin Navajo girls, Morning Star and Evening Star, who come across a dead Spaniard’s body and find the skin so beautiful they are inspired to find a way to turn white.

    Blackhorse Lowe (Navajo) is known for narrative films set on the Navajo reservation that explore the pull between Navajo tradition and contemporary non-Navajo ways. In 2007 Lowe received a New Visions/New Mexico Contract Award to direct Shimásání. His first feature film, 5th World, premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. 

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  • Sundance Institute Selects 22 Fellows Representing 9 Documentary Films for 2013 Documentary Edit and Story Labs

     sundance-institute

    22 Fellows representing nine documentary film projects have been selected to participate in the Sundance Institute 2013 Documentary Edit and Story Labs, June 21-29 and July 5-13 at Sundance Resort in Sundance, Utah.

    Built upon the immersive Lab model launched in 1981 by Sundance Institute President & Founder Robert Redford, each session of the Documentary Edit and Story Labs brings together director and editor teams with world-renowned documentary filmmakers and Sundance Institute staff to support creative risk-taking around issues of story, dramatic structure and character development.

    JUNE 21-29 DOCUMENTARY EDIT AND STORY LAB

    A BLIND EYE (U.S.)
    Director: Kirsten Johnson
    Editor: Amanda Laws
    The voice of an American camerawoman explores the nature of cinematography and what she has failed to see while filming in Afghanistan through her encounters with two Afghan teenagers. Najeeb, a one-eyed boy, struggles to hide what really haunts him, while a bold teenage girl must decide how much she will risk to be visible. A U.S. Military surveillance blimp in the sky over Kabul tracks their every move.

    ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM (U.S.)
    Co-directors and Editor: Ed Pincus, Lucia Small
    Producer: Mary Kerr
    Two filmmakers of different generations turn the camera on each other to explore friendship, legacy, loss and living with terminal illness. Told from two points of view, Elephant in the Room offers a unique, raw, personal glimpse into a creative partnership and the difficulty of capturing the preciousness of life.

    THE LAST HIJACK (U.S., Netherlands)
    Co-directors: Tommy Pallotta and Femke Wolting
    Editor: Edgar Burcksen
    Mohamed, an experienced Somali pirate, assembles his team to conduct his final hijacking. Increasing pressure from his family and future wife to quit an increasingly dangerous profession provide the backdrop for this dramatic tale about survival in a failed state.

    STREET FIGHTING MAN (U.S.)
    Director: Andrew James
    Editor: Jason Tippet
    In a new America where the promise of education, safety and shelter are in jeopardy, three Detroit men fight to build something lasting for themselves and future generations.

    TOTONEL (Romania)
    Director: Alexander Nanau
    Editor: Mirceau Olteanu
    What happens when we discover that we can get more from life than our parents have to offer?

    JULY 5-13 DOCUMENTARY EDIT AND STORY LAB

    AN AFRICAN SPRING (U.S.)
    Director: Elizabeth ‘Chai’ Vasarhelyi
    Editor: Jay Freund
    In the Spring of 2011, Senegal was pitched into crisis when President Abdoulaye Wade decided to change the constitution to allow for a third term. An artist-led youth movement erupted to protect one of Africa’s oldest and most stable democracies.

    THE HOMESTRETCH (U.S.)
    Co-Directors: Anne de Mare, Kirsten Kelly
    Editor: Leslie Simmer
    Four homeless teenagers brave Chicago winters, the pressures of high school, and life alone on the streets to build a brighter future. Against all odds, these kids defy stereotypes as they learn to reach out for help and create new, surprising definitions of home.

    RICH HILL (U.S.)
    Co-directors: Tracy Draz Tragos, Andrew Droz Palermo
    Editor: Jim Hession
    Rich Hill chronicles the turbulent lives of three boys living in a dying Midwestern town, witnessing their struggles up close as they fight to have self-worth, a sense of belonging and a family bond. Despite deep need, these boys still have hope. There is still the dream of transformation: that cycles of poverty can be broken, that love will sustain, that hard work will be rewarded, and that even they can live the American dream.

    STRONG ISLAND (U.S.)
    Director: Yance Ford
    Editor: Shannon Kennedy
    Haunted by the violent death for over 20 years, Strong Island is the director’s meditation on loss, the impact of grief over time and the illusive meaning of “justice.”

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  • Nine Documentary Films Win Gucci Tribeca Documentary Fund Grant Awards

    WHAT TOMORROW BRINGSBeth Murphy’s WHAT TOMORROW BRINGS

    The Tribeca Film Institute (TFI) and Gucci announced the nine documentary film projects selected as the 2013 recipients of the Gucci Tribeca Documentary Fund grant awards, totalling $150,000 to be administered by the Tribeca Film Institute. The Fund provides production and finishing finances, year-round support and guidance to domestic and international documentary filmmakers with feature-length films highlighting and humanizing critical issues of social significance from around the world.

    For the third year, the Kering Foundation (formerly the PPR Corporate Foundation for Women’s Dignity & Rights) has joined the Gucci Tribeca Documentary Fund to present the Spotlighting Women Documentary Award. Three film projects have been chosen that illuminate the courage, compassion, extraordinary strength of character, and contributions of women from around the world.

    2013 projects were selected by a jury comprised of: Brian Sirgutz (SVP of Social Impact at AOL/Huffington Post Media Group); Jada Pinkett Smith; Molly Thompson (SVP, A&E IndieFilms); Olivia Wilde; and director Roger Ross Williams (Music by Prudence, God Loves Uganda). 

    The projects that will collectively receive $100,000 total in funding for the 2013 Gucci Tribeca Documentary Fund are:

    RUN AND GUN, Directed and Produced by Marshall Curry (2008 GTDF grantee for If A Tree Falls).

    RUN AND GUNMarshall Curry’s RUN AND GUN

    A 32 year old American from Baltimore carries a gun in one hand and camera in the other as he documents his experience as a rebel fighter in the Libyan revolution.

    ON A KNIFE EDGE, Directed by Jeremy Williams; Produced by Eli Cane.

    ON A KNIFE EDGEJeremy Williams’ ON A KNIFE EDGE

    Set against a background of rising racial tension and protest, a Lakota teenager learns first-hand what it means to lead a new generation and enter adulthood in a world where the odds are stacked against him.

    PERRY V SCHWARZENEGGER, Directed & Produced by Ryan White & Ben Cotner. In 2010, opponents of gay marriage blocked the broadcast of a federal trial challenging Proposition 8, California’s ban on same-sex marriage. That case is now before the U.S. Supreme Court, where it will rule for the first time on the rights of gay Americans to marry.

    THE SHADOW WORLD, Directed by Johan Grimonprez; Produced by Joslyn Barnes, Anadil Hossain & Driss Benyaklef.

    THE SHADOW WORLDJohan Grimonprez’s THE SHADOW WORLD

    The Shadow World is a feature documentary that explores the international arms trade, the only business that counts its wins and losses in human lives. Based on the book by Andrew Feinstein.

    SILENCED, Directed by James Spione; Produced by Daniel Chalfen; Executive Produced by Jim Butterworth.

    THE SHADOW WORLD by Johan GrimonprezJohan Grimonprez’s THE SHADOW WORLD

    Four whistleblowers fight to reveal the darkest corners of America’s war on terror, challenging a government that is increasingly determined to maintain secrecy.

    UNLOCKING THE CAGE, Directed by DA Pennebaker & Chris Hegedus; Produced by Rosadel Varela & Frazer Pennebaker.

    UNLOCKING THE CAGEDA Pennebaker & Chris Hegedus’ UNLOCKING THE CAGE

    Renowned animal rights attorney Steven Wise wants to break through the legal wall that separates animals and humans. His lawsuit, the first of its kind, will demand the most basic of personhood rights – those of bodily integrity and liberty – for an animal of a species that has been proven to have advanced cognitive capabilities, transforming the status of the animal from that of a mere “thing” to a “person” possessing rights that protect him from abuse and captivity.

    The projects that will collectively receive $50,000 total in funding for the 2013 Spotlighting Women Documentary Award are:

    DEMOCRAZY, Directed by Andreas Dalsgaard, Nicolas Servide & Viviana Gomez; Produced by Joshua Oppenheimer, Signe Sorensen & Anne Kohncke.

    DEMOCRAZYAndreas Dalsgaard, Nicolas Servide & Viviana Gomez’s DEMOCRAZY

    Katherin is fighting for peace and democracy in Colombia. Her hero is the unconventional politician Antanas Mockus. This film investigates how to establish trust in a society ravaged by violence, fear and corruption.

    DISRUPTION, Directed by Pamela Yates; Produced by Paco de Onis.

    disruptionPamela Yates’ DISRUPTION

    A band of Latin American activist-economists set out to change their continent, teaming up with impoverished women to challenge accepted notions on how to eradicate poverty. The women become empowered economic and political engines of their communities. If taken to scale, could 20 million women upend a continent?

    WHAT TOMORROW BRINGS, (pictured above) Directed & Produced by Beth Murphy (2009 GTDF Grantee, The List), Co-Produced by Beth Balaban. In the remote & conservative Afghan village of Deh Subz, the very first girls’ school opens, challenging centuries-old social traditions against the backdrop of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and rising threats to girls’ education.

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  • 13 Filmmaker Finalists for 2013 San Francisco Film Society Documentary Film Fund

    San Francisco Film Society

    The San Francisco Film Society today announced the 13 finalists for the 2013 SFFS Documentary Film Fund awards totaling $100,000, which support feature-length documentaries in postproduction. The SFFS Documentary Film Fund was created to support singular nonfiction film work that is distinguished by compelling stories, intriguing characters and an innovative visual approach. Finalists were selected from more than 200 applications, and winners will be announced in late July.

    Previous DFF winners include Shaul Schwarz’s Narco Cultura, which premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival; Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson’s American Promise, which also premiered at Sundance and won the festival’s Special Jury Prize in the documentary category; and Zachary Heinzerling’s Cutie and the Boxer, which won Sundance’s Directing Award for documentary, has played at film festivals worldwide and will be distributed theatrically by Radius-TWC.

    2013 DOCUMENTARY FILM FUND FINALISTS
    Above All Else — John Fiege, director/producer/cinematographer
    Above All Else is the remarkable story of how one man’s struggle to protect his family from the Keystone XL pipeline transformed the fight against climate change in America. For more information visit aboveallelsefilm.com.

    Art and Craft — Jennifer Grausman, codirector/coproducer and Sam Cullman, codirector/coproducer/cinematographer
    Examining the curious story of a prolific art forger who isn’t in it for the money—but chooses instead to donate his work to museums—Art and Craft uncovers one of the most intriguing cases of deception in art history. Filmed at the moment his ruse is exposed, this story of obsession opens an unlikely window onto questions of mental health, art and philanthropy in the 21st century.

    The Babushkas of Chernobyl — Anne Bogart and Holly Morris, co-director/producers
    As Fukushima smolders, and the world grapples with a dangerous energy era, an unlikely human story emerges from Chernobyl to inform the debate. The Babushkas of Chernobyl is the story of an extraordinary group of women who live in Chernobyl’s post-nuclear disaster “Dead Zone.” For more than 25 years they have survived—and even, oddly, thrived—on some of the most contaminated land on earth. For more information visit thebabushkasofchernobyl.com.

    Evolution of a Criminal — Darius Clark Monroe, director
    Ten years after robbing a Bank of America, filmmaker Darius Monroe returns home to examine how his actions affected the lives of family, friends and victims. For more information visit facebook.com/evolutionofacriminal.

    Freedom Fighters — Jamie Meltzer, director
    There’s a new detective agency in Dallas, Texas, started by a group of exonerated men who have all spent decades in prison for crimes they didn’t commit. They call themselves the Freedom Fighters, and they’ve recently started working their first cases. For more information visit freedomfightersfilm.com.

    Homestretch — Anne De Mare and Kristen Kelly, co-director/producers
    Four homeless teenagers brave Chicago winters, the pressures of high school, and life alone on the streets to build a brighter future. Against all odds, these kids defy stereotypes as they learn to reach out for help and create new, surprising definitions of home.

    How to Become an Extreme Action Hero — Catherine Gund, director
    How to Become an Extreme Action Hero harnesses the power of action architect and spatial philosopher Elizabeth Streb. Through Streb’s daring performances and incisive words, the film jumpstarts our hearts and takes us to the edge. For more information visit strebfilm.org.

    One in a Billion — Geeta Patel, codirector/producer and Ravi V. Patel, codirector
    When Ravi Patel breaks up with his white girlfriend and finds himself almost 30 and still single, he decides to give the traditional Indian matchmaking system a try. His entire family starts a search for his future wife and sends him on a whirlwind of dates around the country in hopes that he’ll find “the one.”

    Radical Love — Hillevi Loven, director
    Radical Love follows the journey of Cole, a transgender Christian teen growing up in rural North Carolina. Upon graduating from high school, he finds love and a sense of belonging with Ashley, a Christian woman. Together, they struggle to gain acceptance in a conservative Bible belt community that is grappling with the changing values of today’s Christian youth.

    Redemption — Amir Soltani and Chihiro Wimbush, co-director/producers
    As with the poor living in the urban slums of India, Egypt and Brazil, a surprising number of Americans make their living off of a vast river of trash. These are America’s untouchables. Through the lives of four recyclers, we are introduced to the art, science, economics and politics of recycling: what it offers, how it touches the poor and why it matters to all of us. For more information visit redemptiondoc.com.

    Rich Hill — Tracy Tragos and Andrew Droz Palermo, co-director/producers
    Rich Hill chronicles the turbulent lives of children living in a dying Midwestern town, witnessing their struggles up close as they yearn to find self worth and imagine a future beyond poverty. For more information visit richhillfilm.com.

    Street Fighting Man — Andrew James, director/cinematographer
    In a new America where the promise of education, safety and shelter are in jeopardy, three Detroit men fight to build something lasting for themselves and future generations in a city that is abandoning its citizens. As we witness each man’s fight to claim his piece of the American Dream, Street Fighting Man reveals that no one can do it alone. For more information visit streetfightingmanthemovie.com.

    Tomorrow We Disappear — Jimmy Goldblum and Adam Weber, co-director/producers
    When their homes are illegally sold to real estate developers, the magicians, acrobats and puppeteers of Delhi’s Kathputli Colony must unite—or splinter apart forever.

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