Documentary "THE ACT OF KILLING" Wins Top Jury  and Audience Awards at International Madrid Documentary Festival

Documentary “THE ACT OF KILLING” Wins Top Jury and Audience Awards at International Madrid Documentary Festival

The Act of Killing

The Act of Killing, by Joshua Oppenheimer, Chistine Cynn and Anonymous won the top prizes, the Jury First Prize and the Audience Award at the just wrapped Documeta Madrid – International Madrid Documentary Festival. The jury commented,“We award the first prize to a film that raised considerable controversy and succeeded at making us feel extremely uncomfortable through a unique construction of fantasy and horror that elicits a brutal reality that remains in impunity.”  The filmmakers received a trophy and 10,000 € Euro.

Complete list of official awards:

Brooklyn Film Festival Announces Lineup for 2013 Festival, themed MAGNETIC; Opens with HairBrained

Brooklyn Film Festival Announces Lineup for 2013 Festival, themed MAGNETIC; Opens with HairBrained

(USA) Dir. Billy Kent

Brooklyn Film Festival (BFF) announced the film line-up for its 2013 festival, themed MAGNETIC, scheduled to run from May 31 through June 9 in Brooklyn, New York. The festival will open with Festival alumnus Billy Kent’s HairBrained starring starring Brendan Fraser, Alex Wolff, Julia Garner and Parker Posey. In the film, 14-year old genius/outcast Eli Pettifog (Wolff) is rejected from Harvard, he ends up at Ivy-League wannabe Whittman College. It’s hate at first sight. Eli’s 41-year-old dorm mate Leo (Fraser), a former gambler whose world has imploded, has dropped out of life to enroll in college. This odd duo become unlikely friends.

REVIEW: Greedy Lying Bastards

REVIEW: Greedy Lying Bastards

by Kelsey Straight

The conflicting ideals of science and politics have created misconceptions regarding climate change, as revealed by Craig Scott Rosebraugh’s documentary, Greedy Lying Bastards. Rosebraugh presents a fundamental struggle between scientific fact and political fabrication: where fact requires evidence, fabrication allows anything to masquerade as reality. The presentation of climate change as “the greatest hoax ever” does not come from humanitarianism, unfortunately, but from the oil industry and those politicians with direct ties to the oil industry. Rosebraugh’s documentary presents a world of individuals who need the earth for different reasons, either as a money-making resource, or as a home for our families and an environment for cultures. If we do not take care of the land that allowed our societies to grow, than the land will not take care of who we are in return.

REVIEW: The Sightseers

REVIEW: The Sightseers

 

by Kelsey Straight

The quirky English humor and quintessential characters of Ben Wheatley’s The Sightseers both disturb us and make us laugh, often without establishing which was the appropriate response. The story follows Chris and Tina on their caravan holiday to a collection of eclectic sights, including the Crich Tramway Museum, the Ribblehead Viaduct, and the Keswick Pencil Museum. Having left her mother and their small English home, a stifling setting where Tina has lived until the age of thirty-four, Tina falls in love with a red-bearded serial killer, Chris. Their odyssey through the countryside is more geared towards personal identity than touristy locations, however. Tina exchanges her baggy 1980’s blue jeans for acid-wash thrift store leggings, and her codes of morality for codes of murder. All the while, Chris gathers material for the book he never begins writing, and Tina discovers that she is less his muse than he is hers. Their story unravels in the rainy countryside instead of on Chris’s blank pages, and every scene becomes a conflict they create for themselves.

REVIEW: Stories We Tell

REVIEW: Stories We Tell

by DeVon Hyman

“There is something kind of deeply uncomfortable with the idea of putting your life out there”
 -Sarah Polley, AMNY, May 2013

True to the fact. A certain level of inner peace would have to be the prerequisite to an initiative being undertaken in the manner in which acclaimed Filmmaker Sarah Polley has done with her much heralded “Stories We Tell” which hit theaters on Friday.  

Centered on a candid look at the reality which was Polley’s birth and actual parents whom were responsible for her existence. For much of her life Polley has been under the belief that her mothers husband was indeed her biological father, only to learn recently and come to terms with that not being the truth.  Her birth in actuality was the product of an affair which her late mom partook in.

Sheffield Doc/Fest Celebrates 20 Years With A Lineup of 120 Films and a New Section on Films About Film

Sheffield Doc/Fest Celebrates 20 Years With A Lineup of 120 Films and a New Section on Films About Film

Sheffield Doc/Fest celebrates its 20th year with a line-up of documentaries screening over five days from June 12 to June 16, 2013. The 120 strong film programme is organized across films in competition as well as thematic sections, also referred to as strands.

This year’s strands include Behind the Beats, The Habit of Art, This Sporting Life, Queer Screen; Resistance, Cross-Platform, First Cut, Best of British, Euro/Doc, Global Encounters, New York Times Op-Docs and Shorts.

RIP: Stepford Wives Director Bryan Forbes Dies

RIP: Stepford Wives Director Bryan Forbes Dies

Film director Bryan Forbes whose work includes the original 1970s horror classic Stepford Wives and Whistle Down The Wind has died “following a long illness” at the age of 86. Forbes, who started his career as an actor, was married to the actress Nanette Newman, died surrounded by his family at his home in the UK. He was awarded the Dilys Powell Award for outstanding contribution to cinema at the London Film Critics’ Circle Awards in 2006.

13 Film Projects Selected for Sundance Institute's June Directors and Screenwriters Labs

13 Film Projects Selected for Sundance Institute’s June Directors and Screenwriters Labs

 

13 film projects have been selected for the Sundance Institute’s annual June Directors and Screenwriters Labs, taking place at the Sundance Resort in Utah from May 27 through June 27. 

At the Directors Lab, Fellows work with an accomplished group of Creative Advisors, professional actors and production crews to shoot and edit key scenes from their screenplays. Through this intense, hands-on process, the Fellows workshop their scripts, collaborate with actors and find a visual storytelling language for their films. Directors Lab Fellows join five additional projects for the week-long Screenwriters Lab, where they participate in individualized story sessions under the guidance of established screenwriters.

“How To Follow Strangers” Set to Open 2013 L.E.S* Film Festival

“How To Follow Strangers” Set to Open 2013 L.E.S* Film Festival

“How To Follow Strangers” directed by Chioke Nassor and starring Ilana Glazer, co-creator/star of the cult web series, Broad City, will open the 2013 L.E.S* Film Festival on June 13. 2013. The L.E.S* Film Festival shows low budget independent films in all categories: features, shorts, documentaries, experimental, foreign and animation.

Full Schedule Released for Rooftop Films 2013 Summer Series

Full Schedule Released for Rooftop Films 2013 Summer Series

 

The 2013 Rooftop Films Summer Series held across New York City begins on May 10th with a collection of new short films including Gold Party by Nellie Kluz, a recipient of a grant from the Rooftop Filmmakers Fund; Slomo by Josh Izenberg, winner of the jury award for best short documentary at the 2013 SXSW film festival; and Weighting, directed Brie Larson and Dustin Bowser. The Summer Series will wrap August 15-17 with three screenings, including a special sneak preview of David Lowery’s, Ain’t Them Bodies Saints.

Below is the full schedule for the 2013 Summer Series.