Ice Cube's Straight Outta L.A., will have its world premiere at Tribeca/ESPN Sports Festival

Editor — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 20:59:03 +0100

I must confess I cannot wait to see that film.!,

What a smart choice and programming from Tribeca.

Let me share with you one of my dearest professionnal experiences as a film distribution (with Columbia at the time). When I was handling the world premiere in Cannes of Boyz'n the Hood, The film revealed both John Singleton as a director, and Ice Cube as an actor and received 2 Academy Award nominations.

I was in charge of the distribution in France, and ran all the promotion and publicity which raised an incredible buzz, some french journalists, handpicked to trigger the buzz compared the direzctor to Orson Welles, John liked that; we did too and got so lucky.
Frank Price, head of the studio (at Sony), told me, with a warm handshake, that he believed the cannes work around the film had been so sucesfull that he had to raise the US Box Office estimate from 30M$ to 50M$ (final box office was 54 indeed!)

Some random fun memories around the launch: the Club Party for Hollywood suits including a rap performance from Ice Cube, some graffitti artists tagging our 4X3 m poster on the croisette live for Canal +, the sold out screening for the black artists community, Mick Jagger Quincy Jones...and some kids from the cannes suburbs, added screening by demand!, the face of John Singleton when he discovered what his "Burger" (from the Carlton Beach) looked like...

So much fun, probably one of the true film fairy tales.
I will make sure our correspondents in New York get a chance to review.

Bruno Chatelin

ESPN Films "30 for 30" production, Ice Cube's Straight Outta L.A., will have its world premiere at the 2010 Tribeca Film Festival. The film will serve as the gala premiere of the Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival, and will take place on Friday, April 23. The 2010 Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival will run during TFF (April 21 - May 2) in lower Manhattan.

"Straight Outta L.A. gives us an entertaining, firsthand account of how a professional sports team captivated a city and ultimately changed the culture of L.A.," said Nancy Schafer, Executive Director of the Tribeca Film Festival. "For the past three years, the Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival program has been an audience favorite at our Festival, and this year's line-up will continue that tradition."

"We are thrilled to launch this year's Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival with a film that shows how sports are intertwined in so many other cultural arenas," stated Keith Clinkscales, senior vice president, ESPN content development and enterprises. "All of the sports documentaries in this year's Festival truly illustrate that the reach of sports in society extends far past solely athletics and into such disciplines as music, language, art and of course, film."

In Straight Outta L.A., director Ice Cube explores the unlikely marriage between the NFL's rebel franchise, the Raiders, and America's glamour city, Los Angeles. In 1982, Raiders owner Al Davis beat the NFL in court and moved his team from Oakland to Los Angeles. With a squad as colorful as its owner, the Raiders captivated a large number of black and Hispanic fans in L.A. at a time when gang warfare, immigration and the real estate boom were rapidly changing the city. The L.A. Raiders morphed into a worldwide brand as the team's colors, swagger and anti-establishment ethos became linked with the hip-hop scene that was permeating South Central Los Angeles. Rapper-turned-filmmaker Ice Cube was not only witness to this revolution, he was also a part of it. As a member of the notorious rap group N.W.A., Ice Cube helped make the silver and black culturally significant to a new generation and demographic.

Straight Outta L.A. will be televised Tuesday, May 11, at 8 p.m. ET on ESPN.

Now in its fourth year, the Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival has become the premier showcase for independent films about sports and competition. The previously announced titles that will screen as part of the Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival include documentary films that explore the rise of BMX superstar Mat Hoffman, an extreme adventurer's quest to reach the North Pole, a struggling rugby team's ambitions to win a single game and the cultural significance of a stadium to a city, team and popular musician.

All of this year's Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival films will screen at Tribeca Cinemas on Saturday, May 1. The films also screen prior to May 1 throughout the Festival.

In addition to the film series, the Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival will present Sports Day as part of the Tribeca Family Festival Street Fair. Sports Day, which will take place on Saturday, May 1, offers fans a day of interactive, sports-related games and activities, as well as appearances by some of New York's most popular athletes. Sports Day is free and open to the public and will take place on Duane Street, between Greenwich and Hudson Streets, in Manhattan.

The following are the films featured in the 2010 Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival. All titles have been previously announced in their respective sections as part of the 2010 TFF film program.

Directors Introducing their Films:

Thessaloniki — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 11:31:54 +0100

Dimitris Gerardis, Director, Greece, WAR ZONE: THE MIRACLE, 2010/80mn (Stories to Tell)

Marc Wolfensberger, Director, Switzerland, OIL ROCKS – CITY ABOVE THE SEA, 2009/54mn (Habitat)

Pierre-Oliver Francois, Director, France, A BARREL FULL OF DREAMS, 2009/93mn (View of the World)

Selana Vronti, Director, Greece, ZORRO THE CAT, 2010/53mn (Portraits: Human Journeys)

Catherine Esway, assisted by Julianna Photopoulos

Thessaloniki Masterclass of Stefan Kloos: Producing and Packaging Documentaries

Thessaloniki — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 10:56:42 +0100

How can short documentaries be produced and packaged in a compelling way? What are the challenges and advantages when working with international co-productions of short documentaries? Will the digital future bring a bigger need for short formats? These are some of the issues explored in this master class focusing on the German -Czech co-production Breathless. This project consists of five short creative documentaries on the theme Breathless - Dominance of the Moment. During the masterclass, producer Stefan Kloos will share his experience and knowledge on developing, producing and distributing a package of short documentaries. He will give a detailed inside view of the process of financing the films, working with such different funders as cultural funds and broadcasters, as well as how it can be an advantage to work with a package of films. During the masterclass short clips from the five films will be screened.
Today: 3PM

Stefan Kloos, born 1968, has been trained as print and radio journalist before working as TV-producer and editor-in-chief for Me, Myself & Eye (MME) in Hamburg from 1994-1999, where he e.g. produced the ARD-documentary series POP 2000 on fifty years of pop and youth culture in Germany. For POP 2000, he was honoured with the prestigious Adolf Grimme TV-Award. After moving to Berlin in 2000 he has been managing two divisions of the multimedia company I-D Media before founding his own production company Kloos & Co. Medien GmbH in 2002. Since, he has been producing various documentaries, amongst others for ARD, MTV and ZDF/ARTE, theatrical documentary films and a drug prevention project for the Federal State of Brandenburg. He was part of the "How to MIP-programme" for young producers and is a member of EDN and AG DOK. In 2009, he was selected for the DISCOVERY CAMPUS MASTERSCHOOL.In 2007, the company founded RISE AND SHINE WORLD SALES and has since been successfully involved in the distribution and world sales of selected award-winning documentaries.

Catherine Esway, assisted by Julianna Photopoulos

New York's Love Affair With French Cinema

FilmNewYork — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:10:17 +0100

New Yorkers are in love again, l'amour fou as they say, with French cinema. Not only has the film "Un Prophete" emerged as one of the big international hits of the year (a much deserved Oscar nominee that should have won the prize) but the current program of new Gallic titles that is the 15th Rendez-Vous with French Cinema offers francophiles (count me in) some boundless treats.

The Rendez-Vous, a favorite New York rite of spring, is presented by the Film Society of Lincoln Center and French publicity organization Unifrance on three of New York's most prestigious arthouse screens....the Walter Reade Theater in Lincoln Center, the IFC Center in the Village and the BAM Rose Theater in Brooklyn.

The series, which began last week and runs through March 21 will present more than a dozen New York premieres including new films from such celebrated film auteurs as Christophe Honoré, François Ozon, Michel Gondry, Claude Miller and Christian Carion.

Festivities began last Thursday with the premiere of Christian Carion’s “Farewell”, which stars Emir Kusturica and Guillaume Canet in a compelling true story of a KGB colonel who gives top-secret documents to a French businessman working in Russia, helping to hasten the end of the Cold War. Other highlights of the festival have included “A Conversation with with Michel Gondry,” in which the director (whose new film “The Thorn in the Heart” screens as part of the festival) discussed his career and upcoming release, “The Green Hornet”. A rare treat is the program “New Films by…the Lumière Brothers!” which presents newly restored films by early-cinema pioneers Auguste and Louis Lumière, les grand-peres of silent cinema.

Francois Ozon, who is remarkably prolific and has a huge following in New York's cinephile circles, is back with "Hideaway" (Le refuge), an intense character drama about a hardened ex-junkie who is visited by the brother of her late boyfriend while recovering at a beachside retreat. Veteran director Claude Miller revisits his earlier themes in

I’m Happy that My Mother is Alive (Je suis heureux que ma mère soit vivante), a comedy drama based on a true story about a man who becomes obsessed with tracking down his birth mother, until he actually finds her.

Some of France's top actors are featured in the series. Francois Cluzet gives a riveting performance as a small-time conman who convinces an economically depressed town that he has come to resurrect a long-dormant highway construction project in "In The Beginning" (A l’origine) by Xavier Giannoli. Chiara Mastroianni stars as a woman recently liberated from her job and husband who heads home to Brittany for the holidays to find some kind of inner happiness in "Making Plans for Lena" (Non ma fille tu n’iras pas danser) by Christophe Honoré. Yvon Attal, one of France's busiest actors, is featured in two films: "Rapt" by Lucas Belvaux, in which he plays a millionaire businessman and playboy who is kidnapped and held for ransom, and in "Regrets" (Les Regrets) by Cédric Kahn, where he is a married Paris architect who returns to his rural hometown to visit his dying mother and rekindles his relationship with a former high-school girlfriend. Veteran actor Michel Piccoli stars as a grandfather and former Resistance fighter who lives with his tomboyish granddaughter in Restless (Le bel age) by Laurent Perreau.

Other well received films in the series have included "8 Times Up (Huit Fois Debout) by Xabi Molia, about a woman (Julie Gayet), struggling to make ends meet, sets up a makeshift camp in the forest in a seriocomic investigation of the pressures of modern society; "French Kissers" (Les Beaux Gosses), a hilarious and touching coming-of-age comedy that follows two geeky Brittany teens as they discover the messiness of first love; and "The Army of Crime (L’armée du crime), a taut, revealing thriller about the beginnings of the French Resistance.

Aside from the early Lumiere films, the series also is featuring the very rare revival of American-born auteur director Jules Dassin's rarely seen The Law (La Loi), a 1959 romantic melodrama set in a seaside Italian village and starring such mid-century superstars as Yves Montand, Gina Lollobrigida, Marcello Mastroianni, Melina Mercouri and Pierre Brasseur. In other words, something for every discerning pallette......a French repas with delicate delights and stirring sauces. For more information, visit: www.filmlinc.com or www.ifccenter.com Sandy Mandelberger, Film New York Editor

....We Have A Dream and Still We Rise....

fountainhead — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:32:27 +0100

XXV. Black International Cinema Berlin 2010 (May 4-8)

We have a dream!

We came from privileged backgrounds in the USA. Families intact, sufficient economic resources, university education, travel, etc. All of these we took for granted. When we were young, we thought everyone had the same lifestyle. As we matured, we became aware of how mistaken we were.

by LJILJANA SAMARDŽIĆ (ljiljana.samardzic@wavemagazine.net)
from Sombor, SERBIA

As a result of Professor Donald Muldrow Griffith's ideas and motivation, this year people may witness the 25th Anniversary of Black International Cinema Berlin, which represents a year based interdisciplinary and intercultural film/video festival. It is produced and directed by Fountainhead® Tanz Theatre.

The festival is going to take place for the second time at the Rathaus Schöneberg (City Hall) in Berlin. This year's title "Opportunity, please knock... We have a dream!" already implies the originality of this festival, but also hides zephyr of a change and better tomorrows. The event consists of video/movie projections, seminars and photo exhibition. The event entitled "The Magical Oasis Cinema Experience" is going to be held between 4th and 8th of May and the photo exhibition will be available from June 1st till 30th.

It all began as part of the Black Cultural Festival in Berlin in 1986, which was an idea of Prof. Donald Muldrow Griffith. Mr. Griffith graduated from the University of Loyola, Chicago, Illinois with a degree in Psychology and Pedagogy. After he spent quite a long time as a group therapist, teacher and probation officer, other interests emerged as spotlights in his life - acting, singing and dancing. In Berlin he established the company Fountainhead® Tanz Theatre, along with four of his colleagues: Ricky Powell, Linda Curry, a German colleague Detlef Bäcker and the very famous ballerina Gayle McKinney, who later became his partner.

Mr. Griffith, what was your initial motive for organizing this kind of event with its theme?

The origins of the festival began prior to 1986, as a result of a conversation with Oscar Brown Jr. His position on the matter of social change was that persons should assume responsibility for the changes they desire in society. His question to me was – "what is the plan?" This thought provoking question among other contributions from my father, my studies and reading led to my assumption of the responsibility to produce and direct the first Black Cultural Festival in Berlin and Europe through the auspices of Fountainhead® Tanz Theatre.

There were four persons who had been invited to Berlin from New York City to perform at Theater des Westens. Our situation was very comfortable economically and administratively, with no visa problems or other concerns. After living in the USA, Chicago and New York, we were accustomed to a variety of persons from different cultures and nationalities, whereas in Berlin, we only saw a sea of persons from one group and rarely saw persons of other cultures.

As time progressed, we gradually became acquainted with small numbers of persons from numerical minority groups and realized there were interesting stories to be documented and presented to the general public, nationally, internationally and we decided to assume responsibility for the dissemination of this information, lest it pass and die, "like footprints in the sand".

Do films have something in common besides actor's and director's origins?

The relativity of film to the human experience is the ability to transcend, cultural and national boundaries with images/pictures that stimulate emotions and thoughts, which have the capacity to inform and transcend humanity from various perspectives.

What enables this festival to maintain its tradition for so long?

The determined desire and need to establish a legacy of what is possible, even under difficult financial circumstances. We came from privileged backgrounds in the USA. Families intact, sufficient economic resources, university education, travel, etc. All of these we took for granted. When we were young, we thought everyone had the same lifestyle. As we matured, we became aware of how mistaken we were. Eventually, we came to believe that those who are given much have a responsibility to return the investment from our families and society, to the individuals, groups and societies in which we reside and elsewhere. The work of Fountainhead® Tanz Theatre is an example to other persons of what can be accomplished without the economic resources customarily associated with such undertakings. We view our efforts as role models and a source of national and international inspiration and hope.

It is said that "Fountainhead® Tanz Theatre believes that prejudice against disadvantaged groups can be challenged and stronger links within society may be forged by using art, theatre, dance, music and seminars". Why do you think that this approach is better or more efficient then any other? Is there any evidence and solid proof for that?

Booker T. Washington, the noted educator said: "Dip your bucket down where you are." Our approach to contributing to a more informed and peaceful society, follows the principle of utilizing the resources available to us as contributions to societies and hopefully as beacons of light, of whom there are many – sung and unsung. We are contributing what and where we have the ability and wish by example, to encourage others to approach life in a similar fashion.

Do you expect the seminars and films are going to change prejudices, even if they have been created for a very long time? How do you think that approach is going to be a success?

Change is usually an incremental process and our attitude is to assume responsibility for supporting our beliefs with performance, activity and aspire for the best possible results. We have witnessed change as a result of our and other's efforts in Berlin and elsewhere - if our colleagues and friends nationally and internationally, had not been willing to support us in many ways, all these years, we might not have been able to fulfill the dream of change, through art and culture. We realize we are a small part of human evolution and our hopes are when our time has physically passed, we will be able to pass the baton of life, our legacy onto the next generation. Change will come, it is inevitable, although we must always be observant of the direction.

In your personal opinion, what makes people hate someone who is "different" in any way?

People learn to hate, because of a lack of education, manipulation by others and personal feelings of inferiority and insecurity, which are bred by individuals, family and societal conditions. The need to "be somebody" often leads to the discharge of low self-esteem or negative projections onto persons or groups unable to protect themselves or their image. This is brought about because of a lack of educational, financial and media resources, plus the lack of physical prowess, which would enable the party or parties to establish a balance of power between themselves and their adversary, thereby serving as a defense or protection against attacks and this resource may also engender respect as a result of the ability of the persecuted to protect themselves.

There are many negative feelings in the world, but many of them have not reached the intensity of hate! Therefore it is our duty to try to hold the "hounds of hell”, at bay, as Malcolm X said: "By any means necessary". Hopefully, peaceful means.

(Published: 09.02.2010)

http://www.wavemagazine.net/arhiva/40/culture/black-international-cinema-berlin.htm

Interview from Elliot Grove, founder of Raindance

Editor — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:43:56 +0100

What made you start Raindance?
I had worked as a scenic artist and set designer on over 68 feature films and 700 commercials, both here at the BBC Shepherd's Bush 1974-77, and in my native Toronto in the early 80's. When I moved to London in 1986 with my family, I entertained a fantasy of becoming a property magnate, and went bust in the 1990 recession. After a year of wallowing in self-pity, my neighbour, an elderly retired farmer (who served as a barber in WW1) said to me: "Elliot, as long as ou are feeling sorry for yourself, no doctor in the world can help you."

He was right, of course, but I no longer had any film contacts here or back in Tronto. So I hatched a plan of imported so-called gurus from Hollywood to give seminars and workshops enabling me to learn, make contacts and survive until something concrete kicked in. After a few months, mates of mine started making films, and back then, in 92/93, there wasn't really anywhere special to show British films. So I started the festival, in Leicester Square, to showcse the works of British Filmamkers.

You have been running Raindance for nearly twenty years now. How do you manage to keep the festival and training that you do so fresh?

A couple of reasons I guess: Firstly, we have somehow managed to stay true to our roots. I am blessed to be working with such an energetic, talented and passionate crew. Secondly, since I have failed to get any government funding for Raindance, I don't have to worry about any outsiders pulling strings and trying to tell me what we can or cannot do. This means our films are typically much more controversial and underground than the fare served up by other festivals. And by controvesial, remember that we are never controversial for the sake of controvesy. we are just trying to be true to ourselves.

What was the reaction of British filmmakers, and the British film industry when you started Raindance. Wasn't John Major still prime minister then?
Raindance was pretty much ignored by the Brits until about six years ago. It was the Japanese, French, German and American filmmakers who discovered Raindance well before the Brits.

Is it true you got into trouble over using the name?
It is. I ws sharing a one-room office with a single line with call-waiting when the phone rang and The Man himself asked why I was stealing his name. I tried to explain that I was on a different continent, and would do everything possible to assist him in accessing the plethora of British talent for his marvellous festival when the line went dead. Later that year, in Montreal, the producer of Sundance threw a glass of wine in the face of Jamie Ader Bron, ho at that time was scouting American films.

But there's been no trouble since.

So why did you chose the name Raindance. Surely it creates confusion with Sundance.
Because of the ‘dance' you need to do to make your film, and because it rains a lot in London.

Is it harder or easier to get people interested in Raindance Film Festival?
It's actually a lot easier now to get people interested in Raindance for several reasons:

Firstly: we have a reputation for showing really excellent films. And films often never seen before in Europe. Distributors regularly come to Raindance to find new films, especially the Asian films.

Secondly, people are getting pretty tired of Hollywood fare with their routine formulaic plotlines, and thirdly, independent cinema, by its very nature, is about topics told by deeply passionate people who tell stories about worlds we haven't seen before (where we can learn something useful) or show us the world we already know (where we can learn). And generally, these topics and stories are stories so raw and visceral that Hollyood doesn't dare touch them.

How would you describe a Raindance movie?
Off-Hollywood!

What makes Raindance different?
Raindance is unique because we rely on films submitted to us by filmmakers, we who work at Raindance are filmmakers, and most of our films are by debut filmmakers.

What is the most rewarding memory of Raindance so far to you?
There have been too many rewarding moments to single out a specific one - but to say this: Every so often an idea we have had here, worked hard and long on - and it works. The stars seem to all line up, and it seems to work. This yer it had to be the private dinner I had with Faye Dunaway and a dozen of our benefactors.

i also meet dozens and dozens of the most talented people in my work at Raindance - and that is a special privelege which you just can't describe.

Where do you see traditional film festivals going?
With the advent of on-line films and services such as Joost and Babelgum, all film festivals, including Raindance, have to constantly evaluate their programme to ensure an attractive off-line presence. Some film festivals will fail to do so, and I suppose will fail. And any film festival without a on-line strategy is, in my opinion, doomed.

John Hurt and Elliot Grove

7th edition of Dubai International Film Festival to be held next December

Editor — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 20:42:27 +0100

The seventh edition of the Dubai International Film Festival, the definitive film festival of the Arab world, Asia and Africa, will be held from December 12 to 19, 2010.

The latest edition of the film festival is being planned to showcase an even diverse selection of movies from around the world across a dozen themed segments including Arabian Nights, Gulf Voices, Cinema of the World, Cinema for Children, Cinema of AsiaAfrica, Lifetime Achievement and Cinema from India.

DIFF 2010 will feature the competitive Muhr Arab and Muhr AsiaAfrica programmes offering over US$575,000 in prize money for excellence in acting, cinematography, editing, music and scriptwriting in addition to the jury general excellence awards.

DIFF will expand its partnership with the International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI) this year for the annual "Prize of the International Critics" to include all three film segments - feature, shorts and documentaries - in the Muhr Arab competition.

DIFF Chairman Abdulhamid Juma explained that the integration of powerful cinema from across the world, celebrity attendance and a host of industry events has given DIFF a leading position in the regional film festival circuit.

"Despite being the final international film festival in any given year, producers and directors are keen to use DIFF as a sounding board to promote their movies to an international audience. Films screened at DIFF continue to make headlines, catalysed by the wide-scale publicity generated from Dubai, a city of over 200 nationalities."

DIFF Artistic Director Masoud Amralla Al Ali said the seventh Dubai International Film Festival will further build on the momentum it has achieved in promoting regional cinema to a global audience.

"Over the past six years, DIFF has achieved its founding objective of encouraging Arab and local filmmaking talent, thus facilitating Arab and local film industry. DIFF 2009 was landmark in showcasing two UAE feature films, one of them with international cast and crew. The 2009 selection demonstrates the vitality of film-making in the Arab world, Asia and Africa and we look forward to showcasing many more artistic splendors at DIFF 2010."

Continuing the trend of promoting Arab film industry, DIFF 2010 will further strengthen its seed fund Dubai Film Connection; the distribution initative Dubai Film Market and regular industry and student workshops.

DIFF 2009 had recorded 50,113 admissions for the 168 films screened ranging from the Hollywood blockbuster Avatar to Zindeeq, the Muhr Arab award winning feature. The event also welcomed celebrities from around the world.

The Dubai Film Connection, the seed fund of the festival, broke previous records with 127 script submissions from Arab-origin film-makers around the world. The industry workshops were well-attended, in addition to the Students Day, which was attended by over 300 students.

DIFF 2009's Dubai Film Market hosted over 3,100 screenings for industry buyers, nearly three times over 2008. Potential industry buyers had a total of 323 films at their fingertips via state-of-the-art touch-screens.

DIFF 2010 will be held in association with Dubai Studio City. Dubai Duty Free, Dubai Pearl, Emirates Airline and Madinat Jumeirah are the principal sponsors of DIFF.

AMPAS Official 2010 New York Oscar Evening Gala Coverage

avivapress — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 15:32:17 +0100

By Maria Esteves - March 14, 2010

The 82nd Annual Academy Awards 2010 New York Oscar Night Party commenced Sunday, March 7, 2010, at the GILT Restaurant, in the luxurious New York Palace Hotel. Academy members, past Oscar winners and nominees privately celebrated the evening with a cocktail reception, an elegant multi-course dinner, and live broadcast coverage of the 82nd Annual Academy Awards, co-hosted by actors Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin at the Kodak Theatre, in Hollywood, California. The 82nd Annual Academy Awards (Oscars) presented by Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) honored excellence in film achievements of 2009. The Oscars were televised in more than 200 countries worldwide.

AMPAS Official 2010 New York Oscar Party quests included Oscar nominee
actress Catalina Sandino Moreno, Maria Full of Grace; Oscar winner screenwriter Dustin Lance Black, Milk; Oscar winner actress Celeste Holm, Gentlemen's Agreement; Oscar nominee director/screenwriter Courtney Hunt, Frozen River; Oscar nominee actor Burt Young, Rocky; Oscar nominee actress Sylvia Miles, Farewell My Lovely; Oscar winner director Peter Davis, Hearts and Minds; Vice Chair Celia Weston, New York Oscar Night; Oscar nominee actress Shirley Knight, Sweet Bird of Youth; actress Tina Louise, Johnny Suede; Oscar winner composer/orchestrator Sid Ramiin, West Side Story; Oscar winner director/producer/cinematographer Cynthia Wade, Freeheld; actress Arlene Dahl, Journey to the Center of the Earth; actress Eileen Fulton, As the World Turns; Tony Award nominee actress Alison Fraser, Secret Garden; Oscar nominee composer Ken Ascher, The Muppet Movie; and Oscar winner director/producer Ross Kaufman, Born Into Brothels: Calcutta's Red Light Kids.

AMPAS Official 2010 New York Oscar Night Party at the
GILT New York Palace Hotel, actress Catalina Sandino
Moreno, 77th Academy Award nominee for Best Actress
in a Leading Role “Maria Full of Grace.” Photo courtesy:
Steve Mack/AMPAS

AMPAS Official 2010 New York Oscar Night Party at the
GILT New York Palace Hotel, actress Celeste Holm,
20th Academy Award winner for Best Supporting Actress
“Gentlemen’s Agreement.” Photo courtesy: Steve
Mack/AMPAS

AMPAS Official 2010 New York Oscar Night Party at the
GILT New York Palace Hotel, screenwriter Dustin Lance
Black, 81st Academy Award winner for Best Original
Screenplay “Milk.” Photo courtesy: Steve Mack/AMPAS

First highlights of Nippon Connection film program

Editor — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 20:46:44 +0100

The 10th anniversary of Japanese Film Festival Nippon Connection is waiting just around the corner, holding many surprises. From April 14 to 18, 2010, we will show more than 150 of the latest Japanese feature and short films, ranging from avant-garde to blockbuster, as well as a broad cultural program. For the tenth time, the biggest festival for Japanese cinema worldwide will offer exciting and innovative films, with many international premieres being presented by the film makers personally.
In a special anniversary retrospective, Nippon Connection will take a look back at ten years of great Japanese cinema that has proved to be a magnet for the audience.

PROGRAM

First highlights of the film program

Nippon Cinema

A Piece of Our Life – Kakera by Momoko ANDO, J 2009, 107 Min., OmeU
www.love-kakera.jp

Bare Essence of Life by Satoko YOKOHAMA, J 2009, 120 Min. OmeU
www.umls.jp

The Blood of Rebirth (Yomigaeri no chi) by Toshiaki TOYODA, J 2009, 83 Min., OmeU
yomigaeri-movie.com

The Chef of South Polar (Nankyoku Ryorinin) by Shuichi OKITA, J 2009, 125 Min., OmeU
nankyoku-ryori.com

Chocolate Underground by Takayuki HAMANA, J 2009, 87 Min., OmeU
www.choco-bar.jp

Crime or Punishment?!? by Keralino SANDOROVICH, J 2008, 110 Min., OmeU
www.tsumi-batsu.com

Crows Zero II by Takashi MIIKE, J 2009, 133 Min., OmeU
www.cz2.jp

Dear Doctor by Miwa NISHIKAWA, J 2009, 127 Min., OmeU
deardoctor.jp

Glasses (Megane) by Naoko OGIGAMI, J 2007, 106 Min., OmU

Heaven’s Door by Michael ARIAS, J 2008, 106 Min., OmeU
h-door.jp

Kaiji by Toya SATO, J 2009, 129 Min., OmeU
www.kaiji-movie.jp

Miyoko by Yoshifumi TSUBOTA, J 2009, 86 Min., OmeU
www.miyoko-asagaya.com

No More Cry!!! by Nobuo MIZUTA, J 2009, 134 MIN., OmeU
nakumonka.jp/index.html

Oh, my Buddha! (Shikisoku zenereishon) by Tomorowo TAGUCHI, J 2008, 114 Min, OmeU
shikisoku.jp/indexp.html

One Million Yen Girl by Yuki TANADA, J 2008, 121 Min., OmeU
nigamushi.com

Oppai Volleyball by Eiichiro HASUMI, J 2009, 102 Min., OmeU
www.opv.jp

Toad`s Oil by Koji YAKUSHO, J 2008, 131 Min., OmeU
http://gama-movie.com

Zero Focus by Isshin INUDOU, J 2009, 131 Min., OmeU
www.zero-focus.jp

Nippon Digital

8000 Miles, SR Saitama`s Rapper by Yu IRIE, J 2008, 80 Min, OmeU
www.sr-movie.com

Annyong Yumika by Tetsuaki MATSUE, J 2009, 119 Min., OmeU
www.spopro.net/annyong_yumika/

Autumn Adagio by Tsuki INOUE, J 2009, 70 Min., OmeU
www.autumn-adagio.com

Live Tape by Tetsuaki MATSUE, J 2009, 74 Min., OmeU
www.spopro.net/livetape

Pyuupiru 2001-2008 by Daishi MATSUNAGA, J 2009, 90 Min., OmeU

S-94 by Shozin FUKUI, J 2009, 29 Min., OmeU
www.honekoubou.jp/en/s94.html

Nippon Retro „Best of Nippon Connection“

Pornostar by Toshiaki TOYODA, J 1998, 98 Min., OmU
(NC 2000)

The New God (Atarashii Kamisama), by Yutaka TSUCHIYA, J 1999, 99 Min.
(NC 2002)

Annyong Kimchi by Tetsuaki MATSUE, J 1992, 52 Min., OmeU
(NC 2003)

Dolls,by Takeshi KITANO, J/ F 2002, 113 Min., OmU
(NC 2003)

Tokyo Godfathers bySatoshi KON, J 2003, 91 Min., OmU
(NC 2004)

Izo byTakashi Miike, J 2004, 128 Min., OmU
(NC 2005)

Moon & Cherry (Tsuki to Cherry) byYuki TANADA, J 2004, 82 Min., OmeU
(NC 2006)

Tekkon Kinkreet byMichael Arias, J 2006, 111 Min., OmU od. OmeU
(NC 2007)

The Tender Throbbing Twilight, (Tasogare / Ikutsu ni natte mo yaritai otoko to onna)
by Shinji IMAOKA, J 2007, 64 Min., OmU
(NC 2008)

Love Exposure (Ai no mukidashi) by Sion SONO, J 2008, 237 Min., OmU
(NC 2009)

http://www.nipponconnection.com/

Guadalajara Film Festival Notches 25 Years

Editor — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 20:31:27 +0100

Love, betrayal, death, machismo - as neatly as these themes suit mariachi music, they flatter Latino cinema even more. Happily, there's room for both in Guadalajara, the birthplace of mariachi music, of the tequila that often fuels it and of Mexico's ultimate cinema showcase.

Scene from Rodrigo Garcia's Mother and Child.

For its 25th milepost, the Festival Internacional de Cine en Guadalajara returns March 12 - 19, 2010 with a tally of 250 films. The venerable Festival in the Mexican state of Jalisco gives pride of place to Latin American fare, and while it features world cinema, this year's selection is as gnawed as its budget.

FICG's heart resides in its Mexican feature and documentary jousts. One eagerly anticipated film of the 50 in competition is Carlos Carrera's entry, Of Childhood (De la infancía), which spins a ghost tale about a son who receives other-worldly protection from his abusive father. Carrera's 2002 tragic melodrama, The Crime of Father Amaro (El crimen del padre Amaro), is Mexico's top-grossing film to date. Director María Novaro, best known to U.S. audiences for her 1991 dance hall movie, Danzón, will season this year's slate with The Good Herbs (Las buenas hierbas), which sets a story of an Alzheimer sufferer against the backdrop of brain chemistry, healing and family emotions.

Other contenders for the Mayahuel Award for Best Mexican film and its $150,000-peso piňata include The Dead Sea (El mar muerto), by Ignacio Ortiz Cruz, and Perpetuum Mobile, by emerging helmer Nicolás Pereda. Pereda's newest project, Summer of Goliath, will be unfurled in the "Guadalajara Constructs" program of unfinished works.

Though upstart initiatives like the Morelia International Film Festival are giving Guadalajara a run for its money, other fiestas, notably the kaput Mexico City International Contemporary Film Festival (dubbed Ficco), have given FICG a bounce. Former Ficco programmers Michel Lipkes and Maximiliano Cruz now work their programming mojo at Guadalajara, where they present the "Alternative Currents" sidebar.

More than most festivals, FICG makes a point of romancing its urban host. Together with the acclaimed Guadalajara International Book Fair and University of Guadalajara - a prime incubator of documentary talent - it helps bolster Mexico's second-largest city as a cultural hub of the Latino world. The home of 4 million "Tapatios" exudes a mixture of Colonial charm and industrial soot that makes it both inviting and at times tricky to stroll around.

Yet the fiesta that erstwhile filmmaker and cultural diplomat Jorge Sánchez directs is quite the hot spot for discovering emerging national and regional talent.

Mexican cinema was churning out between 60 and 70 films a year prior to the recent slump. (In earlier times FICG would show the year's full domestic crop, though more recently submissions have tumbled in and required a proper ginning.)

Kindling the explosion was a 2006 corporate tax incentive program known as "226," which was recently threatened with severe cuts. The industry rallied, however, and now the finance legislation seems assured. Still, global recession lingers, as do pressures to create not just quantity but quality fare, which accounts for some of the combustion behind today's quest for co-production and distribution deals.

Enter el Mercado de Cine Iberoamericano en Guadalajara. Latin America's leading film market totes up its fifth "Ibero-American Co-Production Meeting" in alliance with the Cannes Film Market and its Producers' Network. As ever, Festival and market programming dovetail at Guadalajara, and this year's spotlight on France is no less a celebration of Gallic cinema than it is a chance to learn from official industry policy in that country.

The Festival's "Talent Campus," now in its second year, further fuels the campaign for better product. "Persuasion and Seduction, The Art of Storytelling" is the theme of this year's program of master classes, workshops and panels pairing international film experts with some 50 selected "Talents" from around the region.

Matt Dillon will join the roster of mentors in this collaboration with the Berlinale Talent Campus and the Goethe-Institut Guadalajara. The American actor and director is slated to receive a Guadalajara International Prize at the Festival's inauguration gala.

Also in line for tributes are Mexican actress and politician María Rojo, who will bag a Silver Mayahuel, and the late Joaquín Pardavé, whose acting career will be honored in a retrospective.

Once again, the downtown Teatro Diana will serve as Festival headquarters. Five charity galas will unfold there, beginning with the worldwide premiere of Fernando Pérez's Cuban-themed José Martí, Eye of the Canary (José Martí, el ojo del canario), part one of eight films spotlighting key Latino liberators. Lula, The Son of Brazil (Lula, o filho do Brasil) and The Secret in Their Eyes (El secreto de sus ojos) fill the next two gala slots. They are, respectively, Fábio Barreto's biopic about Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and the Argentine thriller from Juan José Campanella that snagged the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Picture.

Mother and Child, by American filmmaker Rodrigo García, will also enjoy gala treatment. Like the vignettes of his previous feature, Nine Lives, García's newest work dramatizes women's stories, only this time they interlace in a single narrative starring Naomi Watts, Annette Bening and Kerry Washington.

To clinch the eight-day Festival and its gala program, there's the Spanish film Me, Too (Yo, también), Álvaro Pastor and Antonio Naharro's offbeat romance starring an actor with Down's Syndrome who won Best Actor Award at San Sebastian.

Seguir Siendo, about Mexican rock band Café Tacvba, will have its world premiere in a special anniversary section dedicated to music and the movies, "Film Sound" ("Son de Cine"). Directed by Ernesto Contreras and Juan Manuel Craviotto, the documentary observes another anniversary, that of the iconic group's 20th-year tour. Café Tacvba will perform after the screening.

The 33 shorts vying for prizes this year fall into an Ibero-American section and two Mexican ones, including "Mexican Animated Short Film," whose" Rigoberto Mora Award is granted by the Festival and Guillermo del Toro.

FICG's 25th birthday prepares the way for 2010's much giddier celebrations: the 200th anniversary of Mexican Independence and 100th anniversary of its Revolution. Just in time to head over to Guadalajara's famed "charro" shops and outfit yourself with a Mexican cowboy hat.

By Laura Blum

Additional details are at http://www.guadalajaracinemafest.com/.

Guadalajara International Film Festival
Nebulosa 2916
Jardines del Bosque C.P. 44520
Guadalajara, Jalisco, México

Wall Street 2 the trailer

Editor — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:51:08 +0100

New York Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Fall/Winter 2010 Coverage and Photos

avivapress — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 04:24:08 +0100

By Maria Esteves - March 10, 2010

The snowy winter conditions, news of designer Alexander McQueen's death and recent Haiti's earthquake set the tone at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in New York Fall/Winter 2010 (MBFW/FW10) which celebrated its final season in the iconic Bryant Park Tents, February 11-18, 2010. Produced by IMG Fashion, this season included over 80 outstanding shows in the Tents hosted by designers from all over the world such as Custo Barcelona, Perry Ellis, Diane von Furstenberg, Alexandre Herchcovitch, Carolina Herrera, Tommy Hilfiger, Marc Jacobs, Academy of Art University and many others. Over 30 magnificent off-site runway shows and presentations by independent designers ran concurrently during New York Fashion such as NCL Couture, Loris Diran, Norma Kamali, C. Marchuska, George McCracken, Rebecca Moses, Irina Shabayevh along with Japan Fashion Week and many others. Sherry-Lehmann Wine & Spirits celebrated its yearlong 75th anniversary as the official sponsor of champagne and wine at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week.

The fall/winter 2010 colors for men and women are bright colors from purple orchid, chocolate truffle, woodbine, oyster gray, lipstick red, golden glow, endive and liberty blue. The fall/winter 2010 collection included floral, metallic ruffle tops and sweater coats with the essence of a metamorphosis by Diane von Furstenberg; classic gowns and dresses with sheer elegance by Carolina Herrera; urban designs captivating folklore, Georgian and Armenian culture by Alexandre Herchcovitch; glamorous yet casual designs by Marc Jacobs; wool pea coats, velvet evening jacket and goat skin trench coats by Perry Ellis; and buckled paper bag waist trousers, knit turtleneck sweaters and cropped mohair pea coats by Tommy Hilfiger gave the classic American preppy collection a new look.

MBFW/FW10 Opening Night Runway show "The Heart Truth'sannual Red Dress Behind the Seams Collection 2010," presented by Diet Coke commenced Thursday, February 11, 7:00 pm, in the Tent at Bryant Park. The show benefited the foundation for the National Institutes of Health in support of
women's heart health education and research. The celebrity models who walked the runway included The celebrity models who walked the runway included Paula Abdul, Amanda Beard, Joan Collins, Estelle, Bethenny Frankel, Nelly Furtado, Kim Kardashian, Marcia Gay Harden, Valerie Harper, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, Felicity Huffman, Regina King, Heidi Klum, Kimora Lee, Susan Lucci, Camryn Manheim, Stephanie March, Dania Ramirez, Robin Roberts, Cybill Sheperd, Brittany Snow, Raven Symoné, Olympic Champion Figure Skater Kristi Yamaguchi and many others.

"Naomi Campbell's Fashion For Relief - Haiti NYC 2010," runway show in the Tent at Bryant Park paid tribute to her friend the late designer Alexander McQueen, on Friday, February 12, 7:00 pm. Sponsored by American Express with guest speakers Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York and Fran Lebowitz. Famous fashion designers contributed to the show. All proceeds went towards the CARE organization Haiti relief fund. The celebrity models who walked the runway included Malin Ackerman, Chris Brown, Georgina Chapman, Alan Cumming, Diane von Furstenberg, Donna Karan, Daphne Guinness, Cheyenne Jackson, David LaChappelle, Kelly Osbourne, Olivia Palermo and many others. Naomi Campbell walked the runway three times and joined other models wearing designs by Alexander McQueen.

MBFW/FW10 Final Runway show by famous American fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger officially closed the legendary Tent at Bryant Park, Thursday, February 18, 8:00 pm. The outstanding event was most captivating and sentimental in the history of fashion. MBFW in New York twice a year collection preview runway shows new location will be in the cultural landmark of Damrosch Park, at Lincoln Center, in September 2010.

MBFW/FW10, under the tents at Bryant Park,
senior vice president Fern Mallis, IMG Fashion.

MBFW/FW10 under the tents at Bryant Park,
managing director Peter Levy, IMG Fashion.

MBFW/FW10 under the tents at Bryant Park,
wine consultant, and television host, Leslie
Sbrocco.

MBFW/FW10 backstage in the Tent at Bryant Park,
creative director John Crocco, PERRY ELLIS.

MBFW/FW10 backstage in the Tent at Bryant
Park, designer Alexandre Herchcovitch.

MBFW/FW10 backstage in the Tent at Bryant Park,
Academy of Art University designer Bethany Meuleners.

MBFW/FW10 backstage in the Tent at Bryant Park, designer
Carolina Herrera, right, with American socialite Lee Radziwill
(sister of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis).

MBFW/FW10 backstage in the Tent at Bryant Park,
designer Carolina Herrera with her husband
Reinaldo Herrera.

MBFW/FW10 backstage in the Tent at Bryant Park, designer
Tommy Hilfiger with senior vice president Fern Mallis, IMG Fashion.

MBFW/FW10 backstage in the Tent at Bryant Park, Dalia and Larry Leeds
with designer Tommy Hilfiger.

MBFW/FW10 backstage W Arrivals Lounge in the Tent at Bryant Park,
CEO Patrick Moxey, left, with artist Dan Black, Ultra Records.

MBFW/FW10 backstage W Arrivals Lounge in the Tent at Bryant
Park, Richie Rich AMUSE Fall/Winter 2010, left, with Alex Lux.

Full Sail University returns as primary sponsor of next Florida Film Festival

Editor — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 20:45:52 +0100

Full Sail University (fullsail.edu), an award-winning entertainment institution located near Orlando, FL, is proud to return as primary sponsor of the 19th Annual Florida Film Festival, (floridafilmfestival.com) being held April 9 through April 18, which will present the theme "Film Sweet Film." This year marks the return of Full Sail University's sixth year as the primary sponsor and thirteenth year with the Festival.

Attendees of the festival will be are invited to explore movies that evoke a sense of home during the ten-day experience, which offers a combination of cutting-edge current cinema, an American Independent competition showcasing narrative and documentary features, fine Southern cuisine, celebrity guests, and an extensive list of special events. The festivals' events will begin with the opening night film and party, featuring the renowned masters of Southern cuisine, Matt and Ted Lee and Chef Robert Stehling, and will conclude with the Revel 19, a Mardi Gras inspired celebration held on the Full Sail University Backlot.

"It is great fortune when two local institutions find fertile and creative, common ground," said Henry Maldonado, President of the Enzian Theater. "Such is the partnership between Full Sail University and the Florida Film Festival. We both have deeply similar interests that go to the heart of contemporary culture. Full Sail has supported the Festival for 13 years, and their support is of the best kind. It goes beyond the traditional, and it provides us with creative and spiritual encouragement. Full Sail has been there for us as we grew into our present, and we expect for us to walk together into an even more productive future."

A core program of the Enzian Theater, the Florida Film Festival has earned its place as one of the most respected regional film festivals in the country. Both the Enzian and Florida Film Festival combined have served more than 1.5 million guests, premiered thousands of films and hosted hundreds of celebrities including Academy Award winners Paul Newman, Oliver Stone, Christopher Walken and Jon Voight.

"Full Sail University is honored to support and celebrate filmmaking within the Central Florida community and around the globe, while serving as the primary sponsor of the Florida Film Festival," said Rick Ramsey, Full Sail's Program Director for Film. "As innovative educators in film, we are proud to join the Enzian Theater in their continued efforts to share the power and impact of those who speak to us through the magic of movies."

About Full Sail University:

Since 1979, Full Sail University, located outside of Orlando, FL, has been an innovative educational leader for those pursuing careers in the entertainment industry. With over 34,500 alumni, graduate credits include work on OSCAR®, Emmy® and GRAMMY®-winning projects, best-selling video games, and #1 grossing U.S. concert tours. Full Sail's 191-acre campus and online education platform proudly welcomes over 8,800 students from 50 states and 57 countries.

Full Sail currently offers a total of 28 degree programs including: Associate of Science Degrees in Graphic Design and Recording Engineering; Bachelor of Science Degrees offered in: Computer Animation, Digital Arts & Design, Entertainment Business, Film, Game Art, Game Design, Game Development, Graphic Design, Internet Marketing, Music Business, Music Production, Recording Arts, Show Production, and Web Design & Development; Master of Science Degrees in Education Media Design & Technology, Game Design, Entertainment Business, and Internet Marketing; and Master of Fine Arts Degrees in Creative Writing and Media Design.

Full Sail was most recently named the 2009 IT Florida "Leader of the Year" as well as "Best Company" in the 2009 Orlando Business Journal's Reader's Choice Awards. In addition, Full Sail University has been recognized as the 2008 "School/College of the Year" by the Florida Association of Postsecondary Schools and Colleges and has also been previously named: The Harvard of Game Schools by Tips & Tricks Magazine; one of the top three New Media Schools by Shift Magazine (alongside the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and New York University); one of the Top Five Game Degree Programs in the world by Electronic Gaming Monthly; one of the Best Music Programs in the country by Rolling Stone Magazine; one of the Best Music Business Departments in the Schools That Rock: The Rolling Stone College Guide; and one of the Best Film Programs in the country by UNleashed Magazine.

For more information about Full Sail, please visit http://www.fullsail.edu/.

Coverage with dailies expected on fest21.com

EFP launches programme highlighting European and Turkish films

Editor — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 12:56:48 +0100

BRIDGES EUROPE - TURKEY at the Istanbul International Film Festival (April 3-18, 2010)

NOTHING PERSONAL by Urszula Antoniak

With BRIDGES EUROPE - TURKEY, European Film Promotion (EFP) will be launching a new programme at the 29th edition of the Istanbul International Film Festival. Between April 12-14, the festival, in close cooperation with EFP, will highlight and present 10 current European and 12 Turkish productions of up-and-coming directors.

Apart from the aim of raising public awareness for the selected films in this year's European Capital of Culture, the idea is to facilitate and improve the films' distribution beyond their borders. Key European distributors will be invited to Istanbul to see the newest in Turkish fare; at the same time, the Turkish industry will have the chance to watch new and exciting European cinema with festival audiences. In addition, special industry screenings will take place in the presence of the invited professionals. BRIDGES EUROPE - TURKEY is financially supported by the MEDIA International programme of the European Union, the participating EFP member organisations and the Istanbul European Capital of Culture programme.

The directors and sales agents of the selected films are invited to attend the festival for an intercultural dialogue and to discuss possibilities of fostering the circulation of European and Turkish films in the diverse markets. BRIDGES EUROPE - TURKEY offers various platforms for networking, discussions and business meetings. A part of the programme will be a European Reception and a workshop with the participation of Europe's leading casting directors aiming to strengthen the collaboration between Turkish and European actors and directors.

"We are very pleased to see BRIDGES EUROPE - TURKEY, here in Istanbul", says festival director Azize Tan. "This programme is strengthening the professional relationship between Turkey and Europe and initiates a dialogue between filmmakers and sales from here and there. And, in the end, hopefully quite a few films from Europe will find their way to theatrical release in Turkey, and our national films will bring the issues of our country to the people in Europe. In this way, the films and their makers support the cultural exchange."

10 European films have been selected for BRIDGES EUROPE - TURKEY, among others, the acclaimed Nothing Personal by Urszula Antoniak, starring this year's SHOOTING STAR from The Netherlands, Lotte Verbeek. Nothing Personal is a coproduction between Macdara Kelleher of Fastnet Films (Ireland) and Reinier Selen of Rinkel Film & TV Productions (The Netherlands) realized after they participated in EFP's programme PRODUCERS ON THE MOVE 2008 in Cannes.

Also selected for BRIDGES EUROPE - TURKEY, has been the European coproduction (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Austria, Germany, Croatia) On the Path (Na Putu) by Jasmila Žbanić, which has been screened in this year's Berlinale Competition. The film sees Zrinka Cvitešić, Croatian SHOOTING STAR 2010, as main cast.

The 12 selected Turkish films include Bornova Bornova, winner of the Best Screenplay Award at the SIYAD (Turkish Cinema Critics Association) Awards in 2010. Winning several awards with Made in Europe in 2008, director İnan Temelkuran's second feature film Bornova Bornova is set in the director's hometown İzmir, and is about unemployment and its effects. The latest film Taylan Brothers have directed, Vavien, is a noir comedy that delicately tells the story of a small town family.

In 2010, the Istanbul International Film Festival screens 170 international films, with 111 originating from Europe. The festival seeks primarily to encourage the development of cinema in Turkey and to promote films of quality in the Turkish market. Selected international films compete for the Golden Tulip Award.

European Films selected for the Programme

Turkish Films selected for the Programme

All That I Love
(Wszystko, co kocham)
by Jacek Borcuch (Poland)
Wide Management
A Step into the Darkness (Büyük Oyun)
by Atıl İnaç (Turkey)
TFT Yapım

The Calling
by Jan Dunn (United Kingdom)
Arrow Entertainment Inc.
Angels and Gamblers (Melekler ve Kumarbazla)
by Ertekin Akpınar (Turkey)
Hayalet Yapım

Camping (Camping)
by Jacob Bitsch (Denmark)
Nimbus Film
Bornova Bornova
by İnan Temelkuran (Turkey)
Temelkuran Film ve Müzik

Colony
by Carter Gunn, Ross McDonnell (Irel.)
E1 Entertainment
Dark Cloud (Bahti Kara)
by Theron Patterson (Turkey)
Bulut Film

Dogtooth (Kynodontas)
by Giorgos Lanthimos (Greece)
MK2
Five Cities (Bes Şehir)
by Onur Ünlü (Turkey)
Eflatun Film

Muezzin
by Sebastian Brameshuber (Austria)
Cinephil
Love in Another Language (Başka Dilde Aşk)
by İlksen Başarır (Turkey)
Ofisistanbul by Ppristanbul

Nothing Personal
(Rien de personnel)
by Matthias Gökalp (France)
MK2
Love, Bitter (Aci Aşk)
by A. Taner Elhan (Turkey)
Tim’s Productions

Nothing Personal
by Urszula Antoniak
(The Netherlands / Ireland)
Bavaria Film International
Me and Roz (Benim ve Roz'un Sonbahari)
by Handan Öztürk (Turkey)
Gala Ajans

On the Path (Na Putu)
by Jasmila Žbanić (Bosnia and Herzegovina /Croatia/Austria/Germany)
The Match Factory
Not Worth a Fig (İncir Çekirdeği)
by Selda Çiçek (Turkey)
Çiçek Film

The World is Big and Salvation Lurks around the Corner
(Svetat e golyam i spasenie debne otvsyakade)

Other Angels (Teslimiyet)
by Emre Yalgın (Turkey)
Logos Film

by Stephan Komandarev (Bulgaria / Germany / Hungary / Slovenia)
m-appeal
There (Orada)
by Hakkı Kurtuluş, Melik Saraçoğlu (Turkey)
İki Film

Vavien
by Yağmur Taylan, Durul Taylan (Turkey)
İmaj Entertainment

La Résidence de la Cinéfondation hosts its 20th session

Cannes — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 08:34:21 +0100

Since March 1st 2010, and until July 15th, La Résidence de la Cinéfondation welcomes its 6 latest winning candidates to support them in the writing of their first or second feature and help them prepare their film.

The jury selected two female and four male filmmakers from the 200 applicants.

- Daniel Joseph Borgman
  
  Daniel Joseph Borgman was born in 1981 in the small coastal town of Dunedin in New Zealand. After studying Film Science at Otago University, he moved to Copenhagen, Denmark, where he has worked as a visual effects artist and film colourist on numerous feature film projects. His first short, The Man & the Albatross (2007) premiered in the Leopards of Tomorrow competition at the Locarno Film Festival. His second short, Lars and Peter (2009), was in the Official Selection in the short film competition at the 62nd Cannes Film Festival and has been nominated for a Robert, the Danish Film Academies national film prize. In 2009 Daniel completed production on three more short films, Behaviour, Kaleidoscope and Berik. Daniel is currently developing Brainy, a 30 minute novel film with funding from The Danish Film Institute's New Danish Screen scheme. At the Cinéfondation residence Daniel writes on his debut feature film project, The Weight of Elephants, a coming of age drama about 14 year old Jess, a local paper boy, whose life is flipped upside down when a horrific murder happens in the street where he delivers newspapers.
- Michel Franco
  
  Michel Franco is a Mexican born Award Winning film director (Entre Dos - Golden Dancer for Best Short Film, Huesca 2003, Best Short Film, Dresden, 2004). He Majored in Communications at the Universidad Iberoamericana in México City and accredited course in Film Direction at the New York Film Academy and made his name directing TV advertisements with Pop Films. In 2009, he wrote and directed his first feature film Daniel & Ana which was selected for Directors' Fortnight at Cannes Film Festival, and Horizontes Latinos in San Sebastian. Daniel & Ana will be released in France on March -31 -2010. Michel is developing his new feature film After Lucia.
- Cristián Jiménez
  
  Cristián Jiménez was born in Valdivia, Chile in 1975. Before becoming a filmmaker, he wrote short stories and studied sociology in Santiago de Chile, Heidelberg and London. His first feature film, Ilusiones Ópticas, a deadpan dramatic comedy (or comic drama) where different lives intersect during a grey winter in Valdivia, was premiered in San Sebastián in 2009. He wrote and directed several short films, among them El Tesoro de los Caracoles and XX, co-wrote the feature films 199 Recetas para ser Feli" and Los Debutantes, and worked as a TV producer in the UK during 3 years. Two of his videos have been exhibited in art galleries in Chile and Bolivia. He's currently developing his next feature project and working as a lecturer at two Chilean film schools. As a child his dream was to become a stand-up comedian.
- Yaelle Kayam
  
  Yaelle Kayam was born in 1979 in Tel-Aviv, Israel. Before entering the field of filmmaking, yaelle studied anthropology and acting at the Tel-Aviv University, and the "Sela"- Performing Arts Studio. Her love of travelling led her to move to Melbourne, Australia, where she attended the Victorian College of the Arts B.A program of Film and Television. On her return to Israel she completed her Degree at the Sam Spiegel Film School in Jerusalem, and became highly active in human rights organizations in the West Bank. Diploma, her graduating film was screened at the Cinefondation's Cannes film festival 2009 and won the 3rd prize. It was screened in numerous festivals around the world, as well as by Canal+. Diploma won the Best Screenplay Award and the Intercultural Award at the Munich International Student Film Festival. Yaelle has also directed two documentary films and took part in the Adam Mickiewicz Institute documentary project, New Gaze, in Poland. She is currently developing her first feature, Providence: A dark comedy which takes place in a small settlement situated in the lawless territories of the West Bank.
- Franco Lolli
  
  Franco Lolli Franco Lolli was born in 1983 in Bogotá, Colombia. He studied cinema in France, first at the University Paul Valery and Sorbonne Nouvelle then at La Femis (direction department). His diploma film Como todo el mundo, was selected in many festivals including San Sebastian, Guadalajara and Los Angeles. The film won 26 prizes, among them the Jury Prize in Clermont-Ferrand, Angers, Bruxelles, R.I.H.L Poitiers and Expresión en Corto. Franco went to Cambodia with director Rithy Panh to direct the documentary Mémoire et Images, une expérience cambodgienne. He lives both in Paris and Bogota where he teaches cinema at the university and is also a film critic. Franco is developing his first feature film that will be produced by Lazennec, Gente de bien, the story of a reunion with an unemployed father and his nine year old son, their meeting with a middle-class family and their relation with their old dog.
- Dominga Sotomayor
  
  Dominga Sotomayor Dominga was born in Santiago de Chile in 1985. In 2007 she finished her direction studies at the Universidad Católica de Chile. That same year she received a scholarship, allowing her to complete a Masters in Film Direction at the ESCAC, Barcelona. She has directed the short-films Cessna (2005), Noviembre (2007), Debajo (2008), La Montaña (2008) and Videojuego (2009), which have been shown and won awards in both national and international festivals such as Rotterdam, Sao Paulo, Biarritz and Toulouse. She was selected to participate in the 7th Berlinale Talent Campus. De Jueves a Domingo (Thursday Through Sunday), is her first feature film. The project was supported in its development phase by Hubert Bals Fund and the Chilean funds CORFO and Fondo de Fomento Audiovisual. She has participated in the Bafici BAL '09 and won the "Biarritz Rencontres des jeunes réalisateurs" as well as the Co-production Meetings in IFF Valdivia. The project is a family journey to northern Chile. It's the chidren's distant and fragmented outlook of their final trip together.

Line-up at its finest: prominent speakers at FMX 2010

Editor — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 16:16:48 +0100

FMX 2010 15th Conference on Animation, Effects, Games and Interactive Media
May 04-07, 2010
In the beginning of May, most of the big names in digital entertainment will collectively gather in Germany's Southwest. FMX 2010, the 15th Conference on Animation, Effects, Games and Interactive Media, the 17th Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film and the business platform Animation Production Day are three events enjoying high international standing.

FMX preparations: the final countdown...

Only two months before the event, last program decisions are made, the list of speakers is almost fixed. We have just recently received confirmations by two animation experts: Daniel Jeanette, Animation Director and Visual Effects Supervisor on Where the Wild Things Are and Simon Otto, Head of Character Animation for Dreamworks' How to Train Your Dragon. The 3D Special will welcome Stereoscopic Supervisors Jayme Wilkinson (Ice Age 3) and Anthony Shafer (A Christmas Carol) among others. Noel Sharkey, Professor of Artifical Intelligence, Robotics and of Public Engagement at the University of Sheffield, will risk a glimpse into the crystal ball asking "How likely is it that one day we will have robot surrogates or robot avatars (robatars) representing us in the world?" Renowned make-up artist Todd Masters will illuminate the symbiosis of Prosthetics and SFX.

And the winners are...awarded movies and artists at FMX

And there are even more excellent FMX 2010 speakers who have just won several awards. Joe Letteri has been honored with the Best Visual Effects Oscar this Sunday and recently with three VES Awards for Avatar, while Bruce Smith received an Annie for The Princess and the Frog. FMX will also welcome Bob Whitehill, Stereoscopic Supervisor for UP in Stuttgart, together with Pixar returning to the Recruiting section. Last but not least the Oscar nominated The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, the last movie with Heath Ledger, will be represented by Paul Docherty, Visual Effects Supervisor of the film.

Masters live at FMX

FMX offers far more than a wide range of conference presentations. In the Masterclasses you can bring your skills to the next level with the help of the top notch experts in the industry. In 2010 Kevin Todd Haug (Quantum of Solace, The Kite Runner, Fight Club) will give a VFX Design & Supervision Masterclass. Author and VFX Specialist Joseph Gilland will present "Elemental Magic - The Art of Special Effects Animation" and long-standing FMX speaker Ed Hooks returns with "Acting for Animators". Side Effects Software with will let you "Go Procedural with Houdini".

All inclusive: Animation hotspot Stuttgart

FMX 2010 is one of three internationally renowned animation events taking place simultaneously in Stuttgart in the beginning of May. The 17th Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film (ITFS) marks a prominent partner event of FMX with international reputation, being a magnet not only for animation enthusiasts but the industry as well. Together FMX and ITFS host the Animation Production Day (APD), a business platform which has become one of the leading events for the financing and marketing of animation projects.

Festivals and Competitions at FMX

It's movies time in the Screenings by event partners such as Siggraph Computer Animation Festival (CAF) who will show their Juried Reel, a selection of award winners and nominees of the competition. The Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film will show the ITFS selections, and last but not least the award ceremony of the invaZion 2010 3D Short Film Challenge will also take place at FMX. It is one of the few competitions on 3D shorts with a high class jury involving major Hollywood studios for the categories "Stereoscopic Storytelling", "Excellence in Visual Art" and "Best Overall". Prizes are awarded by FMX, Panasonic, The Foundry and more3D. You can still submit your commercial or non-commercial 3-D short film in March 2010 at http://www.invazion.org/.

Online Accreditation for Press

In addition to the online ticket shop, journalists can also get their accreditation online in the Press section of our website.

FMX is an event in cooperation with VES Visual Effects Society, AIAS Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, ACM Siggraph, 5D Conference and the Stuttgart Media University. It is hosting the Animation Production Day 2010 (APD), a joint venture with the Festival of Animated Film Stuttgart (ITFS). FMX is funded by the Ministry of State and the Ministry of Economics Baden-Wuerttemberg, the MFG Film Funding, the MFG Innovation Agency for IT and Media, and the FFA German Federal Film Board. It is organized by the Institute of Animation, Visual Effects and Digital Postproduction at Filmakademie Baden-Wuerttemberg.

Haapsalu Horror & Fantasy Film Festival (HÕFF) will reawaken zombies

Editor — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:22:47 +0100

This year's fifth annual Haapsalu Horror & Fantasy Film Festival (HÕFF) will reawaken zombies and feast on modern French horror.

Estonia's only festival devoted to the fantasy, horror, science fiction and trash film genres will run from 23-25 April at Haapsalu, Estonia (http://www.haapsalu.ee/) - once a renown summer retreat of the Russian Czars, now a picturesque spa town infamous for healing mud treatments. The fifth HÕFF features the screening of over 19 full-length films from more than 10 countries, a thematic photo exhibition and make up effects workshop, the latest offerings from Estonian horror film and plenty of celebrations and special events - such as a parade of the living dead through the streets of central Haapsalu (luckily just a costume party).

Along with the new films in the main program - representing the latest science fiction and horror film classics from all over the world - the festival is dedicating this year's installment to 21st century French horror in all of its frightening forms. The French zombie film "Mutants", which has made waves with its fast-paced action and gore, will open this year's festival on a giant outdoor screen at Haapsalu Bishop's Castle.

The second focus of the festival is an homage to the Japanese director Shinya Tsukamoto's cult classic experimental series "Tetsuo", which first premiered exactly 20 years ago.

The first and last film in the trilogy - completed last year - will be shown non-stop on a big screen on 35mm film.

More emphasis will lie on the freak film programme this year, where every B movie buff and fan of the slightly eccentric will find something to their taste. Meanwhile, extreme film will get its due with no less than two screenings of the work of scandalous Siberian-based film-maker Andrei Iskanov - banned in his native Russia.

For the exact film listings, check the film festival website http://www.hoff.ee/ on 29 March.

The festival is brought to you by the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival (http://www.poff.ee/), one of the largest art house festivals in the region together with Haapsalu Culture Center and the City of Haapsalu.

2010 berlinale: JUD SUESS resurrected

Berlin — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:36:13 +0100

In German and Jewish themed film festivals the focus on the Third Reich and the Holocaust remains essential as expressed in the large number of features and documentaries screened on those topics. The New York Jewish Film Festival excelled earlier this year with documentaries like EINSATZGRUPPEN: THE DEATH BRIGADES (Michal Prazan) and FORGOTTEN TRANSPORTS: TO POLAND (Lukas Pribyl) or features like GRUBNER'S JOURNEY (Radu Gabrea) and PROTECTOR (Marek Najbrt). These films may differ in their creative content and production value but show a fundamental respect for past history and its suffering.

The 2010 Berlin International Film Festival, the berlinale, included several productions about the German past among which A FILM UNFINISHED an Israeli-German co-production by Yael Hersonski and the 2009 German feature JEW SUSS: RISE AND FALL (the German titles actually translates JEW SUSS: A FILM WITHOUT A CONSCIENCE) by Oskar Roehler were most prominent and provided object lessons on how the past and perceptions of the past are dealt with.

Josef Goebbels Born: October 29, 1897, died: May 1, 1945

In A FILM UNFINISHED Hersonski uses about one hour of unedited 1942 footage from a Nazi propaganda film on life in the Warsaw ghetto to reconstruct the Nazi version, contrasting the Nazi film with commentaries of several ghetto survivors viewing her film, the re-enactment of Adam Czerniakow, head of the Ghetto Judenrat whose diary confirms the events portrayed in the Nazi footage, and a staged commentary by the German cameraman who filmed the material. Some of the footage reminds of material shot by German camera men in the Lodz ghetto for Goebbels propaganda film THE ETERNAL JEW by Fritz Hippler. In Hersonski's film the imagery of death and dying from the Warsaw ghetto which held half a million Jews before they were shipped to the camps to be killed, are heart breaking even for those who have seen much similar material before.

Roehler's film JEW SUSS - RISE AND FALL a feature about the 1940 JUD SUESS film production by Veit Harlan proved to be the most controversial film screened at the 2010 berlinale. This Austrian-German co-production is one of the most expensive recent German feature films with a budget of about 30 million Euros. It includes a first class crew of seasoned actors like Moritz Bleibtreu as Joseph Goebbels; Tobias Moretti as Ferdinand Marian, the leading actor of Harlan's JUD SUESS; Martina Gedeck as Anna Marian; Heribert Sasse as Deutscher and Armin Rhode as Heinrich George who played the duke in the original Nazi film, to name but a few. They all received kudos for their performance since the figures they portrayed were so convincing and the re-enactment of scenes from the original JUD SUESS so persuasive. This expensive film had further assets such as superb sets with an extraordinary attention to detail. Last but not least the film was directed by Oskar Roehler, a noted German award winning director (NO PLACE TO GO, AGNES AND HIS BROTHERS, THE ELEMENTARY PARTICLES). It would have been difficult to omit such a prestige film from the berlinale, why it was entered for the main competition remains a puzzle.

The original 1940 JUD SUESS film depicts the history of the Jewish banker Joseph Suess Oppenheimer who served as the financial adviser to the Duke of Württemberg in the 18th century. After the duke died Suess was arrested, charged with fraud, tortured and condemned to death and, refusing to convert to Christianity, executed in 1738. Under the close guidance of Joseph Goebbels Veit Harlan transformed the story into an anti-Semitic agitation and propaganda film with the clear message that all Jews should be driven away and annihilated. JUD SUESS was the most successful film in the German 1939/1940 season viewed by 20 million people and shown to international praise at the 1940 Venice Film Festival, applauded by young

Michelangelo Antonioni. JUD SUESS became mandatory viewing for the SS, concentration camp guards, for populations of areas from which Jews were deported, and other groups, and according to some witnesses, proved effective in inciting violence against Jews.

Roehler's version of the making of JUD SUESS and the fate of its leading actor was booed during the press screening and received the worst evaluation of all films competing this year for the Golden Bear, the award for the best feature. In ten years reporting on the berlinale I do not recall any other films with such a negative assessment. Yet there are reports that in public screenings the German audience applauded at the end of the film. In presenting the story of Ferdinand Marian from his discovery by Goebbels , rise as a Nazi and international film star to his death, Roehler re-writes the actual events and shows little sensitivity for that dreadful part of German history. Goebbels becomes a manic studio head running the German film industry giving lavish champagne parties Ferdinand Marian is portrayed as a victim of his circumstances; he becomes "Der Gute Oesterreicher", The Good Austrian, as a German daily headlined its critique of Roehler's film. Roehler does not show him as a career opportunist and willing Nazi collaborator.

The real Marian worked closely with Goebbels through the end of the Third Reich after starring in JUD SUESS. He acted in three more propaganda films and in eight other non-political films produced during that period turning into one of the most popular German male leads. As other German artists on Hitler's official list of artists deserving special treatment like Herbert von Karajan, Wilhelm Furtwaengler, Gustaf Gruendgens, Richard Strauss and Johannes Heester, Ferdinand Marian led a comfortable life, close to the Nazi elite while the world was crumbling and millions perished. He survived the war, was in the process of being ‘denazified‘and already offered again a job in 1946 when he died in a car accident.

In Roehler's perspective, modifying, or re-writing the truth, is justified by ‘following film industry practices'. In his film Marian becomes a victim and an alcoholic who is dropped by Goebbels after completion of the film. His life continues on provincial stages or military encampments where he presents JUD SUESS. Marian seems to meander between debaucheries, liquor and sex. His wife disappears on Goebbels orders and is shipped to the camps since she is half Jewish. He cannot locate his child, thus becomes more and more conflicted, prone to depressions and anxieties. After learning after the war that his wife was killed in a concentration camp he commits suicide by crashing his speeding car into a tree. All of these elements which are essential for Roehler's story have been invented (as well as minor ones such as Goebbel's appearance at the Venice film festival). Roehler violates a taboo which for obvious reasons is still respected in Germany; do not to use the holocaust for entertainment or commercial gain.

In my talks with individuals involved in Roehler's production, I learned that the script was written in order to make the production more marketable and that it would have been difficult making a commercially viable film sticking to the truth. There were some cynical quips such as a prominent actor's statement that "this [Roehler's] film Jew Suss has been funded by Goebbels" or the quip that Roehler's film is Goebbels revenge. Unfortunately not all German reviews of the film focus on the discrepancy between the films story and what actually happened. Unsuspecting readers and the audience stay in Roehler's imaginary universe and leave the film with sympathy for Ferdinand Marian. Even if JEW SUSS becomes a commercial success the film remains an embarrassment.

Claus Mueller, New York Correspondent
filmexchange@gmail.com

Alex Deleon wrote another review of this film

http://www.fest21.com/en/blog/berlin/jud_suess_hits_a_raw_nerve_in_berlin

Matadero Madrid is the new headquarters for DOCUMENTA MADRID 10

Documenta Madrid — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 17:50:54 +0100

The 7th International Documentary Film Festival DOCUMENTA MADRID 10 will be held from the 7th of May to the 16th of May, organized by the Arts Department of The City of Madrid with support and backing once again from HRH the Princess of Asturias,who will be the Patroness of Honor for this event.

This year, the festival has received more submissions than ever, with 1,153 films from 92 different countries. Out of the total, 233 films are Spanish productions, a figure that increses year to year and which proves the good state of the genre in Spain. Furthermore, all the films participating in the competitive sections will be making their premier in Spain.

Three new venues have been added along with Matadero Madrid: Casa Asia, the Sala Berlanga and the Reina Sofía National Art Museum. The public will be able to enjoy the festival programing in usual places such as:Cines Princesa, Cine Estudio Círculo de Bellas Artes, Filmoteca Española (the Film Arcives), Academia de Cine, Casa Árabe, the Goethe Institute, Casa Asia, the French Institute and 8 y Medio Bookshop.

This year, the competition will feature monetary prize-winnings totaling 73,000 Euros, to be distributed among 4 competitive sections: Original Documentary Competition, Documentary Competition, National Competition and Filmotech.com.

82nd Annual Academy Awards Winners

avivapress — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:13:50 +0100

By Maria Esteves - March 8, 2010

The 82nd Academy Awards ceremony presented by Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences (A.M.P.A.S.) for outstanding film achievements of 2009, co-hosted by Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin was held at the Kodak Theatre, Hollywood, California, Sunday, March 2, 8:00pm ET (5:00pm PT). Live coverage of 2010 Oscar Awards were seen in the U.S. on ABC Television Network, on the internet, and in more than 200 countries worldwide.

THE HURT LOCKER received the award for Best Picture, Jeff Bridges for Best Actor, Sandra Bullock for Best Actress, Christoph Waltz for
Best Supporting Actor and Mo'Nique for Best Supporting Actress. This year's
Oscar winners list by category are:

Best Picture

THE HURT LOCKER, (Summit Entertainment)

Best Documentary Feature

THE COVE, Richard O'Barry, (Roadside Attractions)

Best Foreign Language

EL SECRETO DE SUS OJOS (The Secret of Her Eyes), Juan José
Campanella, (Sony Pictures Classics), Argentina

Best Director

KATHRYN BIGELOW for THE HURT LOCKER, (Summit
Entertainment)

Best Actor

JEFF BRIDGES for CRAZY HEART, (Fox Searchlight)

Best Actress

SANDRA BULLOCK for THE BLIND SIDE, (Warner Bros.)

Best Supporting Actor

CHRISTOPH WALTZ for INGLOURIUS BASTERDS, (The Weinstein
Company)

Best Supporting Actress

MO'NIQUE for PRECIOUS: Based on the Novel ‘Push' by Sapphire, (Lionsgate)

Best Documentary Short

MUSIC BY PRUDENCE, Roger Ross Williams and Elinor Burkett

Best Animated Feature

UP, directed by Pete Docter, (Walt Disney)

Best Animated Short

LOGORAMA, Nicolas Schmerkin, (Autour de Minuit)

Best Live Action Short

THE NEW TENANTS, Joachim Back and Tivi Magnusson, A Park Pictures and M & M Production

Best Adapted Screenplay

PRECIOUS: Based on the Novel ‘Push' by Sapphire, Screenplay by
Geoffrey Fletcher, (Lionsgate)

Best Original Screenplay

THE HURT LOCKER, written by Mark Boal, (Summit Entertainment)

Best Film Editing

THE HURT LOCKER, Bob Murawski and Chris Innis, (Summit Entertainment)

Best Sound Editing

THE HURT LOCKER, Paul N.J. Ottosson, (Summit Entertainment)

Best Sound Mixing

THE HURT LOCKER, Paul N.J. Ottosson and Ray Beckett, (Summit
Entertainment)

Best Original Score

UP, Michael Giacchino, (Walt Disney)

Best Original Song

THE WEARY KIND from CRAZY HEART, music and lyric by Ryan
Bingham and T Bone Burnett, (Fox Searchlight)

Best Visual Effects

AVATAR, Joe Letteri, Stephen Rosenbaum, Richard Baneham and Andrew R. Jones, (20th Century Fox)

Best Art Direction

AVATAR, art and set directors Rick Carter, Robert Stromberg, Kim Sinclair, (20th Century Fox)

Best Cinematography

AVATAR, Mauro Fiore, (20th Century Fox)

Best Costume Design

THE YOUNG VICTORIA, Sandy Powell, (Apparition)

Best Makeup

STAR TREK, Barney Burman, Mindy Hall and Joel Harlow,
(Paramount and Spyglass Entertainment)

The Hurt Locker wins 6 Oscars

Editor — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 09:44:19 +0100

"The Hurt Locker" (the Iraq War drama) won best picture and five other prizes at the Academy Awards, including best director for Kathryn Bigelow.
Bigelow is the first woman in the Oscars history to receive Best Director award.
"It's the moment of a lifetime," she said. "I hope I'm the first of many," she said afterward backstage.
"The Hurt Locker" won best picture in a year where there were 10 nominees instead of the usual five - an effort to include more commercial, popular movies in the mix. The historical Box Office sucess of Avatar did not impress the members too much who gave the film a 3 technical awards.
For once the predictors got it quite right (we were among those who predicted the success of The Hurt Locker against Avatar, but does that film needs oscars to build Box Office?)

Actor in a Leading Role

Jeff Bridges in "Crazy Heart"

Actor in a Supporting Role

Christoph Waltz in "Inglourious Basterds"

Actress in a Leading Role

Sandra Bullock in "The Blind Side"

Actress in a Supporting Role

Mo'Nique in "Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push' by Sapphire"

Animated Feature Film

"Up" Pete Docter

Art Direction

"Avatar" Art Direction: Rick Carter and Robert Stromberg; Set Decoration: Kim Sinclair

Cinematography

"Avatar" Mauro Fiore

Costume Design

"The Young Victoria" Sandy Powell

Directing

"The Hurt Locker" Kathryn Bigelow

Documentary (Feature)

"The Cove" Louie Psihoyos and Fisher Stevens

Documentary (Short Subject)

"Music by Prudence" Roger Ross Williams and Elinor Burkett

Film Editing

"The Hurt Locker" Bob Murawski and Chris Innis

Foreign Language Film

"The Secret in Their Eyes (El Secreto de Sus Ojos)" Argentina

Makeup

"Star Trek" Barney Burman, Mindy Hall and Joel Harlow

Music (Original Score)

"Up" Michael Giacchino

Music (Original Song)

"The Weary Kind (Theme from Crazy Heart)" from "Crazy Heart" Music and Lyric by Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett

Best Picture

"The Hurt Locker" Kathryn Bigelow, Mark Boal, Nicolas Chartier and Greg Shapiro, Producers

Short Film (Animated)

"Logorama" Nicolas Schmerkin

Short Film (Live Action)

"The New Tenants" Joachim Back and Tivi Magnusson

Sound Editing

"The Hurt Locker" Paul N.J. Ottosson

Sound Mixing

"The Hurt Locker" Paul N.J. Ottosson and Ray Beckett

Visual Effects

"Avatar" Joe Letteri, Stephen Rosenbaum, Richard Baneham and Andrew R. Jones

Writing (Adapted Screenplay)

"Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push' by Sapphire" Screenplay by Geoffrey Fletcher

Writing (Original Screenplay)

"The Hurt Locker" Written by Mark Boal

-->

The 60th Berlinale--Retrospektively Speaking

Berlin — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 19:47:56 +0100

by Richard Traubner

The Retrospektive at the Berlinale usually excites all types of film historians, curators, museum personnel, and other interested parties--especially when it's a German subject. This year, a restored version of Fritz Lang's 1927 Metropolis trumped the Retrospektive itself, which was a look-back at significant and sometimes controversial films shown at the film festival since it began in 1951--in far warmer June weather.

Many of these films are quite familiar now: In the Realm of the Senses, The Deer Hunter, or even Powell and Pressburger's The Tales of Hoffmann. One can obtain these from any video store. There was a large crowd for the showing I caught of Clouzot's Le Salaire de la Peur, but it began by being accidentally screened in widescreen format. After that was corrected, the film's exposition seemed endless, and hardly classic, before the actual dynamite truck ride began.

Metropolis has been restored several times, a few years ago with footage found at Moscow's Gosfilmofond archive. But two years ago a longer version was found in a Buenos Aires archive that contained about a half-hour of footage that had not been seen since the film's premiere at the UFA Palast am Zoo in 1927. With the help of the original Gottfried Huppertz orchestral parts, its music cues, and the archival censorship copy of the script, the grainy Argentinian scenes were fitted into what is now touted as the complete Metropolis. This was shown in direct transmission en plein air at the Brandenburg Gate, and on television, the second night of the festival, to a crowd of very cold film buffs.

The saga of Metropolis's journey, after being severely cut and rewritten for a Paramount release in the USA by the writer Channing Pollock, was also the subject of a fascinating exhibit at the Berlin Kinemathek, which showed everything from original costume designs to a still of Lang and his stars playing in a jazz band on the set. The second German release was much shorter, as it was felt the original was too long for 1920s' audiences. Although Lang's film may have been mutilated in the process, it cannot be said to be the easiest film to sit through, even in its present, restored version. And it's worth remembering that the film was not the desired international success Ufa envisioned.

But the wonders of Lang's film as a predecessor of most science-fiction and futuristic films remain luminously vivid, with the spectacular sets by Hunte and Kettelhut, the amazing lighting, camerawork of Freund, and Lang's strirring mise-en-scène. But the plot itself, with its future + present + Christian-humanist themes, does not wear as well as it might, despite wonderful performances from its cast: Gustav Frölich, Alfred Abel, Heinrich George, and the amazing Brigitte Helm. I was enchanted by the very 1927 nightclub scenes found throughout the film, with their fantastic revue sets and costumes, some of which were newly discovered in Argentina.

Lang was of course courted by the Nazi regime early on, despite his Jewish roots. The spectre of Nazi-era subjects, and even their very films, were potently on display at this Berlinale. Jud Süss-Film ohne Gewissen (directed by Oskar Roehler), scrutinised the making of the

infamous propaganda film originally directed by Veit Harlan in 1940. This was an uneasy mélange of National-Socialist nostalgie, with glamorous receptions peopled by film-star portrayers, songs of the period, jokes against Hitler, non-heiling by an artsy crowd, nightclub scenes, and reconstructions of the original black-and-white film scenes-which turned out to be more riveting than the other recreated vignettes. (One exception was the documented showing of Jud Süss to SS officers who would later work in the as-yet unfinished Auschwitz.)

Although the unease of the lead actor Ferdinand Marian was depicted, the film seemed flat compared to the more captivatingly diabolical tale of an opportunistic actor, a thinly-veiled Gustav Gründgens, in Mephisto (1981). For Jud Süss, the very popular actor Moritz Bleibtreu was on hand to give a very flashy portrait of propaganda minister (and film tsar) Josef Goebbels.

The French La Rafle, a fictional account (shown in the market section) of the Vélodrôme d'Hiver round-up of Paris Jews in 1942, was not open to the press before its Paris release on March 10th. But another commercial film with NS subject matter was: the Norwegian Svik (Betrayal), a compendium of Nazi clichés that almost seemed a parody.

For actual Nazi horror, one could turn to the real footage of a Nazi project that was the subject of a new Israeli documentary, A Film Unfinished (Yael Hersonski). The Warsaw Ghetto scenes filmed by SS cameramen were frightful, with the very evident death, starvation and rags of the inmates on view just before the mass deportations to Treblinka began in the summer of 1942. Not content to show simple misery and degradation, the filmmakers actually staged scenes of comparatively healthy-looking Jews gorging themselves, drinking, smoking and laughing at tables filled with amounts of food they had not seen for months. The "acting" of the Jewish crowds was forced on them by the helmers, with obviously terrible consequences if they failed to react properly.

This is the worst kind of a horror film, as frightening as any concentration camp footage because we know what lay in store for

most of the cast. The Nazi documentary using this footage was never actually made, and only recently uncovered in an archive vault. Further post-Nazi-era documentaries included a film on the postwar prosecutor Fritz Bauer, mysteriously murdered, and a documentary with newly restored footage of some of the Nürnberg war-crimes trials. Ironically, the golden-age Ufa producer Erich Pommer worked on this exposé, shown in postwar Germany but never in the USA.

Another retrospective but modern glimpse of totalitarian days was the superb Czech film Kawasaki's Rose, directed by Jan Hrebejk, dealing in a different, but no less fascinating way to elements of secret-police activity and betrayal as shown in the Das Leben der Anderen. In another depiction of a mass-murderer by a very popular actor, André Dussollier appeared rather unusually as a comparatively gentle, nuanced Stalin in his final days in the French

Une exécution ordinaire (writer-director Marc Dugain), opposite a

quite frightened female doctor played memorably by Marina Hands.

I missed screenings of three prewar Japanese films by Shimazu Yasujiro in the Forum section, unfortunately, but managed to take in such interesting period projects as the French L'Autre Dumas, a study of the unsettling relationship between Alexandre père and his uncredited co-author, Auguste Macquet. With brilliant playing by an overstuffed, over-the-top Gerard Depardieu and the requisitely nerdy Benoit Poelvoorde, and a witty script, based on a play, the film held one's dramatic as well as decorative interest.

Finally, a moving documentary in the Panorama section about a 1950s' Hollywood icon: Rock Hudson-Dark and Handsome Stranger (Andrew Davies, André Schäfer), which plumbed the saga of a real man's man of an actor who of course turned out to be gay, and, in a celebrity death, helped change attitudes toward the AIDS crisis.

by Richard Traubner

http://www.filmfestivals.com/htm/festivals.shtml

Thank you speeches from the Independent Spirit Awards winners

Editor — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:29:52 +0100

Thank U Cam Best Female Lead Gabourey

Thank U Cam Best Director Lee Daniels

Thank U Cam Jeff Bridges Best Male Lead Crazy Heart

Thank U Cam Best Supporting Male Woody Harrelson

Beaune 2nd International Thriller Film Festival

Beaune — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 09:54:36 +0100

Last year, during the first edition of the Festival, Jury Chairman Claude Chabrol said: “The mission of Beaune International Thriller Film Festival is to underline the thriller genre, which is after all one of the most fertile and noble in cinema history, and precisely to try and find new tendencies, or suggest new directions.”

Keeping this ambition alive, the second edition of the Festival will take place from Thursday 8th to Sunday 11th April 2010.

The Prize list of the 1st edition confirmed the diversity of the selection as well as the ongoing success of thrillers, a genre that still shines at the height of world cinema, all categories considered.
Thus last year Grand Prize, Bertrand Tavernier’s “In the Electric Mist”, drew 860,000 viewers, and Nicolas Winding Refn’s “Bronson”, the New Blood Prize, has conquered the audience with 110,000 tickets sold. As for the “OSS 117 Rio ne répond plus” phenomenon by Michel Hazanavicius, it has appeal to 2,520,000 viewers.

TRIBUTE TO A CITY
Every year, the Beaune International Thriller Film Festival pays tribute to a city for its influence and mythological dimension within the thriller genre.
After “Paris Noir” last year, the Festival is now to honour New York City with:

NEW YORK NOIR
“NAKED CITY”

“Here is the city and here are the lights”. A camera is hovering above New York, while a voice-over comments: “It is the story of several people, and it is the story of the city itself. With its apartment houses, its skyscrapers, the hot summer pavements, the children at play, the buildings in their naked stone, the people without makeup… The city has a pulse, and it never stops beating…”
In just a few words, everything is said in this prologue to Jules Dassin’s The Naked City (1948). Leaving behind tourism and postcards, this New York is the city of film noir, with its crime-ridden alleys (Underworld USA), muggy strip-clubs (Fear City), fashionable clubs (The Wrong Man), boxing halls (Body and Soul), shabby backyards (Killer’s Kiss), dubiouslooking police stations (Detective Story), elevated railway (French Connection), fire escapes (The Window), the violence in Queens (Kiss of Death) or Harlem (A Rage in Harlem), gangs in Little Italy (Mean Streets), or Brooklyn and its famous bridge, from which Dassin contemplates the “naked city”, warning us that “there are eight million stories in the unveiled city, and we have only told you one.”
As early as in 1912 (Griffith and his Musketeers of Pig Alley), New York proved to be obsessed by darkness. And, either showing itself at dawn in the desert streets of Madigan, or hiding in the manholes fumes on the asphalt of Taxi Driver, it hasn’t stopped to share this obsession with us.

François Guérif (Publisher, creator and director of the Rivages Noir collection, and member of the Festival’s Red Circle*)
Films mentioned
- The Musketeers of Pig Alley, D.W. Griffith, 1912.
- Kiss of Death, Henry Hathaway, 1947.
- Body and Soul, Robert Rossen, 1947.
- The Window, Ted Tetzlaff, 1949.
- Detective Story, William Wyler, 1951.
- Killer’s Kiss, Stanley Kubrick, 1955.
- The Wrong Man, Alfred Hitchcock, 1956.
- Underworld USA, Samuel Fuller, 1961.
- Madigan, Don Siegel, 1968.
- French Connection, William Friedkin, 1971.
- Mean Streets, Martin Scorsese, 1973.
- Taxi Driver, Martin Scorsese, 1976.
- Fear City, Abel Ferrara, 1984.
- A Rage in Harlem, Bill Duke, 1991.
As part of the “New York Noir” tribute, a selection of emblematic films will be screened to festival-goers.

* THE RED CIRCLE
Introduced during the 1st edition of the Beaune International Thriller Film Festival, the “Red Circle” (Le Cercle Rouge) gathers fifteen personalities from literature and cinema, eminent connoisseurs of the dark lights of thriller.
These godfathers will follow every edition of the Festival and keep a benevolent eye on its cinematic intoxications. Their mission is also to give an award every year to the best French and foreign pieces of noir fiction, with two literary prizes: Le Grand Prix du roman noir français, and Le Grand Prix du roman noir étranger.
François Guérif (Publisher, creator and director of the Rivages Noir collection, journalist, translator and writer of biographies and books on film noir)
Claude Chabrol (screenwriter and director)
Marie-Caroline Aubert (publisher and writer)
Tonino Benacquista (writer and screenwriter)
Laurent Chalumeau (writer, screenwriter and lyricist)
Benoît Cohen (screenwriter and director)
Alain Corneau (screenwriter and director)
Antoine de Caunes (screenwriter, director and actor)
Jean Hernandez (film distributor)
Pierre Jolivet (screenwriter and director)
Joëlle Losfeld (publisher)
Olivier Marchal (screenwriter, director and actor)
Claude Mesplède (detective novel critic and historian)
Claude Miller (screenwriter and director)
Frédéric Schoendoerffer (screenwriter and director)

FIRST EDITION JURY AND PRIZE LIST
2009
Feature Films Jury: Claude Chabrol (Chairman), François Berléand, Amira Casar, Benoît Cohen, Anne Consigny, François Guérif, Noémie Lvovsky and Elsa Zylberstein.

PRIZES
Grand Prize – IN THE ELECTRIC MIST by Bertrand TAVERNIER
Jury Prize – JUST WALKING (Sólo Quiero Caminar) by Agustin DIAZ YANES
Critics’ Prize - SUSPECT X by Hiroshi NISHITANI
Special Police Prize - TERRIBLY HAPPY by Henrick RUBEN GENS
New Blood Jury: Etienne Chatiliez (Chairman), Sami Bouajila, Rachida Brakni, Samuel Le Bihan and
Nicolas Saada.
PRIZE
New Blood Prize: BRONSON by Nicolas WINDING REFN
Short Films Jury: Jean-Paul Rouve (Chairman), Fred Cavayé, Marius Colucci, Arié Elmaleh, Julie
Ferrier and Thomas Verovski.
PRIZE
Best Short Film Prize: BAPTEME DU FEU by Nicolas MESDOM

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"How An Oscar Statue Is Made"

SharonAbella — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 19:30:06 +0100

"The Oscar statuette was designed in 1928 by Cedric Gibbons. MGM's chief art director and one of the Academy's founding members. Fredric Hope, who was then Gibbons' assistant, created the original Belgian black marble base, and artist George Stanley sculpted the design. The California Bronze Foundry hand-cast the first statuette in bronze plated with 24-karat gold.

Today the statuettes are manufactured in Chicago by R.S. Owens & Company using a metal alloy called britannia. After the initial casting, artisans buff the statuette's rough surface, leaving a dull pewter-like finish. Polishers then give it an even smoother shine to prepare it for electroplating.

Electroplating involves dipping the statuette into several different liquid solutions, each of which contains a different sheet of metal. An electric current imparts a positive charge to the metal and a negative charge to the Oscar, causing tiny ions of the metal in the solution to bond to the statuette.

The Oscar is first plated with copper to prevent corrosion. Then nickel is plated over the copper for adhesion. A silver layer provides further protection against corrosion, as well as a bright and shiny surface for the final layer: 24-karat gold. Once electroplating is complete, the Oscar is sealed with a heavy coat of lacquer.

Each statuette is then engraved with a unique identification number behind it's heels-a practice that was started in 1949. Finally the Oscar is mounted onto its base, which currently is finished with black nickel plate. It will receive an engraved gold nameplate once its future owner is announced.

At its official height and weight, the Oscar stands 13 1/2 inches tall and weighs 8 1/2 pounds."

Check the making of a statue video

The Global Film Village: It was a Precious Spirit Awards Gala

MarlaLewinGFV — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 10:14:51 +0100

by Marla Lewin

Lenny Kravitz and Mariah Carey celebrate with Lee Daniels at Spirit Awards

Lee Daniels' Precious swept the 25th anniversary of the Film Independent Spirit Awards taking home the Best Feature, Best Director, Best First Screenplay, Best Female Lead and Best Supporting Female awards. Precious won in every category for which it was nominated taking 5 awards. The other winners were lucky that Precious didn't have any male actors nominated and Lee Daniels wasn't a first time filmmaker.

Fox Searchlight was the other big winner with three awards, two for Crazy Heart, Best First Feature, and Best Male Lead for Jeff Bridges; and one for (500) Days of Summer, for Best Screenplay.

Host Eddie Izzard opened the show by joking that the independents have undergone big changes this year. Even the Spirit Awards have seen change moving from being held on the beach under a tent in Santa Monica to being held in Downtown LA under a tent on top of a parking structure. The show is known for its anything goes style and everyone gets to say whatever they want for as long as they need to say it. There is no band attempting to drown out the winners gushing their thank you's to everyone they know or love or in the past has ever met. Guest attire seemed a little more formal than in the past were it was more casual and funky.

Abramaorama's Anvil! The Story of Anvil, from Director: Sacha Gervasi won Best Documentary. It was produced By Film Independent's Film Festival Director Rebecca Yeldham prior to her joining the organization.

Sony Pictures Classics' An Education won Best Foreign Film unlike the Oscar's the Spirit's only require that the film be made outside of the United States.

Oscilloscope Laboratories' The Messenger, Woody Harrelson won Best Supporting Male.

Magnolia Pictures' Humpday from Director/Producer Lynn Shelton won the John Cassavetes Award.

Focus Features' A Serious Man, won two awards; Best Cinematography for Roger Deakins and The 3rd annual Robert Altman Award, given to Joel Coen & Ethan Coen's A Serious Man. This is an ensemble award so winners included the entire team including casting directors Ellen Chenoweth and Rachel Tenner, and cast members Richard Kind, Sari Lennick, Jessica McManus, Fred Melamed, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Aaron Wolff.

Winners of the Spirit cash prizes were:

Kyle Patrick Alvarez, director of Easier With Practice, received the seventeenth annual Acura Someone to Watch Award, which includes a $25,000 unrestricted grant.

Bill Ross and Turner Ross, directors of 45365, received the sixteenth annual Chaz & Roger Ebert Truer Than Fiction Award, a $25,000 unrestricted grant.

Karin Chien, producer of The Exploding Girl and Santa Mesa, received the fourteenth annual Piaget Producers Award, a $25,000 unrestricted grant.

The 2010 ELLE/Garnier Directing Fellowship a production grant of $10,000,was given to Film Independent Fellow Jennifer Arnold (2005 Directors Lab) for her film A Small Act, which will air this summer on HBO.

Dick Clark Productions produced the show for Film Independent and it aired live on IFC.

The following is a complete list of the winners:

Best Feature Precious - Lionsgate -Producers: Lee Daniels, Gary Magness, Sarah SiegelMagness

Best Director Lee Daniels - Lionsgate Precious

Crazy Heart Team for Best First Feature at Spirit Awards

Best First Feature Crazy Heart - Fox Searchlight Director: Scott Cooper

Producers: T Bone Burnett, Judy Cairo, Rob Carliner, Scott Cooper, Robert Duvall

Best Screenplay - Scott Neustadter, Michael H. Weber - Fox Searchlight (500) Days of Summer

Best First Screenplay Geoffrey Fletcher - Lionsgate Precious

John Cassavetes Award Humpday Magnolia Pictures (For the best feature made under $500,000) Writer/Director/Producer: Lynn Shelton

Best Supporting Female Mo'Nique -Lionsgate Precious

Best Supporting Male Woody Harrelson -Oscilloscope Laboratories The Messenger

Best Female Gabourey Sidibe -Lionsgate Precious

Best Male Jeff Bridges -Fox Searchlight Crazy Heart

Best Cinematography Roger Deakins -Focus Features A Serious Man

Best Foreign Film An Education-Sony Pictures Classics Director: Lone Scherfig

Best Documentary Anvil! The Story of Anvil-Abramaorama Films Director: Sacha Gervasi

European Film Academy protests against arrest of Iranian director Jafar Panahi

Editor — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 18:55:03 +0100

The Board of the European Film Academy strongly protests against the arrest of Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi and demands his immediate release.

Jafar Panahi is an internationally recognised artist and his work has been honoured at the festivals in Berlin, Cannes and Venice. Before his arrest, Panahi was denied permission to leave Iran in order to attend the 60th Berlinale as an honorary guest.

The Board of the European Film Academy encourages the EFA Members to join this protest by personal letters to the respective Iranian embassy.

Yves Marmion Nik Powell Volker Schlöndorff
- on behalf of the EFA Board -

As a member of EFA I joined this petition please do so.

Nature documentaries are boring.

Editor — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 19:22:21 +0100

If you believe that, set aside 40 minutes and prepare to be astonished. It's the running time for "Rabbit à la Berlin," a history of the Wall told from the POV of wild rabbits who lived between East and West Berlin. Heavily guarded, grassy and predator-free, the Death Zone they called home for 28 years let them to do what rabbits do. They flourished.

But in time some tried escaping their safe animal farm for West Berlin. And since the fall of the Wall, the furry rodents have been struggling to survive under freedom -- just like former citizens of the Soviet Bloc.

Directed by Bartek Konopka and Anna Wydra, the film (Królik po berlinsku in Polish and Mauerhase in German), was produced by Polish broadcaster TVP. It's one of five short documentaries vying for this year's Oscar.

Last Sunday, a week before the March 7, 2010 Award ceremony, New York's Museum of Modern Art screened the whole classy quintuple at its "Eighty-Second Academy-Nominated Documentary Shorts" program. The annual bloom is among MoMA's most highly anticipated, with tickets being snapped up the moment they go on sale. This year it clocked in at around three hours. And not one audience melee broke out, surely a Museum first.

Perhaps viewers were stunned into silence by "China's Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province." In the first 39-minutes of the evening, Jon Alpert and Matthew O'Neill had taken them on a journey through the emotional and physical rubble of China's 2008 earthquake, where communities mourned its young casualties and decried official negligence.

What begins as disaster coverage boils into a political diary of protest against shoddy building and relief efforts.

A collective gasp went up in the auditorium with each new horrific fact: that families were compensated $317 per dead child; that more than three parents were forbidden at school sites; that, given China's one-child policy, most parents lost their only child. And so on.

If "Rabbit à la Berlin" uses nature as an allegory of totalitarian rule, "China's Unnatural Disaster" takes it as a platform for people to express civic rage. One bereaved mother sums up her disillusionment as "this is a lesson of blood." Another, pardon her Chinese, tells a fat cat to "search your mother's cunt."

Death and politics coalesce as well in "The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner." The 38-minute film by Daniel Junge trails the former Washington State governor's 2008 campaign to legalize assisted-suicide. Gardner mounted the initiative while combating Parkinson's disease.

As Woody Allen has noted, success amplifies what you already are. But what if success ends what you are? Tough to say which caused more audience squirming, this conundrum, Booth's growing incapacitation or his opponents' efforts to quash the ballot. What's plain, though, is that Junge picked a compelling hero and that his own cogency -- a skill perhaps honed as creative director of campaign strategy firm Just Media -- helped him construct a sturdy work of nonfiction.

Work, or lack thereof, is the focus of another entry with "Last" in the title. "The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant" gives a 40-minute insight into the final six months of General Motors' factory in Moraine, Ohio. The backstory on its shuttering involves "the slowest auto market in 15 years."

Directors Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert build the film almost entirely out of conversations with workers. Speaking to the camera between shifts, these mostly middle-aged men and women give unemployment a personal face. Will blue collar workers without computers find new jobs? Are they up for retraining? Can they hope to re-experience the pride and mastery they achieved as autoworkers? Hope is the key word here, and it's not in conspicuous supply.

It is in "Music by Prudence."

The film opens with shots of the Zimbabwe bush so surreal and chords of a woman's song so rousing that what comes next is a jolt. A mangled and legless African gets stuck in a puddle with her wheelchair. She is 21-year-old Prudence Mabhena, the source of the voice, the producer of the film and the lead singer of Bulawayo-based group Liyana.

Maybe the Shona and Ndebele languages have a word for "uplifting" to suit her 35-minute story, directed by Roger Ross Williams. From the paternal grandmother who blamed her arthrogryposis on witchcraft (and wanted her killed) to the stepmother who let her marinate in three weeks' worth of bodily eliminations,
Prudence thankfully made it to the King George VI School for the disabled. There she met the seven other members of Liyana and became the singer, songwriter, lyricist, arranger and choreographer who's now recognized as an emerging star.
MoMA thundered with applause after the group's climactic Afro-fusion performance of marimbas, African drums, keyboards, shakers, keyboards -- and, of course, dear Prudence.

However different these five Oscar contenders, one common denominator is HBO Documentary Films. The network, which has a long history of sweeping awards, was behind all but "Rabbit à la Berlin."

Interwoven news clips are another thing some of the films share. "China's Unnatural Disaster" replays the devastating earthquake through television and cell phone footage; and "The Last Campaign" dusts off archival reels of Booth Gardner in the heyday of his governorship.

"Rabbit à la Berlin" takes the historical footage award, however. MoMA's savvy spectators ooohed at the shots of Fidel Castro and John F. Kennedy on opposing sides of the Berlin Wall, and seemed no less moved by scenes depicting armed punishment of dissidents. Allegedly, the filmmakers only turned up six images of the original rabbits, though it's easier to guess which film will take the Oscar than which bunny was a body double.

By Laura Blum

Festivals organizers: how to get more submissions with FestivalExpress

FestivalExpress — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 10:22:43 +0100

To optimize the use of our FestivalExpress submission tool, please read the guidelines provided in attachment, follow our tips described in the text and use the attached images to promote your submission pages and call for entry on your website...

Download the document in pdf or in .doc

The Annual 2010 Oscar Week Party

avivapress — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 03:08:11 +0100

By Maria Esteves - March 3, 2010

The Annual 2010 Oscar Week Party has over thirty two celebrations sponsored by various organizations (Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Women in Film, The German Consulate, et al.) and brands (BMW, Dior, Diane von Furstenberg, Moet Chandon, et al.). Invited filmmakers, actors and celebrity guests from around the world will attend an average of six events each night.

The 82nd Academy Awards presented by A.M.P.A.S. for outstanding film achievements of 2009 co-hosted by Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin will commence on Sunday, March 7, 2010, at the Kodak Theatre, Hollywood, CA, and televised live by the ABC Television Network in the U.S., and in more than 200 countries worldwide. The 2010 Oscar Week Party
Schedule lineup includes:

TUESDAY
* Screening of the nommed short subjects, hosted by AMPAS, with a filmmaker discussion, Samuel Goldwyn Theater

WEDNESDAY
* Luncheon celebration for THE HURT LOCKER, hosted by Moet Chandon, RH restaurant, Andaz Hotel, Sunset Boulevard

* Screening of the nommed documentary films with the filmmakers, hosted by AMPAS, Samuel Goldwyn Theater

* Global Green USA Annual Party/Concert, Avalon, Hollywood

* Brioni reception, hosted by Paul Haggis, Lee Daniels and Gerard Butler, BevHills Hotel's Bar Nineteen 12

* Cocktail reception for THE COVE, Haven360, Andaz Hotel, Sunset Boulevard

THURSDAY
* The Third Annual Essence Black Women in Hollywood luncheon, (honors Gabourey Sidibe, Queen Latifah, Zoe Saldana and Mary J. Blige), BevHills Hotel

* The Annual Oscar Wilde party hosted by United States - Ireland Alliance's (honors J.J. Abrams, Seamus McGarvey, Saoirse Ronan), Wilshire Ebell

* The Third Annual Pieces of Heaven art, hosted by Amy Smart and Scott Caan, Palihouse

* Animated features symposium hosted by AMPAS, Samuel Goldwyn Theater

* The Third Annual reception for femme nominees hosted by Women in Film, at Peter and Tara Guber Bel-Air home

* The Fifth Annual Hollywood Glamour dinner by Dior Beauty, the Chateau Marmont

* PRECIOUS helmer Lee Daniels, hosted by Uptown mag and BMW, Haven360, Andaz Hotel, Sunset Boulevard

FRIDAY
* The Independent Spirit Awards, Los Angeles

* The 17th Annual Oscar Student Filmmakers Scholarship luncheon, (honors Tom Ford, David Scearce and the cast of PRECIOUS ), Montage Hotel

* Diamond Information Center luncheon (honors AN EDUCATION’S Carey Mulligan), the Chateau Marmont
* Isaac Mizrahi and QVC Reception, the Four Seasons, Beverly Hills
* CAA's Bryan Lourd Annual Party at his home

* OK! Magazine Party, performance by Keri Hilson, Beso

* The Golden Trailer Awards, presented by Premiere.com and Jack Daniels, Haven360, Andaz Hotel, Sunset Boulevard

SATURDAY
* The Eighth Annual Night Before Party benefit for Motion Picture & Television Fund, poolside, BevHills Hotel

* Annual symposium for nominated foreign-language films and makeup category by AMPAS, Samuel Goldwyn Theater

* Annual luncheon hosted by Barry Diller and Diane von Furstenberg (honors Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter)

* A party for nominees (INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS, NINE, A SINGLE MAN), Soho House, West Hollywood

* Fete German nominees, hosted by The German Consulate and the Goethe Institute, Villa Aurora

* The Society of Composers & Lyricists annual reception by Charles Bernstein and Arthur Hamilton for the music nominees, Beverly Hills

* Sony Classics Dinner for its 13 nominees, Il Cielo, Beverly Hills

* Evening reception for THE HURT LOCKER by Summit and Vogue, the Mondrian

SUNDAY
* Governors Ball hosted by AMPAS, Grand Ballroom, Hollywood and Highland

* Vanity Fair magazine annual dinner and post-Oscar party, Sunset Tower Hotel

* Oscar after-party hosted by Madonna, Guy Oseary, and Demi Moore, Oseary's Hollywood Hills home

* 18th Annual Elton John AIDS Foundation dinner/viewing party, Pacific Design Center

* Fox and Fox Searchlight viewing party, Boulevard 3

* The Envelope Please AIDS Benefit, the Abbey, West Hollywood

* InStyle annual viewing party, BLT, West Hollywood

* E! Network partY, the rooftop Drai's Hollywood, W Hollywood Hotel

* Night of 100 Stars annual dinner/viewing party, BevHills Hotel

Ice Cube's Straight Outta L.A., will have its world premiere at Tribeca/ESPN Sports Festival

Directors Introducing their Films:

Thessaloniki Masterclass of Stefan Kloos: Producing and Packaging Documentaries

New York's Love Affair With French Cinema

....We Have A Dream and Still We Rise....

Interview from Elliot Grove, founder of Raindance

7th edition of Dubai International Film Festival to be held next December

AMPAS Official 2010 New York Oscar Evening Gala Coverage

First highlights of Nippon Connection film program

Guadalajara Film Festival Notches 25 Years

Wall Street 2 the trailer

New York Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Fall/Winter 2010 Coverage and Photos

Full Sail University returns as primary sponsor of next Florida Film Festival

EFP launches programme highlighting European and Turkish films

BRIDGES EUROPE - TURKEY at the Istanbul International Film Festival (April 3-18, 2010)

Turkish Films selected for the Programme

La Résidence de la Cinéfondation hosts its 20th session

Daniel Joseph Borgman

Michel Franco

Cristián Jiménez

Yaelle Kayam

Franco Lolli

Dominga Sotomayor

Line-up at its finest: prominent speakers at FMX 2010

Haapsalu Horror & Fantasy Film Festival (HÕFF) will reawaken zombies

2010 berlinale: JUD SUESS resurrected

Matadero Madrid is the new headquarters for DOCUMENTA MADRID 10

82nd Annual Academy Awards Winners

Best Picture

Best Documentary Feature

Best Foreign Language

Best Director

Best Actor

Best Actress

Best Supporting Actor

Best Supporting Actress

Best Documentary Short

Best Animated Feature

Best Animated Short

Best Live Action Short

Best Adapted Screenplay

Best Original Screenplay

Best Film Editing

Best Sound Editing

Best Sound Mixing

Best Original Score

Best Original Song

Best Visual Effects

Best Art Direction

Best Cinematography

Best Costume Design

Best Makeup

The Hurt Locker wins 6 Oscars

Actor in a Leading Role

Actor in a Supporting Role

Actress in a Leading Role

Actress in a Supporting Role

Animated Feature Film

Art Direction

Cinematography

Costume Design

Directing

Documentary (Feature)

Documentary (Short Subject)

Film Editing

Foreign Language Film

Makeup

Music (Original Score)

Music (Original Song)

Best Picture

Short Film (Animated)

Short Film (Live Action)

Sound Editing

Sound Mixing

Visual Effects

Writing (Adapted Screenplay)

Writing (Original Screenplay)

The 60th Berlinale--Retrospektively Speaking

Thank you speeches from the Independent Spirit Awards winners

Beaune 2nd International Thriller Film Festival