Chicken & Egg Pictures, the non-profit organization dedicated to supporting women and gender-expansive filmmakers with funding and mentorship, today announced its 2024 (Egg)celerator Lab grantees. The organization is granting $40,000 each to ten feature documentary film projects, directed or co-directed by first- or second-time directors. Funds are targeted for production, and each director will also receive year-long mentorship. From today’s press release: The 2024 (Egg)celerator Lab films find families reimagining their histories, legacies, generational grief, and intimate end of life journeys such as in Ashley O’Shay’s Southmont Drive (Working Title), Gabriela Díaz Arp’s Matitinó, and Emma Francis-Snyder’s Anatomy of a […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Mar 5, 2024The Sundance Institute announced today the eight storytellers who comprise the 2024 Momentum Fellows cohort. Led by the Institute’s Women at Sundance and Artist Accelerator programs, the fellowship “specifically targets mid-career artists hailing from historically marginalized backgrounds, offering them tailored support and resources.” From the press release: The fellowship supports creators working in fiction or nonfiction who have recently achieved a noteworthy accomplishment, such as a highly regarded feature film or series. Momentum provides participants with a full-year program of customized support around current goals they identify for themselves to level up in their craft and career, including an unrestricted […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Feb 22, 2024The U.S. trailer for Bertrand Bonello’s The Beast has arrived. The latest film from Bonello (Nocturama, Saint Laurent) marks his third collaboration with Léa Seydoux, who gives not one but three great performances across three different timelines. The Beast enters release on April 5, and our next issue will feature an interview with Bonello conducted by Michael Almereyda.
by Filmmaker Staff on Feb 13, 2024In the Sundance 2024 Midnight premiere It’s What’s Inside, the feature debut of writer-director Greg Jardin, an uninvited guest with a mysterious suitcase derails a pre-wedding party. Below, Jardin discusses what led him to edit his own film, the balance between long shots and flutter cuts, and more. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor questionnaire here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Jardin: I started out directing low-budget music videos, which I more or less […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 31, 2024Films are made of and from places: the locations they are filmed in, the settings they are meant to evoke, the geographies where they are imagined and worked on. What place tells its own story about your film, whether a particularly challenging location that required production ingenuity or a map reference that inspired you personally, politically or creatively? Ninety percent of our film takes place in one location, which makes that the default answer – a giant house in the middle of nowhere. The whole impetus behind the film’s premise was coming up with something that could unfold in a single […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 31, 2024The nonprofit Chicken & Egg Pictures has announced the eight recipients of its Chicken & Egg Awards for 2024. From the press release: Chicken & Egg Pictures, the organization dedicated to offering support and funding for women and gender-expansive documentary filmmakers, has announced more than $600,000 in new grants to eight recipients of its 2024 Chicken & Egg Award, with each receiving a $75,000 grant–a $50,000 unrestricted career grant and $25,000 to be applied to a project the filmmaker will work on during their award year. The recipients are Alisa Kovalenko, Beth Aala, Jumana Manna, Katy Lena Ndiaye, Nailah Jefferson, […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 31, 2024The 2024 Slamdance Film Festival, which returned this year to its original home at the Doubletree Park City (i.e., the Yarrow), announced the winners of its Sparky Awards on Friday. Giuseppe Garau’s The Accident, a 16mm-shot film about a newly separated woman finding employment within the tow-truck industry, won the Narrative Feature Grand Jury Prize. The Documentary Feature Grand Jury Prize went to Matt Moyer’s and Amy Toensing’s Inheritance, an Appalachia-set film dealing with the opioid epidemic. Kiarash Dadgar, whose short film The Steak played the festival, was awarded the AGBO Fellowship, which comes with $25,000 in prize money and […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 27, 2024The Sundance Film Festival has announced the awards for this year’s edition. The list follows below, with links to our coverage of the films in question as available: GRAND JURY PRIZES The U.S. Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic was presented to In The Summers / U.S.A. (Director and Screenwriter: Alessandra Lacorazza, Producers: Alexander Dinelaris, Rob Quadrino, Fernando Rodriguez-Vila, Lynette Coll, Sergio Lira, Cristóbal Güell) — On a journey that spans the formative years of their lives, two sisters navigate their loving but volatile father during their yearly summer visits to his home in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Cast: René Pérez Joglar, […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 26, 2024Creative Capital, the granting and artist support organization, announced this week its 2024 awardees in the categories of Visual Arts and Film/Moving Image, totaling $2.5 million in grants to artists chosen from 5,600 applications. The Film/Moving Image recipients include 25 New Faces of Film Ephraim Asili and Marnie Ellen Hertzler. The full list follows below, and click here to learn more about the individual projects. VISUAL ARTS Jordan Ann Craig, Santa Fe, NM Brigit Johnson, Placerville, CA Emily Barker, Los Angeles, CA Andrea Carlson, Grand Marais, MN and Chicago, IL Nani Chacon, Albuquerque, NM Christy Chan, Richmond, CA william cordova, […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 25, 2024Films are made of and from places: the locations they are filmed in, the settings they are meant to evoke, the geographies where they are imagined and worked on. What place tells its own story about your film, whether a particularly challenging location that required production ingenuity or a map reference that inspired you personally, politically or creatively? God Save Texas: La Frontera unfolds its narrative amidst the backdrop of El Paso, Texas—a sister city to Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua. Within the embrace of the Border, a realm pulsating with political fervor, two cultures harmonize, forging the unique tapestry that defines this […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 25, 2024