The IFP announced earlier today that two indie film stalwarts will be co-hosting this year’s Gotham Independent Film Awards: Stanley Tucci and Patricia Clarkson. Veterans of the stage and screen (both large and small), Clarkson is coming off a busy year where she received rave reviews for playing the lead in Cairo Time and starred in Hollywood projects Shutter Island and Easy A (which Tucci also starred in). Tucci, who received a Gotham Awards tribute last year, was nominated for a Best Supporting Oscar last year for his performance in The Lovely Bones and will be seen next in Burlesque. […]
by Jason Guerrasio on Nov 15, 2010Voting is currently underway for the Gotham Independent Film Awards‘ first-ever Festival Genius Audience Award. The IFP and Slated have complied 26 titles from 50 U.S. and Canadian film festivals that will vie for the award, which will be announced during the Gotham Awards on November 29. They include Winter’s Bone, Fair Game, Waiting for ‘Superman’, Waste Land, The New Year and happythankyoumoreplease, to name a few. Voting for the five nominees of the award will close Nov. 7, then voting for the winner will open Nov. 9 and end the night of the event. And by voting you will […]
by Jason Guerrasio on Nov 2, 2010Announced moments ago on UStream by Elvis Mitchell, the nominees for IFP’s 20th annual Gotham Independent Film Awards have been revealed. Known as the official kick off to the awards season, a total of 26 films were nominated across six categories for an event that gives recognition to this year’s top independent films. Listed below are the full list of nominees. Standouts include Debra Granik‘s Sundance Grand Prize winner Winter’s Bone, which received Best Feature, Breakthrough Actor (for lead Jennifer Lawrence) and Best Ensemble Performance; while Lisa Cholodenko‘s The Kids Are All Right and Lena Dunam‘s Tiny Funrinture both received […]
by Jason Guerrasio on Oct 18, 2010Tuesday was a day dedicated to documentaries at the Independent Filmmaker Conference, starting off with a conversation with Sheila Nevins from HBO, fielded by Toronto Film Festival documentary programmer Thom Powers (also well known in NYC for his Stranger Than Fiction doc series at the IFC Center). Nevins brought the biggest crowd yet to the conference, despite speaking first thing in the morning. She talked cheerfully about how difficult it is to get people to care about tough issues and how documentaries are always a struggle. “We’re very lucky because we’re the Off Off Broadway of HBO. People don’t subscribe […]
by Ingrid Kopp on Sep 22, 2010In this time of economic peril, many Americans have begun to shed frivolous spending for small but rich pleasures. With less nights of take-out or cineplex movies, they’ve learned that it’s the homemade things that count in this world. Filmmaker Anna Farrell portrays a tight-knit community in her documentary Twelve Ways to Sunday, one that always knew about the basic and organic things in life. Fixing up motorcycles, dishing up meals at the local diner, and canning fruit preserves, the people of Allegany County, New York, have always sustained through the good and bad times. Playing this Wednesday at Rooftop […]
by Melissa Silvestri on Sep 22, 2010Along with Labor Day, IFP’s Independent Film Week marks the end of Summer for me. It is a time to get back into the work groove and make plans for the year ahead. In this vein, the Independent Filmmaker Conference started yesterday with a day of panels dedicated to the future of film. Joana Vincente, Executive Director of IFP, opened the conference by noting a flurry of acquisitions at the recently completed Toronto International Film Festival and suggesting that things may be starting to look a little rosier for the independent film business. There were certainly some notes of optimism […]
by Ingrid Kopp on Sep 20, 2010Hello there. My name is Marc Maurino, as the byline indicates, and close watchers of this blog might remember that a few days ago there was a post entitled “Why I’m Looking For a Producer at Independent Film Week.” That post just dove into what I’m looking for in a producer and was scant on background information about myself, because it actually started life as a letter I wrote to Filmmaker magazine editor Scott Macaulay a few weeks ago, in response to his query in one of his editor’s letters about an upcoming article for the magazine (yes, I sometimes […]
by Marc Maurino on Sep 19, 2010With IFP‘s Independent Film Week starting on Sunday we wanted to share with you the new names you’ll see on our blog in the days ahead. These people have projects in the Project Forum and will be giving you a first-person account of what goes on at IFW. They include: Emerging Narrative Marc Maurino (Inside the Machine) Steve Collins (The Garden) Roja Gashtili & Julia Lerman (Pretty To Think So) Spotlight on Docs Joshua Z Weinstein (Off Duty) Sandra Jaffe (Our Mockingbird) No Borders Ryan Koo and Zak Lieberman (3rd Rail) Peter Sterling (The Restoration) Labs Chris Ohlson (Melvin) Felix […]
by Jason Guerrasio on Sep 15, 2010The IFP announced today their line up for this year’s Filmmaker Conference, which will take place during their Independent Film Week Sept. 19 – 23. Sheila Nevins, President of HBO Documentary Films, John Sloss, founder of Cinetic Media, and cross-media and digital film expert Liz Rosenthal of Power to the Pixel will headline their “Conversations With…” series. There will also be daily case studies featuring the Duplass Brothers’ Cyrus, Lena Dunham’s SXSW winner Tiny Furniture and Sundance 2010 Grand Jury Prize winners Debra Granik’s Winter’s Bone and Restrepo by Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger. And for the first time the […]
by Jason Guerrasio on Aug 19, 2010Project Forum, part of IFP‘s Independent Film Week which will take place Sept. 19-23, is the centerpiece of IFW, designed specifically as a place for industry to meet with new talent, as well as discover fresh projects from emerging and veteran filmmakers. 150 projects have been selected for this year’s Project Forum, and will be spread out over its four section — Emerging Narrative, Independent Filmmaker Labs, No Borders International Co-Production Market and Spotlight on Documentaries. Some of the established names showing new work this year include producers like Howard Gertler & John Cameron Mitchell (Shortbus), Lynette Howell (Half Nelson), […]
by Jason Guerrasio on Aug 15, 2010