'Mondays at Racine' is nominated for Best Short.
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Above Photo: Todd Wawrychuk / ©A.M.P.A.S. In a de facto preamble to the Oscar-cast on February 24, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences staged the fourth annual Governors Awards this past Saturday, December 1, at the Ray Dolby Ballroom of the Hollywood and Highland Center in Hollywood. Among the four honorees, DA Pennebaker earned an Academy Honorary Award for his undeniable impact on the documentary form. As the inscription on his Oscar says, he "redefined the language of film and taught a generation of filmmakers to look to reality for inspiration." Senator Al Franken, the subject
15 Films Advance to the Next Round
Have you seen ¿Más Bébes? or Land of Opportunity? By linking to these online productions, you have dipped your toe into the vast pool of the future: Mozilla, Living Docs, and the world of HTML5. This new filmmaking experience is brought to you by an ever-expanding consortium of organizations that are making your computer and the Web the burgeoning new frontier of filmmaking. As Tiffany Shlain, cloud filmmaking pioneer and creator of the Webbys, proclaimed in her talk at TEDxBerkeley, "If you have a hammer in your hand, everything looks like a nail. If you have a camera in your hand, everything
If you have ever used a clip or a photo or an existing piece of music in your documentary, you must have spent more than a little time looking for the owner to obtain the proper permission to use the item in your film. You might have spent a lot of time. You might not have found the owner. When the owner can't be found, after you've made a reasonable effort to do so, the item in question is called an "orphan work." IDA is helping to solve this problem and we believe that help is on the way. Congress has been aware of the problem for some time. It was mentioned when the Copyright Act was
'After Tiller,' 'Citizen Koch,' and 'Valentine Road' are all official selections of this year's program in Park City.
Some of the more vital voices and visionaries in indie doc and feature filmmaking today proffered their words, wisdom and wit at the annual Film Independent Forum last month, held at the Directors Guild of America in Los Angeles. With a robust directory of case studies and resources to complement the panels, workshops and discussions over the weekend, the forum held its own as an essential educational and informational confab. One of the Saturday offerings, "Reality Bites: The Perils of the Doc," addressed the challenges and dangers of dealing with difficult documentary subjects—both people
'The Central Park Five' opens in theaters November 23 through Sundance Selects.
The United Nations Association Film Festival ( UNAFF) celebrated its 15th anniversary this year at Stanford University. The annual event, founded by journalist and professor Jasmina Bojic, was originally conceived to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Over 15 years the range of program has broadened to 70 documentaries this year, and the festival has taken films to local schools and throughout the country on an annual tour. Here's a sampling, from a critic whose recent feature documentary film, Portrait of Wally, was also included in the
'Crossfire Hurricane' airs November 15 on HBO.