Film festival juries are a funny thing. For the festival, they are as much about PR as they are about making sure that major corporate sponsors are happy - who doesn't want to get their picture taken with an Academy Award winner or supermodel(!) at a swank film party. Juries are also tricky in that they should reflect the ethos of the film festival as well as be made up of people who at least have seen a film. There also needs to be a significant balance between writers, directors, and actors so that the prize has some relevance to filmmakers. Whether made up of cash, services or prestige, Jury prizes can make careers, get or expand a film's distribution and make the filmmaker an international media darling. Perhaps the most famous or infamous film festival jury for all of these things is the one for Cannes - headed up this year by the magnificent Stephen Frears. MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE is still one of my favorite films of all time.

For filmmakers winning a jury prize is always good as long as the festival and the jury has some relevance. You don't want to win a jury prize for an animated film from a bunch of musicians. More often than not, the jury prize as mentioned above, will bring increased media attention and will also more often than not get your submission fees waived at other film festivals. Though I am not a big fan of juries that are made up of people who know nothing about the category they are judging on, the prize (especially if it is cash) can make a huge difference in the life of the filmmakers so I can't be a hater.

The 2007 Tribeca Film Festival has an inordinate amount of jury members. On one hand because they actually give out a lot of prizes and on the other, because it is the Tribeca Film Festival headed up by Robert DeNiro - who knows a few people. Most are "of this moment" for one reason or another but there are few wild cards thrown in to make it interesting. My hat's are off to the talent relations department of this year's festival. This year's eclectic slate includes fashion designer Rachel Roy, actresses Whoopi Goldberg and Edie Falco, Ivanka Trump, Andre Leon Talley, Quincy Jones and DJ Spooky to name a few.

The juries will award cash and prizes in 16 categories and a complete list of who is doing what and where is below.

World Narrative Competition: Chris Cooper, Edie Falco, Goran Paskaljevic, Catalina Sandino Moreno and Barry Sonnenfeld

World Documentary Competition: Heidi Ewing, Whoopi Goldberg, Jehane Noujaim, Raoul Peck and Gideon Yago

“Made in NY” Narrative Feature Award: Minnie Driver, Dave Fear, Alex Gibney, Leah Rozen, Oren Rudavsky and Mercedes Ruehl

“NY Loves Film” Documentary Feature Award: Eric Bogosian, Marshall Fine, Susan Lyne, Patrick McCarthy, Sheila Nevins, Gene Seymour and Ivanka Trump

Narrative Short Award: Elizabeth Banks, Lee Daniels, Thelma Golden, Quincy Jones, Dany Levy, John Leguizamo, Alfred Molina and Todd Wagner

Documentary and Student Short Awards: Frank Deford, Barbara Gladstone, Mario d’Urso, Ted Leonsis, Dan Lohaus, Emmy Rossum and Helen Zell

Tribeca All Access Creative Promise Award (Narrative): Elizabeth Avellan, Susie Castillo, Ashwin Navin, Freddy Rodriguez, Andre Leon Talley and Kerry Washington.

Tribeca All Access Creative Promise Award (Documentary): DJ Spooky (Paul Miller), Shola Lynch and Rachel Roy.

Tribeca All Access Creative Promise Award (Screenwriting): Heavy D, Tracey Edmonds and Milton Liu

Keeping it indie,

Julie

Phoning it In...

I am constantly amazed about how fast technology has advanced, particularly when it comes to cellphones. I still have my "first phone" which I bought in 1997. It is so big (it almost the size of my current home phone) compared to the skinny models that we have access to now. And forget just using the phone for a call. You can send email, text message, download and listen to music, and take pictures, and both watch and capture video footage.

Has the cellphone launched a new era of filmmakers? Gone are the days where one must carry around a video camera, it's as simple as pulling out your phone. And because of the size, the "filmmaker" is practically invisible. Just a few weeks ago here in Chicago, footage was released of a former police officer beating up a bartender. Then, in Virginia last week, the news used a student's footage of the chaos on Virigina Tech campus, also captured on a phone. The images are erratic and a bit blurry but it's clear to see what is happening. The media and audience seemingly has accepted this coverage as a reliable means of journalism, but would they it accept it as entertainment?

This week, Why Didn't They Tell Me It Would Become this bad in Afghanistan, a film shot almost entirely on a cellphone, will play at both the Tribeca Film Festival and the San Francisco Film Festival. The film is told through the eyes of Cyrus Frisch, a Dutch soldier who has returned to Amsterdam, traumatized after a tour of duty in Afghanistan. Frisch has taken advantage of the fuzzy video quality and easy mobility of a cellphone, to create a intimate, experimental film told in the first-person narrative.

I'm curious to see the film myself to see how it stands up as a feature. But nonetheless, I find it truly inspiring that someone has taken what was only used a tool for communication to make art. As the technology continues to advance, I believe this will open up more doors for future filmmakers who use alternative methods to share their story. Indie filmmaking on the rise... you can't beat that.

Long live indie film,
Michelle

P.S. If you are in San Fran or Tribeca and see the film, email me at Michelle@indieIN.com and let me know what you think.

The demise of Premiere Magazine is certainly a sad thing as it was part of the institution of Hollywood for so many years. It was, in fact, Entertainment Weekly before Entertainment Weekly in that it was a place to find a certain kind of film journalism that covered films coming out, reviews, who was hot and who was not in an easily digestible manner that both your granny and your kid sister could enjoy. In an age, however, of EW which covers all media from what is on in cinemas to what books are out to plays and DVDs, Premiere lost its way a bit in the competition for shelf space. Why would consumers spend money on one magazine for each of the media that they enjoy when they can get what they want, how they want in a weekly offline (and online) format that is quick and easy to read and looks pretty. Premiere writers have gone on to "bigger" and better things e.g, Anne Thompson the former Wext Coast editor for Premiere for many years is now a staple at the Hollywood Reporter writing a blog about what is going on in the business of Hollywood.

What is interesting to me about the whole thing is that it brings to fore the idea that though publications like EW cover indie film, there really is not a publication that currently exists that covers indie and foreign film in that vein that appeals to the average moviegoer. Fantastic online and offline pubs like Filmmaker, indieWIRE, and Sight&Sound often do amazing and informative coverage of these type of films but their coverage is geared for the most part, towards filmmakers or people actually working in the film industry NOT the average moviegoer. The one thing that we, at indieIN, have tried to do since we started was to offer information about indie and foreign film in a format that was appealing to the most amount of people possible. The tagline "because there's more out there" is not only about the fact that there are more than just the movies that the studios put out but also, and perhaps, more importantly, about the fact there is more than just an audience of cinephiles, critics and filmmakers who are/can be interested in indie and foreign film. This fact is demonstratedby the fact that there are over 1000 film festivals in the US alone. All of those festivals were not started and do not continue to run successfully because they are run solely by film afficionados. The large majority of people who run AND attend these film events are above all regular people who are just a comfortable seeing Spiderman 3 as they are Little Miss Sunshine or Half Nelson.

In the coming months, one of the things that we will be focussing on is developing indieIN's editorial content. We will be expanding our profiles and creating new features to give our faithful readers - that means you- a bit more meat to bite into. You will see more and therefore be able to make more informed choices about what to see, where to see it and a bit of the context of the industry. As we go through ths process, I would invite you to write to me or Michelle with any suggestions that you may have to improve our coverage. We are here to serve, you, the audience so anything we can do to make the experience better, please do not hesitate to let us know.

Keeping it indie,
Julie