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2012 Indie Spirits Noms: Artist leads Drive, Beginners, Take Shelter and MMMM with Five Noms
Fresh off a big double win at the Gothams (where it won Best Feature and Best Ensemble), Mike Mills' Beginners has nabbed four nominations for the 27th Indie Spirit Awards tying with three other Best Feature hopefuls in Jeff Nichol's Take Shelter, The Descendants and Cannes preemed, Drive. However the four were outmatched by Michel Hazanavicius's The Artist which garnered five noms in Best Feature, Best Director, Best Male Lead, Best Screenplay and Best Cinematography categories.
Interview: Mark Jackson (Without)
Mark Jackson's directorial debut Without, premiered in Park City this year - not at Redford's biggie event, but Sundance's competing film festival. It won the Special Jury Award in Slamdance and when Jackson was named among Filmmaker Magazine's Top 25 New Faces, the minimalist/microscopic budgeted chilly and ambiguous psychological thriller found more international love with showings at international fest stops Locarno, BFI London, Deauville and the Hamptons.
21st Gotham Awards: Hung Jury Means The Tree of Life and Beginners win Best Feature
The 21st Gotham Awards ended with a hung jury: Mike Mills' “Beginners” and Terrence Malick's “The Tree of Life” are both crowned with Best Feature film beating out fellow noms “The Descendants”, “Meek’s Cutoff” and “Take Shelter”.
2012 Sundance Film Festival: 80 Predictions Recap
Sometime late this month (or at the beginning of the month of December) the Sundance Film Festival will start unveiling the line-up for their 2012 edition. In an effort to give our readers a heads up on what we'll most likely be seeing at the fest, I've put together yet another predictions list. Caution: I cast a wide circle with a total of 80 predix so I'm bound to get some wrong, but as I've proven in prior years, I'm spot on with at least half the titles you'll find here.
2012 Sundance Predictions: Brian M. Cassidy and Melanie Shatzky’s Francine
And for my final pick, I'm thinking that the husband-and-wife filmmaker team of Melanie Shatzky and Brian M. Cassidy will lock up a U.S Dramatic Comp section slot for their feature (fiction) debut. Francine should be among the buzz titles of the fest for what Melissa Leo (who plays the titular lead) will bring to the role, but my high expectations for the title have plenty more to do with my viewing of the craft in the stunning TIFF preemed The Patron Saints (here's our 4-star review and interview). The pair were previously at Sundance back in 2007 with their docu short God Provides.
