SXSW, the venerated spring break for the smart set, where film, music and web collide, closed its latest edition--the first film fest under Janet Pierson--just as winter turned to spring. A few more Audience Awards went out to Scot McFadyen and Sam Dunn's Iron Maiden: Flight 666, which won in the 24 Beats Per Second section, while Michel Orion Scott's Over the Hills and Far Away, about one family's journey through Mongolia to find a possible cure for their son's autism, scored in the Lone Star States section.

Our next e-zine will include a full-fledged report on SXSW, but in the meantime, here's a sampling of some of the items and tidbits out there.

David Carr, the ever-enterprising Bagger from The New York Times, shares his story on that rarest of phenomena: a successful newspaper-this being the Austin Chronicle, whose founders, Louis Black and Nick Barbaro, also founded SXSW.

Scott Kirsner of the Cinematech blog sat down for breakfast with a bevy of indie filmmakers, tech gurus, producers and programmers to chat about the ever-evolving world of business models and community building. Representing the doc community was Brett Gaylor, director of the much-discussed RiP: A Remix Manifesto, which takes a mashed-up look at mash-ups, Creative Commons and Open-Source Cinema. Here's an article about RiP in the Spring 09 issue of Documentary. And here's a link to Kirsner's blog, which includes the audio podcast of the breakfast-complete with the ambient sounds of an Austin eatery.

To recap the winners:

Feature Jury Award, Documentary Feature: 45365 (Dirs.: Bill Ross IV, Turner Ross)

Of 45365, the irrepressible AJ Schnack wrote that it's "a film that I feel compelled to warn you about even as I recommend it... a non-narrative, impressionistic, whisper of a film." Here's the complete impression.

Judging from the trailer, I'd say the film recalls the Goddfrey Riggio/Phillip Glass "Qatsi" trilogy. Check it out for yourselves:

Honorable Mention: The Way We Get By (Dir.: Aron Gaudet)

The Way We Get By profiles a group of dedicated senior citizens who have fulfilled their lives by welcoming home hundreds of thousands of US troops as they land in an airport in Bangor,
Maine. Here's the trailer:

Audience Award, Documentary Feature: MINE (Dir.: Geralyn Pezanoski)

Geralyn Pezanoski's MINE documents the rescue and custody battle over thousands of pets straned in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Here's an interview with Pezanoski at SXSW:

Emerging Visions--Audience Award: Motherland (Dir.: Jennifer Steinman)

For a trailer of Motherland from our website, click here.

Wholphin Short Film Award: Sister Wife (Dir.: Jill Orschel)

Here's the trailer from the film:

24 Beats per Second-Audience Award:  Iron Maiden: Flight 666 (Dirs.: Scot McFadyen, Sam Dunn)

Lone Star States--Audience Award: Over the Hills and Far Away (Dir.: Michel Orion Scott)