The Paley Center for Media, the New York and Beverly Hills-based nonprofit media arts center, and SnagFilms, the Web-based documentary distribution initiative, are teaming up to help docmakers find their audiences, and, in the process, helping them generate new financial resources.
As models for distribution become increasingly informed by the Web 2.0 world, with traditional means having succumbed to economic realities, SnagFilms is one of several Internet entities that have launched in the past year or two, but this collaboration with the Paley Center seems to infuse Web infrastrcuare with nonprofit managerial know-how. The Paley Center for Media and SnagFilms will work together to raise awareness of important new distribution outlets for documentarians whose films may not have traditional theatrical distribution, or who have personal film libraries that are not currently available to the public.
"The Paley Center for Media is continually seeking out new ways that we can support and strengthen the documentary community," said Pat Mitchell, president and CEO of The Paley Center for Media, in a statement. "Our relationship with SnagFilms is particularly exciting since they are on the cutting edge of bridging the divide between filmmakers and fans worldwide who have an appetite for high quality documentaries but have very limited access through theaters and television. As our organization continues to expand our role as a ‘media connector,' we are pleased to be able to help filmmakers better understand and become familiar with options for reaching ever larger audiences through innovative Internet services like SnagFilms."
"SnagFilms was created to address the bottleneck in distribution for quality documentary films," said Rick Allen, CEO of SnagFilms. "By joining with the Paley Center, we help our audience gain greater exposure to both established and emerging documentary filmmakers, and provide them access to an even greater diversity of films."
The Paley Center, which formerly operated as the Museum of Television and Radio, hosts numerous live documentary events throughout the year including the annual PaleyDocFest in New York, as well as screenings, seminars, workshops, and receptions.
Mitchell has extensive experience in both the nonprofit and private sectors, having worked as executive in charge of original productions at CNN for eight years prior to taking the helm at PBS, where she served for six years as President and CEO
With three weeks to go before perhaps the most consequential election in recent history, SnagFilms, the Web-based distribution site for nonfiction films, will be streaming more than 60 election-themed films so that voters might become better informed on issues before November 4. "Snag The Vote: Elections ‘08 Film Festival" will feature the world premiere of Inside the Bubble, Steve Rosenbaum's insiders' view of the 2004 Kerry campaign, and a suite of other films that have never previously been distributed online. SnagFilms promotes both free streaming and viral web distribution through virtual movie theater widgets, and engages viewers to assist in charitable and community efforts. "Snag the Vote" is particularly designed to let voters embed films on their blogs or social network pages, to share them with friends, and to advance the electoral debate in a way that is both fun and deeper than bumper stickers and sound bites.
Beginning October 21, SnagFilms will also offer the national premiere of The End of America (Dirs.: Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern), which examines threats to our civil liberties and is framed by Naomi Wolfe's best-selling book of the same name. Other featured films include Wayne Kopping's The Third Jihad, which takes a close look at Islamic extremism. SnagFilms intends to release other premiere and special-release films over the course of its festival.
SnagFilms has redesigned its homepage to make its extensive library especially accessible to viewers interested in entertaining and in-depth films that illuminate key election issues. The more than 60 election-relevant movies, culled from SnagFilms' library of 450 nonfiction films available for instantaneous free streaming, will be organized under such issue headings as the Economy; National Security/Iraq War; Energy; Health Care; Education; Environment; Electoral Process; Government Ethics and Partisanship; Immigration; and Individual Rights.
"So much of the discourse in American elections is reduced to 30-second ads and sound bites," said SnagFilms CEO Rick Allen. "We offer long-form, substantive, issues-based documentaries which viewers can view immediately, on-demand and for free. In addition to our deep library of issues-focused films, for these last three weeks of the election, we've secured an amazing line-up of documentaries that will appeal to voters across the political spectrum."
A documentary, no less, Crawford, by first-time filmmaker David Modigliani.
Even though Modigliani blogged that "If you're looking for a political polemic or a filmmaker injecting himself into the story of a film, Crawford is not for you" we posted a player featuring the full movie in our Doc the Vote political section. Grab some popcorn and enjoy the show.The film, about how the small town was changed when George W. Bush moved there in 1999 also represents a change in distribution models. With Hulu's wide reach, people will get to see the film--and Modigliani may even make a buck or two.
Modigliani's take on it, via the Hulu blog:
But first, let me say this: as a first-time filmmaker, I'm proud and I'm excited to premiere Crawford on Hulu. Over the last year, I've seen how the traditional models of film distribution are breaking down, how theatrical releases are failing, great films are going unwatched and distributors are closing their doors. And yet, simultaneously, I've seen that the audience for independent film is at an all-time high. There's a buffer between quality content and an audience that's hungry for it. Hulu's excitement about Crawford and their choice to make it their first premiere will help us cut through the morass out there and connect all of you to a film I think you'll love. These are exciting times.
Crawford will be able to play in Hulu's high quality player on Facebook pages, fly over email and embed into blogs and websites. A lot of people are philosophizing about the future of film distribution; we're doing it right here, right now.
This release is a true experiment and we're excited to have all of you as partners and collaborators. After three years of filmmaking I can finally say: this is yours, now. Take it and run with it!
For the entire post, go here.
Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines! The race for the Oscars has just begun! The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences released the short list for the entries in the Documentary Short Subject category. Up to five of these films will be earn Oscar nominations, which will be announced Thursday, January 22, 2009, at 5:30 a.m. PT in the Academy's Samuel Goldwyn Theater.
Voters from the Academy's Documentary Branch viewed this year's 31 eligible contenders and submitted their ballots to PricewaterhouseCoopers for tabulation.
The eight films are listed below in alphabetical order:
The Conscience of
Nhem En (Dir.: Stephen Okazaki)
David
McCullough: Painting with Words (Dir.: Mark Herzog)
Downstream
(Dir.: Leslie Iwerks)
The Final Inch (Dir.: Irene Taylor
Brodsky)
Smile Pinki (Dir.: Megan Mylan)
Tongzhi
in Love (Dir.: Ruby Yang)
Viva La Causa (Dirs.:
Bill Brummel and Alonso Filomeno Mayo)
The Witness from the Balcony of Room 306
(Dir.: Adam Pertofsky)
Smile Pinki screened as part of IDA's DocuWeek Theatrical Documentary Showcase this past summer. For the trailer, click here; for the Q&A with director Megan Mylan, click here.
The 81st Academy Awards nominations will be presented on Sunday, February 22, 2009, at the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center, and televised live by the ABC Television Network.
Religulous, Bill Maher and Larry Charles' tongue-in-cheek quest to understand the faiths of the world while mocking them, opened strongly last week, taking in $3,428,633 at the box office, according to the indieWIRE BOT
The Lionsgate release also finished among last week's top ten grossersof any genre, and is the sixth documentary to top the hallowed seven-digit mark this year, joining Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed ($7,690,544), Shine A Light ($5,371,629), Young @ Heart ($3,966,690), Man on Wire ($2,509,822) and Gonzo ($1,218,652), according to BoxOfficeMojo.com.
Still hanging in there are Werner Herzog's Encounters at the End of the World ($921,813), which opened at the beginning of the summer, and Yung Chang's Up the Yangtse ($799,061), another long-distance runner for Zeitgeist Films, which released the doc back in April. On the downside, Paramount Vantage must be licking its wounds with its last hurrah, American Teen, which the former arthouse division of Paramount bought for $2.5 million at Sundance and spent an additional sum for marketing and PR. But the film ended its run at $942,441, well before American teens were back in high school.
Today The Hollywood Reporter dug into a controversy over the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' feature documentary rules that has may distributors and film festivals worried.
To be considered for the upcoming 81st Annual Academy Awards, filmmakers need to screen their film for one week in both Los Angeles County and Manhattan by Aug. 31 (you know, like at DocuWeek).
Easy, right? Not so much.
Some are miffed over the the changing requirements, especially screening early in NY, for fear of ruining their official rollouts later. Some are at risk of being ignored for by the New York Film Festival because of an earlier premiere date. Other rules create even more hurdles for docs to get their shot. From THR:
"I can't understand why the Academy is making it even more difficult for documentaries by saying you need some kind of shadow release," New York Film Festival topper Richard Pena said. "I don't see how this policy helps the greater good of cinema."
What do you think of these new rules? Sound off in our comments section.
The International Documentary Association (IDA) will award its prestigious 2008 Career Achievement Award to legendary filmmaker Werner Herzog. Herzog will accept the honor at the organization's annual IDA Documentary Awards Ceremony, to be held December 5, 2008 at the Directors Guild of America Theater in Los Angeles.
This award is given to a filmmaker who has made a major impact on the documentary genre through a long and distinguished body of work. While equally known for his narrative films, Encounters at the End of the World (see below) is the latest in a long list of enduring documentaries from Herzog, including Grizzly Man, White Diamond, My Best Fiend, Little Dieter Needs to Fly and Land of Silence and Darkness. Encounters was released earlier this year from Image/THINKFilm, to much critical and audience acclaim.
"With the onslaught of new technologies such as digital effects and Photo Shop, and new forms of ‘reality TV' and virtual realities in cyberspace, our sense of reality is challenged in an unprecedented way," said Herzog. "Documentary filmmaking is called upon to find new answers. In these times of re-definition, it is a particular honor for me to receive the award from the IDA."
"Werner is a true original, and we are extremely proud to recognize his vast and unique contributions to the evolving art of nonfiction film," said IDA's Interim Executive Director Eddie Schmidt.
In previous years, IDA has bestowed its Career Achievement award on documentary luminaries such as Sheila Nevins, Michael Apted, Ken Burns, Albert Maysles, Haskell Wexler and last year's recipient, Michael Moore.
During this December's awards show, five documentary feature-length films and five documentary shorts will compete for the organization's top film honors, with nominations announced later this fall. Other annual awards presented at the event include its Pioneer Award, Preservation & Scholarship Award and the new Avid Excellence In Editing Award, sponsored by the industry's editing giant.
The IDA Documentary Awards are currently in their 24th year. Additional details for the upcoming ceremony will be revealed shortly, with tickets on sale in October.
IDA, a non-profit dedicated to supporting and promoting the art of documentary film and video, can be reached at (213) 534-3600 and via www.documentary.org
Additional Coverage:
Paste Magazine
Los Angeles Times "The Envelope"
IMDB.com
Variety
Our interview with Werner Herzog for release of Encounters at the End of the World
All Werner Herzog information on www.documentary.org
It's a big day at Adobe.
Today, Adobe Systems Incorporated announced Adobe® Creative Suite® 4 Production Premium, a complete solution for creative professionals who craft world-class video, audio, and interactive media--for delivery on-air, online, and on device.
There will be a CS4 launch webcast today at 9pm PST at www.adobe.com/go/somethingbrilliant. (The webcast will will also be viewable after the event if you miss it).
The entire press release is below. Plus, don't forget to check out the IDA's library of Adobe product tutorials in our video gallery. It's always being updated.
Adobe Systems Incorporated announced Adobe® Creative Suite® 4 Production Premium, a complete solution for creative professionals who craft world-class video, audio, and interactive media--for delivery on-air, online, and on device. Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium offers unprecedented levels of integration across major new releases of its video, audio, design, and Web tools, including Adobe After Effects® CS4 Professional, Adobe Premiere® Pro CS4, Adobe Encore® CS4, Adobe Photoshop® CS4 Extended (see separate release), Adobe Illustrator® CS4, Adobe Flash® CS4 Professional, Adobe® Soundbooth® CS4 and Adobe OnLocation™ CS4--now redesigned to natively support Intel-based Macs.
Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium offers unique features for professional production. Powerful new Speech Search in Adobe Premiere Pro CS4 and Adobe Soundbooth CS4 uses spoken dialogue to make video searchable, significantly reducing the time spent searching for clips and creating rough cuts, and makes content searchable when delivered online. With deep XMP metadata support, the production workflow is simplified, resulting in online content that gives viewers new ways to interact with and search for video, while giving content owners new opportunities to track and monetize content. In addition, After Effects CS4 has enhanced support for Adobe Flash CS4 workflows providing new, powerful paths for creating compelling interactive content.
With Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium, Adobe strengthens its support for film and broadcast production, as well as extending its industry leadership in supporting efficient, tapeless, cross-platform workflows. Editors can work natively with RED, P2, XDCAM, and AVCHD without transcoding or rewrapping, giving them one of the fastest possible workflows to see what the camera captured without loss of fidelity. Adobe OnLocation CS4 enables the capture of DV, HDV and DVCPROHD footage directly to disk and offers powerful on-set clip annotation and metadata editing, then couples with Adobe Premiere Pro CS4 for a streamlined editorial workflow. For final output, Adobe Creative Suite 4 has powerful workflows for large and small screens, efficiently exporting to film, DVD, Web DVD, Blu-ray disc, the web and mobile devices.
Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium for Mac OS X on Intel® based systems and for Microsoft® Windows® XP and Windows Vista® platforms is scheduled to ship in October 2008. Estimated street price for the Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium edition is US$1699. Prices for upgrading to Creative Suite 4 Production Premium from CS3 will be US$599 and from previous versions will be US$799. For a limited time, licensed customers of any version of Adobe Production Studio are eligible for the US$599 upgrade price.
For more information go to http://www.adobe.com/products/creativesuite/production.
PBS captured
eight News and Documentary Emmy Awards
at the ceremony in NMew
York City,
with its America at a Crossroads
project earning two, both for Operation
Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience. Among other winners included
P.O.V.'s Made in L.A., produced and directed by Robert Bahar and Almudena
Carracedo, who have been tirelessly criss-crossing the globe with their film,
long after its Labor Day 2007 airing. For a complete list of all the nominees,
click here.
Here's
a sampling of some of the News and Documentary nominees:
Outstanding Continuing
Coverage of a News Story--Long Form
P.O.V. / PBS
Made in L.A.
Executive Producers:
Sally Jo Fifer, Simon Kilmurry, Cara Mertes
Producer/Director: Almudena
Carracedo
Producer: Robert Bahar
Outstanding Investigative
Journalism--Long Form
Cinemax Reel Life / Cinemax
Have You Seen Andy?
Executive Producer:
Sheila Nevins
Supervising
Producer: Nancy Abraham
Producer/Director:
Melanie Perkins
Outstanding Informational Programming--Long Form
America at
a Crossroads / PBS
Operation Homecoming: Writing the
Wartime Experience
Director/Producer:
Richard Robbins
Executive Producers:
Jeff Bieber, Dalton Delan, Tom Yellin
Outstanding Historical
Programming--Long Form
A Distant Shore: African Americans of D‑Day / History Channel
Executive Producers:
Douglas Cohen, Dolores Gavin, Louis Tarantino
Producer: Samuel Dolan
Outstanding Arts and
Culture Programming
FRONTLINE / PBS
The Undertaking
Executive Producers:
David Fanning, Michael Sullivan
Producers/Directors:
Miri Navasky, Karen O'Conner
Outstanding Science,
Technology and Nature Programming
The Mysterious Human Heart / PBS
Executive Producer/Producer/Director:
David Grubin
Executive Producer,
Thirteen /WNET New York: Jared
Lipworth
Executive Producers, WETA: Dalton Delan, Jeff Bieber
Producers: Tania Castellanos, Thomas Jennings, David
Murdock
Co-Producer: Mica McCarthy
Best Documentary
Independent Lens / PBS
Billy Strayhorn: Lush Life
Producer/Director:
Robert Levi
Producers: Joshua
Blum, George Seminara
Executive Producer:
Sally Jo Fifer
New Approaches to News & Documentary Programming:
Documentaries
Uprooted /
mercurynews.com
Executive Producers: Richard Hernandez, Geri Migielicz
Producer: Dai Sugano
Reporter: Julie Patel
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft:
Writing
National Geographic
Special / National Geographic Channel
Incredible Human Machine
Writer: Chad Cohen
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft: Research
American Experience
/ PBS
The Living Weapon
Researchers: Rich Remsberg, John Rubin
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft: Cinematography--Nature
Documentaries/Dramatic Recreations
Nature Tech: The Magic
of Motion / Smithsonian Channel
Cinematographers: Tony Allen, Rudolph Erlach, Stefan Fischer,
John Hadfield, Manfred Walzl
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft: Cinematography--News
Coverage/ Documentaries
Dan Rather Reports
/ HDNet
Cinematographer: Sean Fairburn
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft: Editing
Breaking Point /
Discovery Channel
Editors: Guy Federico, Bob Fahringer
How the Earth Was Made
/ History Channel
Editor: Huw Jenkins
Incredible Human
Machine / National Geographic
Editor: Arthur Binkowski
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft: Graphic
Design & Artistic Direction
Inside the Living Body /
National Geographic
Art Director:
David Barlow
Computer Animator: Steven Gomez
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft: Music
and Sound
America at a Crossroads / PBS
Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime
Experience
Sound Editor: Glen Frazier
Re‑recording Mixer: Terrance Dwyer
Foley Artist:
Monique Reymond
Sound Effects Editors: Sam Londé, Matthew Slivinski
Dialog Editors: David Ball, Vince Tennant
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft:
Lighting Direction and Scenic Design
NOVA / PBS
Forgotten
Genius
Lighting Director and Scenic Designers:
Gary Henoch, Katha Seidman
What with the woebegoings on Wall Street this week, one
barely noticed the significant stirrings on the Web...
Let's start with SnagFilms, launched two months ago as an
online distribution platform for docs, with the added dimension of encouraging
viewers to snag a film and share it anywhere else on the Web. SnagFilms CEO
Rick Ellen delivered the keynote address at this week's Independent Film Week
in New York, proffering
essentially a State of the Snag address.
Just in the past two months alone, according to a prepared statement, 10,000 online "theaters" have been opened for SnagFilms' 450 titles, SnagFilms' widgets have been seen more than 55 million times, and SnagFilms.com has had one million page views. Among SnagFilms' partners include Spout, the indie film community blog site, and Cinelan, the three-minute doc publisher. SnagFilms also owns indieWIRE, the indispensible nerve center of the indie community, which will be relaunching its website in time for the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. In addition, SnagFilms secured a $210,000 grant from the John S. and James l. Knight Foundation to "help filmmakers encode their movies for digital distribution, reduce streaming costs, identify and reach online audiences passionate about their topics, and secure necessary intellectual property rights."
And if all that's not enough, SnagFilms will premiere two documentaries simultaneously with the Hamptons International Film Festival in October: Haze, by Pete Schuermann, about the death of a Colorado University fraternity pledge due to alcohol poisoning, and The End of America, the latest from Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern (The Devil Comes on Horseback; The Trials of Darryl Hunt), which utilizes as its basis a lecture by writer Naomi Wolf on her best-selling book of the same name.
Bob Geldof, the long-running musician/activist behind so many global causes, just launched an online channel devoted to peace and global conflict resolution, according to a report in The Guardian. The Peace Channel will feature documentary work provided by acclaimed production company Brook Lapping, as well as video reports, online discussions and opportunities for user-generated content. The Peace Channel, which debuted last week at the Point of Peace Summit in Norway, is supported by Ten Alps, Geldof's media company; the Peace Channel Foundation; the Kids Rights Foundation; the World Trade Centres Association; and the Norwegian government.
The Swedish and UK based Web-TV company factualTV just launched a global platform dedicated to finding factual programming on specific interests. The company currently owns over 2,500 licensed titles of factual and lifestyle television and documentaries. The service is accessible on www.factualtv.com, and most of the titles are available by free, ad-funded streaming, and can also be downloaded in a higher quality through a pay-per-view option. "We are following the trend within traditional television towards ever more niched channels," said factualTV CEO Daniel Hill, in a statement. "We take this one step further by introducing specific thematic sections within our service FactualTV. These sections are marketed internationally over the Internet to the respective target groups."
Also from the UK is TrueTube, a platform for discussion and debate of social issues via uploaded videos from around the world. Not a recent launch, but worth checking out.