DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES | "Acne," "Dream" Lead AFI Fest Winners

"What a week this has been," AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival Artistic Director Rose Kuo said as the introduced Sunday's festival awards presentation at the Roosevelt Hotel in Hollywood. "Just over a week ago, we didn't know what [AFI's] opening film would be, or who would be leading this country." But without a doubt (and with "Doubt"), AFI Fest, and the American people, have come to a decision. And regarding AFI Fest's 2008 awards, that decision fell on to Frederico Veiroj's "Acne," which won the Grand Jury Prize for narrative feature, and Kief Davidson's "Kissim The Dream," which won both the Grand Jury Prize for documentary, and tied for the documentary Audience Award.
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES | "Skin," "Marriage" Look For Sales as Sun Sets on AFI

Though many of the 2008 AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival's most high-profile screenings have long found distribution, some films are on the look out for pick ups as the festival enters its busy final days. So far, two sales have gone through. Thursday, Strand Releasing picked up U.S. rights to Pablo Trapero's "Lion's Den," Argentina's Oscar submission, and last week, MSNBC Films finalized a North American television deal for Dana Nachman and Don Hardy's "Witch Hunt." indieWIRE spoke with two filmmakers who haven't been so lucky - yet.
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES | Despite a Dropout and an Election, AFI Fest Runs with it

Timing hasn't exactly been on the 2008 AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival's side. Besides its first half coinciding with massive buildup to today's election, the Hollywood-centered festival also had to contend with the unfortunate last minute news that its opening night film, Joe Wright's "The Soloist," was dropping out of its lineup. But the show had to go on, and AFI Fest has proven as resilient as possible since its opening night switcheroo premiere of John Patrick Shanley's "Doubt" last Thursday.
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AFI FEST '08 | 22nd Edition Announces 148 Films; Boyle, Swinton To Receive Tributes

The 22nd AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival, running October 30-November 9, 2008, has announced its complete schedule. The lineup totals 100 features and 48 shorts, including 6 World Premieres, 17 North American Premieres, and 18 U.S. Premieres. "This year's selection of international films shows a commitment to cinematic innovation and a renewal of a tradition of realism in cinema," said Artistic Director Rose Kuo in a statement. In addition, 37 of the features in official selection will be represented by distributors at the American Film Market, unfolding concurrently with AFI from November 5-November 12.
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AFI FEST '07 CRITICS NOTEBOOK | "Nailing" Vibrant Performances With a Mixed Bag of New Films

As the chaos of the market begins to settle in Southern California, the second round of AFI Fest premieres starts to prove itself somewhat valuable with a mixed bag of solid performances and above competent direction. First up, writter/director Henry Bean, the mastermind behind 2001's Jew turned neo-Nazi biopic "The Believer," returns with his sophomore feature, "Noise," starring Tim Robbins as David Owen, a frustrated New York City citizen who has decided to take the noise pollution of car alarms into his own hands.
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES | Herzog, Docs and Truth at AFI Fest

It should surprise no one that Werner Herzog's new film about Antartica, "Encounters at the End of the World," is the antithesis of the most successful documentary releases in recent years, "March of the Penguins" and "An Inconvenient Truth." Talking about filmmaking and his latest project during an AFI Fest conversation earlier this week in Los Angeles, Herzog noted that he didn't want to make a film on "fluffy penguins" and he wasn't trying to make a movie overtly about the climate crisis, later adding that however effective the film, "An Inconvient Truth" is actually a slideshow. His remarks effectively challenged the large audience to reconsider its own views on non-fiction film as AFI Fest unspooled a roster of acclaimed new documentary films.
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AFI FEST '07 CRITICS NOTEBOOK | Sifting Through a Lack of Notable Debuts, One Doc Shines

Botched opportunities, bad acting and misguided directorial decisions seem to be recurring themes among the premieres at this year's AFI Fest. Though boasting quite an impressive array of great cinema out of the North American festivals from the last six months, the AFI programmers seem to be struggling to keep it together when it comes to newer material. World premieres like the abrasively haphazard American shocker "Pop Skull," directed by Adam Wingard, have audiences running for the lobby, keeping good on the catalog blurb's promise of being "literally difficult to look at."
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES | Culture, Commerce and L.A. Stories at AFI Fest & AFM

As a student at UCLA in the late 1970s, filmmaker Alex Cox ("Repo Man," "Sid & Nancy") would head out to Santa Monica with college friends, trying to crack the business veneer of the annual American Film Market, chatting up attendees and hoping to score a coveted party invite. Anything to find some money for early film projects. "Nothing has changed," he laughed on Saturday, addressing a group of AFI Fest filmmakers who had traveled over to the Market from Hollywood for the afternoon, "This is the life of the independent filmmaker." Cox, like many of the emerging filmmakers gathered at the Loews Beach Hotel, is at the festival with a new low-budget film, "Searchers 2.0."
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES | L.A.'s The Place: A Tale of Two Festivals as AFI Fest Kicks Off

Chatting with a non-industry friend recently in Southern California, it became clear that Los Angeles movie fans who aren't frequent observers of the film industry sometimes find it hard to distinguish between LA's two major annual film festivals -- the AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival and Film Independent's similarly named Los Angeles Film Festival. The friend was surprised at the impending arrival of AFI Fest (opening tonight in Hollywood): "Didn't that event happen a few months ago?" Not exactly. In a city where locals often refer to La Brea as a dividing line between the dense but distinctive halves of L.A. on its east and west sides, it should hardly surprise anyone that Angelenos would embrace two large, annual international film festivals. One essentially for each side of town.
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES: International Stories Take Top Prizes as AFI Fest Wraps

One week after announcing its U.S. distribution deal at the American Film Market, Jasmila Zbanic's "Grbavica: The Land of My Dreams" won the narrative grand jury prize at AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival. Winner of the Golden Bear at the Berlinale in February, the film is Bosnia and Herzegovina's official entry for the 2006 Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award and Strand Releasing is planning a 2007 release of the acclaimed feature film. Set in a contemporary Sarajevo still reeling from the aftermath of war, the film is the story of a single mother who lives with her rebellious twelve-year-old daughter in the Grbavica district of Sarajevo, a neighborhood used as an internment camp during the conflict in the nineties. Unable to survive on government aid and hoping to provide for her daughter, she takes a day job in a shoe factory and a night job as a waitress in order to pay for her daughter's school trip, and along the way, her daughter discovers a dark secret. The jury singled out Peter Schonau Fog's "The Art of Crying" with a special mention at the festival.
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES: Mountains, Music, Genocide and More True Stories in AFI Fest Doc Competition

As is often the case at U.S. film festivals, the documentary competition can present some of a festival's strongest works. A number of acclaimed new non-fiction films are having their U.S. premiere at AFI Fest 2006, alongside a selection of world premieres. From the Toronto International Film Festival (and the recent London Film Festival) is British director Lucy Walker's "Blindsight," which had festgoers buzzing about its moving chronicle of a group of Tibetan blind children's quest to climb Mt. Everest. In all, there are eleven films screening in the festival's International Documentary Competition.
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES: Foreign Films Get AFI Fest Star Treatment

AFI Fest rightfully styles itself as an international festival, showcasing foreign films from around the world in a city that is not always receptive to overseas fare. Though non-U.S. work may have difficulty at the box office during their regular rollouts in L.A., screenings are often full for foreign films at the AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival. In fact the festival has added three new sections this year, including a world cinema, African Voices and a "genre bending" Dark Horizons sidebar that includes science fiction/thriller titles from the U.K., U.S. and Asia. Additionally, this year's AFI is screening over a dozen best foreign-language Oscar contenders, of which four of the group's filmmakers met with journalists at a panel last weekend.
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES: The Lure of Hollywood: Art and Commerce at AFM & AFI

An actor from a successful indie film is paying the bills working in the restaurant at Hollywood's upscale ArcLight Cinemas complex, while upstairs an AFI Fest filmmaker is taking a few days off of work as an underpaid set P.A. to double as a "real filmmaker" while his latest film screens at the festival. Meanwhile out in Santa Monica, would-be producers trade business cards and buzz inside the crowded lobby of the Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel at the American Film Market. Here in Los Angeles, more than in any other American city, the dream of making it in the movies seems to be on display everywhere you turn. Sit by the pool at your hotel and eavesdrop on guests talking about their screenplays or listen in on informed analysis of the "Borat" box office grosses during Sunday brunch. Of course, none of these are groundbreaking revelations about life in Los Angeles, but it's often a bit surprising to the occasional visitor.
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES: Penelope Cruz in Spotlight at AFI Fest Tribute

After nearly six months of critical attention and acclaim for her lead performance in Pedro Almodovar's "Volver," actress Penelope Cruz stepped into Hollywood's spotlight on Thursday night, accepting this year's AFI Fest tribute on the second night of the festival. A veteran of some 40 films in just over 15 years, Cruz was joined by close friends and family at the AFI Fest event, thanking them for allowing her to pursue her acting dreams at the age of 17. Singling out her father in the audience, Cruz praised her parents who were, "so generous for letting me fly so young. I really appreciate, now that I am older, that it was hard for them -- they gave me that freedom."
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DISPATCH FROM LOS ANGELES: Famous Faces and FILMEX in Spotlight as AFI Opens 20th Fest

A long line of men in tuxedos and women in cocktail dresses gathered outside the Kodak Theater on Hollywood Blvd. last night in Los Angeles, but while it wasn't Oscar night, a nearby red carpet was filled with name Hollywood actors and rows of screaming fans. The big crowd of formally dressed guests were waiting to check-in for the opening night of AFI Fest at Hollywood's legendary Grauman's Chinese Theater down the street. The festival, celebrating its 20th Anniversary, opened with the U.S. premiere of Emilio Estevez' "Bobby" and evoked the November 1971 kick-off of FILMEX, the venerable Los Angeles film festival that preceded the American Film Institute's AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival.
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"The Fountain" and "Inland Empire" Added as AFI Fest Unveils Complete '06 Lineup

Darren Aronofsky's "The Fountain" and David Lynch's "Inland Empire" have been added as Centerpiece Galas at the 2006 AFI Fest in Los Angeles, joining Pedro Almodovar's "Volver" as centerpiece films at the festival, running November 1 - 12, 2006. The announcement was made as organizers unveiled the complete lineup for the festival, set to kick off with Emilio Estevez' "Bobby" (the closing film is still to be announced). Aronofsky's "The Fountain" stars Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz, while Lynch's latest film stars Laura Dern, Jeremy Irons and Justin Theroux. Also added is a special evening with Ed Zwick. Aronofsky, Lynch and Zwick are all alumni of the the AFI Conservatory's directing program.
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First Person: Christian Gaines on Film Festivals

[This is the second in a new regular series of "First Person" articles written by members of the film community. It is meant to showcase the opinions of our readers. indieWIRE readers interested in contributing a future "First Person" column should contact us by email: office AT indiewire DOT com.] [The following includes excerpts from a keynote address at the International Film Festival Summit in New York City earlier this month.] Like most businesses, film festivals are at the mercy of all sorts of market forces - the economy, the evolution, growth or diminishment of countless forces regionally and globally that are often beyond the control of their organizers. Unfortunately, it's unlikely that too many people in your hometown understand or are aware of these forces. Your board just wants to know how many years before your festival becomes the 'Sundance of the Pacific', or the 'Cannes of the Antarctic'.
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"Kissed By Winter" "Refugee All Stars" "Tsotsi" and "C.R.A.Z.Y." Honored as AFI Fest Concludes

The AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival capped off its 2005 edition with an awards ceremony atop the Hollywood ArcLight parking structure at the event's festival village, awarding Norway's "Kissed by Winter" its grand jury prize in the international feature competition, while the audience award for best feature film went to both Canada's "C.R.A.Z.Y." and South Africa's "Tsotsi."

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DISPATCH FROM L.A.: Four-Letter Word Film Explores the Etymology of an Expletive

A provocative new documentary premiering at the AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival this week has a title too racy to be listed on the large digital marquee inside Hollywood's Arclight cinemas. Yet, movie tickets here at AFI Fest boldly proclaim its title: "Fuck." The origins of the four-letter word, the prevalence of its usage in movies, on TV and in music, and the tightening of restrictions regarding free expression in this country are among the topics explored in Steve Anderson's new film. Through animated segments by Bill Plympton, and conversations with late author Hunter S. Thompson, filmmaker Kevin Smith, critic Michael Medved, columnist Judith Martin (aka "Miss Manners"), rapper Ice-T, porn figure Ron Jeremy, newsman Sam Donaldson, comedians Billy Connolly, Janeane Garofalo, and Drew Carey, and more, Anderson considers the history of the word and its role in popular culture and throughout history.

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DISPATCH FROM L.A.: Hoping for Oscar Attention, A Trio of Foreign Language Titles Win Over Audiences at AFI Fest

This year's AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival, screening ten foreign-language titles submitted for Oscar consideration, includes a trio of titles that in the first half of the event have each been a hit with festivalgoers. Marc Ruthermond's "Sophie Scholl - The Final Days" and Gavin Hood's "Tsotsi were popular over the festival's first weekend and over the past two days, crowds have embraced Jean-Marc Vallee's "C.R.A.Z.Y." Other foreign submissions to the Academy Awards(R) playing at this year's AFI Fest include France's "Merry Christmas" (Joyeux Noel), Georgia's "Tblisis-Tblisi," Hungary's "Fateless," Israel's "What a Wonderful Place," Mexico's "On the Other Side," Norway's "Kissed by Winter" (Vinterkyss), and Sweden's "Zozo."

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