The Slamdance Film Festival announced their winners in Park City, Utah in 13 categories at the Closing Night Ceremonies at Cisero’s. The winners are as follows:
GRAND JURY AWARD FOR BEST FEATURE: GOOD HOUSEKEEPING Written/Directed By FRANK NOVAK.
GRAND JURY AWARD FOR BEST SHORT: “Elevator World” directed by Mitchell Rose.
AUDIENCE FEATURE AWARD: DOLPHINS directed by Farhad Yawari.
AUDIENCE SHORT AWARD: “Mutual Love Life” directed by Robert Peters
DOCUMENTARY AWARD: THE TARGET SHOOTS FIRST directed by Chris Wilcha
ILFORD BLACK AND WHITE AWARD: “Great Falls” directed by Yves Stening
KODAK VISION AWARD FOR BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY: TUVALU directed by German filmmaker Veit Helmer. Cinematography by Emil Cristof.
AWARD FOR BEST EDITING: THE TARGET SHOOTS FIRST directed by Chris Wilcha. Edited by Chris Wilcha & Bill Yoelin.
SPIRIT OF SLAMDANCE AWARD: “Harry Knuckles” (Short film) directed by Lee DeMarbe.
ANARCHY AUDIENCE AWARD: “Night Deposit” directed by Monika Mitchell.
BEST PRODUCTION VALUE: “Luz” (Short film) directed by Jose Javier Martinez.
SCREENPLAY WINNERS:
First Place: Percy Angress & Livia Linden for “RETRO”
Second Place: Michael Stark for “THE BEEKEEPER’S TANGO”
Third Place: Brent Studler for “THE RAPE OF MARTA ALASTOR”
Awards were also given for out in three categories for promotion of one’s film at the festival. Todd Robinson & Sidney Sherman won “Best Promotional Materials” for their AMARGOSA campaign. They produced hotel door hang tags advertising their film, bar coasters and stadium seat cushions for the screening room emblazoned with their film’s information. Mark Cabellero & Seamus Walsh for their furry press kits which ultilized the leftover fur fabric from the puppets that are featured in the film. Farhad Ywari was awarded best grassroots promotion for his fearless flyering despite all obstacles.
Winners were awarded their “Sparkys” (bronze statuettes) at the Closing Night Award Ceremony. Dwight Yoakam performed with his band following the closing night screening of his directorial debut SOUTH OF HEAVEN, WEST OF HELL, starring Yoakam, Vince Vaughn and Bridget Fonda (who were both in attendence). The award-winning films will screen at the Best of Slamdance on Saturday, January 29th at the Treasure Mountain Inn (255 Main Street).
In other news, the Slamdance 2000 Special Screening documentary AMARGOSA, directed by Todd Robinson, is on the list of 12 finalists for an Academy Award nomination as well as the competition short “Mutual Love Affair” (directed by Robert Peters) which made the list of 10 finalists for an Academy Award nomination for Best Short.
According to Chris Gore’s recent book The Ultimate Film Festival Survival Guide, “Slamdance has become THE festival to watch for the next big thing.”
Since its inception, Slamdance has come to be recognized as “The ultra independent film festival” (Sam Rubin, “Good Morning America”) and Variety’s Len Klady recently made the comparison to Cannes by referring to Slamdance as “the unofficial Directors Fortnight to Sundance.”
Maintaining its grassroots style into its sixth year, Slamdance is a festival by filmmakers, for filmmakers, and is dedicated to promoting new talent. The festival has been involved with such critically acclaimed first features as Greg Mottola’s THE DAYTRIPPERS, produced by Slamdance supporter, Steven Soderbergh; Daniel J. Harris’ THE BIBLE & GUN CLUB; and Michael Davis’ EIGHT DAYS A WEEK (which starred FELICITY’s Kerri Russell. In 1996, the festival held tributes to Robert Altman and Roger Corman. In 1997 Slamdance hosted an IFC sponsored premiere of independent film guru John Pierson’s television show “Split Screen.”
The 1999 Festival discovered MAN OF THE CENTURY which not only won the Audience Award, but was also distributed by Fine Line. At the 1998 festival, 20 DATES by Myles Berkowitz received the Audience Award, as well as a distribution deal with Fox Searchlight. SIX-STRING SAMURAI won two awards (for cinematography and editing) and was picked up by Palm Pictures. Grand Jury winner Kevin DiNovis’ SURRENDER DOROTHY has since gone on to 23 international film festivals, including winning the top prizes at both the Chicago and New York Underground Film Festivals.
This year Slamdance increased its virtual space by debuting “Anarchy” an online portion of the Slamdance Film Festival. While the Festival has remained intimate by not heavily increasing the number of films in the festival or the number of days, the festival has expanded through its popular On the Road screenings that started with an invitation from the Smithsonian to show the award-winners in Washington DC in 1997 and have increased yearly to include more locations. The festival will debut in London in 2000 and has annually traveled to Baltimore, Maryland; Cannes, France; Los Angeles; New York; Park City in the Summer; Santiago, Chile; Stockholm, Sweden; and Washington DC. Slamdance On the Road 2000 will start in Washington on March 17th and 18th at the Smithsonian before coming to Los Angeles on March 23rd and 24th, at the American Cinematheque. Dates in Cannes and London will follow. The festival also runs an annual screenplay competition.
The Slamdance Film Festival ran January 22-29, 2000 at Park City, Utah’s Treasure Mountain Inn (located in heart of the city’s historic district: 255 Main Street), coinciding with the Sundance Film Festival.
