Motion Picture Academy Awards $450,000 to Festivals

The Academy Foundation of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences® has awarded $450,000 to 24 U.S. film festivals for the 2009 calendar year, Festival Grants Committee Chair Gale Anne Hurd announced yesterday.

Two festivals, the Nashville Film Festival and the New Orleans Film Festival, will each receive a total of $75,000 over a three-year period to help develop long-term projects. The Full Frame Documentary Film Festival and the Virginia Film Festival are each in the second year of a multi-year grant. The San Francisco International Film Festival will receive $50,000 as part of multi-year grant awarded in 2007.

While the grants are awarded for a variety of programs, film festivals are encouraged to submit proposals that make festival events more accessible to the general public, provide greater access to minority and less visible filmmakers, and help strengthen the connection between the filmmaker and the general public.

The 2009 film festival program allocations are as follows:

$50,000
San Francisco International Film Festival **
$30,000
Chicago International Film Festival
Heartland Film Festival (Indianapolis, IN)
Mill Valley Film Festival (San Rafael, CA) **
Sarasota Film Festival (FL)
Seattle International Film Festival
$25,000
Full Frame Documentary Film Festival (Durham, NC)
Nashville Film Festival
New Orleans Film Festival
Virginia Film Festival (Charlottesville)
$20,000
Portland International Film Festival
Native American Film & Video Festival (New York City)
Roger Ebert’s Film Festival (Urbana, IL) **
Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival (Birmingham, AL)
Woodstock Film Festival (NY)
$10,000
Asian American International Film Festival (New York City)
$5,000
Arizona International Film Festival (Tucson)
BAMKids Film Festival (Brooklyn, NY)
Flagstaff Mountain Film Festival (AZ)
Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival (WY)
Olympia Film Festival (WA)
Rocky Mountain Women’s Film Festival (Colorado Springs)
San Francisco Black Film Festival
Washington Jewish Film Festival (D.C.)

Since its establishment in 1999, the Academy’s Festival Grants Program has distributed 198 grants totaling $3.5 million in funding. For more information on the program, visit www.oscars.org/grants/filmfestival.

The program is one of the many activities of the Academy Foundation – the Academy’s cultural and educational wing – which annually grants more than $1 million to film scholars, cultural organizations and film festivals throughout the U.S. and abroad. The Foundation also presents the Academy’s rich assortment of screenings and other public programs each year.

** I follow these and more on my Film Festivals Page. Links on sidebar to the 2008 page, parts I, II, and III.

Roger Ebert of Ebertfest

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is the world’s preeminent movie-related organization, with a membership of more than 6,000 of the most accomplished men and women working in cinema. In addition to the annual Academy Awards – in which the members vote to select the nominees and winners – the Academy presents a diverse year-round slate of public programs, exhibitions and events; provides financial support to a wide range of other movie-related organizations and endeavors; acts as a neutral advocate in the advancement of motion picture technology; and, through its Margaret Herrick Library and Academy Film Archive, collects, preserves, restores and provides access to movies and items related to their history. Through these and other activities the Academy serves students, historians, the entertainment industry and people everywhere who love movies.

Academy Foundation November Calendar

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Foundation® Calendar of Events for November (and part of December) is now online. Let's face it, the Academy is now in the business of exhibition, but the programs are unique, and their prices can't be beat. Most screenings are $5.00, and some special events are free. It doesn't get better than that.

For November they have a special reunion event and screening for ET's 25th anniversary. Some cast members will attend. His honor, director Steven Spielberg may, too. This year is also the 30th anniversary of SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER. No. Say it isn't so. Well, it is, and there is a special screening for it, too.

Events usually take place at one of four Academy locations: The Linwood Dunn Theater, Samuel Goldwyn Theater, Academy's Grand Lobby Gallery, or Academy Theater at Lighthouse International. The first three are in Los Angeles, and the last one in New York. All the information, plus exact locations, contact phone numbers, and methods for ordering tickets in advance are in the calendar.

So, go! There is much, much, more than mentioned here. Click the link in the title to this post and you shall fly there without having to peddle a bicycle past the moon, or shake your booty on a dance floor.

MOVIE & ART EVENTS IN LOS ANGELES

1. Exhibit of movie Posters. Posters honoring the 50-year anniversary of the inauguration of the Oscar® category for Best Foreign Language Film is currently in the Grand Lobby Gallery at the home of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences® (AMPAS®) on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles. The exhibit, "From Amarcord to Z," featuring posters of Oscar winning foreign movies since 1956 will run through 15 April, and is presented by the Academy Foundation of the AMPAS.

The history of the award actually goes back to 1947, when the Academy recognized SCIUSCIÁ (Shoe Shine, Italy, directed by Vittorio De Sica) from war-scarred Italy, for offering “proof to the world that the creative spirit can triumph over adversity.” The Academy presented seven more “special” or “honorary” foreign language film Oscars® before officially establishing the category in 1956, to be awarded for the first time in 1957. The first competitive Academy Award went to Italy for LA STRADA (The Road, 1956, directed by Frederico Fellini).

The exhibition, which has been assembled from the extensive poster collection of the Academy’s Margaret Herrick Library, many of which are originals, includes the posters for both those Italian films. The Academy’s Grand Lobby Gallery is open Tuesday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and weekends from noon to 6 p.m. Admission is free.

2. Contemporary Documentaries Screening Series (Part II), 14 March – 6 June 2007

Presented by the Academy Foundation of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the UCLA Film & Television Archive. The 25th annual Contemporary Documentaries series is a showcase for feature-length and short documentaries drawn from the 2005 Academy Award® nominations, including the winners, as well as other important and innovative films considered by the Academy that year. This is Part II of the series. Part I was screened in December - November 2006. All films in the series screen on Wednesdays at the Linwood Dunn Theater at the Academy’s Pickford Center for Motion Picture Study at 7 p.m., unless otherwise noted. The filmmakers will be present at screenings whenever possible.

Docs Screenings in March:

Wednesday, March 14: MARCH OF THE PENGUINS, directed by Luc Jacquet, and GRIZZLY MAN, directed by Werner Herzog.

Wednesday, March 28: THE DEATH OF KEVIN CARTER: Casualty of the Bang Bang Club, directed by Dan Krauss, and KORDA VISION, directed by Héctor Cruz Sandoval.

For list of additional screenings, visit "2006-2007 Contemporary Documentaries".

The Linwood Dunn Theater is located at the Academy’s Pickford Center for Motion Picture Study, 1313 North Vine Street, Hollywood. Free parking is available behind the building through the entrance on Homewood Avenue (one block north of Fountain). Admission is free. Doors open at 6 p.m. All seating is unreserved. For additional program information call (310) 247-3600.

General Information

Tickets for these, and other, Academy programs may be purchased by mail, at the Academy during normal business hours, or at the box office which opens one hour before the start of the event.

The Academy's main location is at 8949 Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, California. Office hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, except most major holidays. For further information on all Academy events and exhibitions in Los Angeles, call (310) 247-3600, unless otherwise noted.

The Academy's New York office is located at 111 East 59th Street, New York, New York, closed most major holidays. For further information on all Academy events and exhibitions in New York, call (888) 778-7575, unless otherwise noted.

To purchase tickets by mail, please send your check or money order made to "Academy Foundation" to: Academy Foundation Programs Dept., 8949 Wilshire Boulevard, Beverly Hills, CA 90211.

MOVIE & ART EVENTS IN NYC

1. Exhibit of Famous Spanish Artists. The exhibit "Barcelona and the Modernity: Gaudí to Dalí" opened Wednesday, 7 March, at the Metropolitan Museum, NYC, Special Exhibition Galleries, The Tisch Galleries, 2nd floor.

Andalusian Pablo Picasso, the Catalans Joan Miró, Salvador Dalí and Antoni Gaudí are represented in the exhibition that will close 3 June. The president of the Metropolitan, Emily Rafferty, referred to the exhibition as one of the biggest international exhibitions of modern art."

The Metropolitan Museum is located at 1000 Fifth Avenue. New York, New York 10028 -0198. It appears that admission prices are recommended: Adults, $20; Seniors (65 and older) $15; Students, $10 (with some restrictions); and Children under 12 with an adult are free. For more specific information call 212-535-7710. Visit online.


2. "Monday Nights With Oscar®" Screenings. The movie NETWORK (1976) will screen at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences® (AMPAS®) Theater at Lighthouse International in New York City, Monday, 19 March. NETWORK opens the "Monday Nights With Oscar" screening series in New York City (NYC). The movie contains the famous line, “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”

Hosted by Robert Osborne, host of Turner Classic Movies, the special guest will be the movie's director Sidney Lumet, and showtime is 7:30 p.m. The Theater at Lighthouse International is located at 111 East 59th Street, New York.

Tickets are $5 for the general public and $3 for Academy members and students with a valid ID and may be reserved over the phone by calling 1-888-778-7575. Depending on availability, tickets may be purchased in person the night of the screening. Doors open at 7 p.m. For more information.

General Information

Tickets for these, and other, Academy programs may be purchased by mail, at the Academy during normal business hours, or at the box office which opens one hour before the start of the event.

The Academy's main national office is at 8949 Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, California. Office hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, except most major holidays. For further information on all Academy events and exhibitions in Los Angeles, call (310) 247-3600, unless otherwise noted.

The Academy's New York office is at 111 East 59th Street, New York, New York, closed most major holidays. For further information on all Academy events and exhibitions in New York, call (888) 778-7575, unless otherwise noted.