Press Releases Archive for January, 2019

Oscar-Nominated Minding The Gap Debuts On POV February 18

POV DOCUMENTARY ‘MINDING THE GAP’ RECEIVES ACADEMY AWARD NOMINATION FOR BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE ‘MINDING THE GAP’ WILL HAVE ITS NATIONAL TELEVISION DEBUT ON PBS DOCUMENTARY SERIES POV ON MONDAY, FEBRUARY 18 AT 9PM New York, N.Y.  — This morning the critically acclaimed coming-of-age story Minding the Gap received an Oscar nomination for Best Documentary Feature for the…

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Specialized SVOD Streaming OVID.TV Launches in March

[PR] (New York, January 2019)  Jonathan Miller, of Icarus Films, announced today an unprecedented collaborative effort between six of the most noteworthy independent film distributors in the U.S., each respected for the depth of their industry experience and the vitality of their collections. Together, they are supporting the launch of OVID.TV, an innovative new video-on-demand subscription…

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Academy Sets Nomination Announcement Times

1st Oscars® Nominations Announcement Tuesday, January 22, 2019 5:20 a.m. PST/8:20 a.m. EST/1:20 p.m. GMT/9:20 p.m. CST FORMAT The 91st Academy Awards® nominations in all 24 Oscar® categories will be announced in a two-part live presentation on Tuesday, January 22, via global live stream on Oscar.com, Oscars.org, the Academy’s digital platforms – Twitter, YouTube, Facebook – a satellite feed and local broadcasters. 5:20:00 a.m….

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Sundance 2019 Juries Set

Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute will gather 20 celebrated and revered expert voices across film, art, culture and science to award feature-length and short films shown at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival with 12 prizes, announced at a ceremony February 2 that will be livestreamed at sundance.org and on YouTube. Short Film Awards will be announced at a…

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Film Independent Backs 30 Filmmakers Through Project Involve 2019

FILM INDEPENDENT SELECTS 30 FILMMAKERS FOR PROJECT INVOLVE 2019   LOS ANGELES (January 15, 2019) — Film Independent, the nonprofit arts organization that produces the Spirit Awards, has selected 30 filmmakers for Project Involve, the organization’s signature diversity mentorship program. Now in its 26th year, the Project Involve program fosters the careers of talented filmmakers from communities traditionally…

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2019 Writers Guild Awards Nominees

SCREENPLAY NOMINEES ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY Eighth Grade, Written by Bo Burnham; A24 Green Book, Written by Nick Vallelonga & Brian Currie & Peter Farrelly; Universal Pictures A Quiet Place, Screenplay by Bryan Woods & Scott Beck and John Krasinski, Story by Bryan Woods & Scott Beck; Paramount Pictures Roma, Written by Alfonso Cuarón; Netflix Vice, Written by Adam McKay; Annapurna Pictures ADAPTED SCREENPLAY…

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NOMINEES ANNOUNCED FOR THE  69TH ANNUAL ACE EDDIE AWARDS  RECOGNIZING BEST EDITING OF 2018  IN FILM, TELEVISION AND DOCUMENTARIES

Winners to be announced at the 69th Annual ACE Eddie Awards presented by American Cinema Editors (ACE) on Feb. 1 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel Los Angeles, Jan. 7, 2019 — American Cinema Editors (ACE), the honorary society of the world’s top film editors, today announced nominations for the 69th Annual ACE Eddie Awards recognizing outstanding editing…

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Press Releases

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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon