SUNDANCE AWARDS AND THE BEST SHORTS

We are back from Sundance and had a great time. We won't bore you with details of our social interactions, since there are more entertaining and complete Sundance blogs out there. I'll just say that I didn't get to meet Hammer, or Dakota Fanning, but our friend Casimir did.

Some of our favorite features screening in Park City were:
Zidane
In the Shadow of the Moon
The Great World of Sound
Hot House
Chasing Ghosts
Crossing the Line
Zoo
VHS Kahloucha
It is Fine. Everything is Fine!
Comrades in Dreams

Of course, not everything was so fantastic. Some dissapointing films were:
Manda Bala
Chicago Ten
The Unforeseen
Offscreen

We'll try to talk a little bit more about each of these films over the next few days, but I'll also put together some little segments on the shorts as well and try to point out some of our favorites. You can watch most of them online, either for free or by paying $1.99 for them on iTunes (which really isn't so bad, if you think about it, since a good chunk of that goes to the filmmakers). There were a good number of very good shorts and a few that we thought were truly exceptional. Mark Elijah Rosenberg was on the shorts jury, so obviously he saw al of them. I have seen most of the selections at this point, though not Don Herzfeldt's new short--which everyone says is extraordinary and which won the jury prize. Hopefully Mark will get the chance to blog a little bit about his experience and about his selections. Until then, I will just list the winners:

Jury Prize in Short Filmmaking
"Everything Will Be OK"; directed by Don Hertzfeldt

Jury Prize in International Short Filmmaking
"The Tube With a Hat"; directed by Radu Jude

Shorts Jury Honorable Mentions in Short Filmmaking
"Death to the Tinman"; directed by Ray Tintori
"The Fighting Cholitas"; directed by Mariam Jobrani
"Men Understand Each Other Better" ("Mardha Hamdigar Ra Behtar Mifahmand"); directed by Marjan Alizadeh
"Motodrom"; directed by Joerg Wagner
"Spitfire 944"; directed by William Lorton
"t.o.m."; directed by Tom Brown and Daniel Gray

Feel free to sort through all the shorts yourself, but the Sundance website is a little screwy and I will be posting highlights from the shorts with links to where you can watch the films over the next week or so, so you can also just check back in here daily and I'll give you my recommendations. To start, you should all go watch Ray Tintori's newest short, Death to the Tinman.