Reactions to the Inaugural Cinema Eye Honors
Wrapping up the bulk of our coverage of the first annual Cinema Eye Honors for Nonfiction Filmmaking is a survey of thoughts from various folks who attended last Tuesday's ceremony - and the thoughts of a few who couldn't make it:
First, thoughts from presenter and acclaimed filmmaker Joe Berlinger, as relayed by Pamela Cohn at Still in Motion:
"For years, I, too, have lamented the documentary-consuming public's confusion of subject matter versus craft when evaluating the quality of a nonfiction film. In the narrative (fiction) feature world, a poorly made film on an "important" subject would be rejected as inferior; yet in the world of documentary evaluation, too often a film is validated in terms of its subject matter instead of its craft...
(A)s one of the early pioneers of the current new wave of nonfiction theatrical filmmakers with two decades of hindsight, last night's celebration of outstandingly-crafted films and the recognition that there should be no rules for conveying cinematic truth represented a real milestone in the evolution of the perception of nonfiction films.
I was honored to have been a small part of the evening, and I wish you the greatest success with this endeavor."
Nell Boase of the Guardian UK:
"It's the first outing of the Cinema Eye awards, and there's a bubbling sense of camaraderie at this little Manhattan cinema packed with documentary makers.
The evening is billed as the first non-fiction film-making awards. Of course, there are plenty of prizes going round for documentaries. But they tend to be the odd single category, and these films hardly ever get nominated in the main cinematography or editing sections...
There are some impressive films on the slate. BILLY THE KID is a short study of a 15-year-old boy in Maine. It's not clear whether his awkwardness comes from Asperger's syndrome or simple teenage gauchery, but director Jennifer Venditti captures some extraordinarily touching moments. Picking up the prize for best debut, she enthuses: "I'm so excited to share the cinema I see around me every day."
The cinematography award goes to Heloisa Passos for her work on MANDA BALA (SEND A BULLET). This movie, which also won for best film and best editing, isn't one of the new digital breed; it was beautifully shot on film over five years in Sao Paulo. It's an odd tale of a frog farmer, a hostage victim and a cosmetic surgeon, but the disjointed threads manage to frame a tale of corruption and class war in modern Brazil...
There is even, unusually, an award for best producer, which goes to another Dane: Mikael Rieks for GHOSTS OF CITE SOLEIL, a portrait of gangs in Haiti. And that's rather what this evening is about - celebrating the unsung roles. "Behind every director is a producer, and there are some brave producers in this room," says Rieks."
"While most of the film industry doesn't need another awards event, it was clear from last night's Cinema Eye nonfiction honors that the unsung and aesthetic-minded nonfiction filmmaker deserves a little celebration, a few extra pats on the back, and a community to help them in these dire times -- when both funding and distribution are drying up. Cutting loose, doc filmmaker and event co-organizer AJ Schnack ("KURT COBAIN ABOUT A SON") set the tone early with an impressive musical rendition of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" with lyrics inspired by Tony Kaye's abortion film "LAKE OF FIRE." Clearly, this was a room full of trusted colleagues, where anything was welcome -- although Barbara Kopple's enthusiastic climactic appearance drew some nervous titters.
Even so, Cinema Eye -- named after the equally kooky excitable "Kino Eye" manifestos of the Russian experimental filmmaker Dziga Vertov ("Everyone who cares for his art seeks the essence of his own technique" ) -- deserves support. Driven solely by art, not by commerce or self-promotion, the awards seek to offer validation to those who need it most: Working on the margins, stringing togething financing piecemeal and struggling for years at a time on labors of love that have no obvious payday or plaudits at the end, these films and filmmakers deserve a night to admire their own artistic accomplishments. Docs, often shunned as second-class citizens to narrative filmmakers, it was noted last night, are not even recognized by the guilds. Maybe with a little pressure, the American Society of Cinematographers could add a nonfiction category."
Jennifer Marin at About.com's Documentary Blog:
"With the creation of the Cinema Eye Awards, the documentary film community takes a large leap forward in gaining recognition for the craft involved in making non-fiction films.
The Oscars, Spirit Awards and other such presentations recognize outstanding achievement in direction, cinematography, art direction and all the other specific skills that go into making a narrative feature--but they present just one award in the non-fiction feature category--and, in some ceremonies, one for documentary short.
That's just plain unfair to documentary filmmakers whose skills are every bit as sharp as those of narrative filmmakers--and it's misleading for audiences who may not realize that making documentary films is as challenging as making narrative features, or more so...
Some industry commentators have noted that the winning and nominated films are, as documentaries go, all fairly high profile and well-promoted works, and that many worthy smaller films are still being overlooked. I was personally disappointed to see that Tony Kaye's masterfully made and profoundly provocative Lake of Fire didn't win an award--although it was nominated for four.
The Cinema Eye Awards are slated to become an annual event. Pay attention to them--they're you key to what the documentary community thinks are its crowning achievements for the year."
Jason Guerassio at Filmmaker Magazine:
"With a quick running time of two hours, the mood in the theater was light and in no way competitive. The one thing that may have slowed things down was a Director's Roundtable moderated by Powers in the middle of the awards, which I felt really killed the show's momentum. But that's just one example of how the creators were thinking outside the box. There was also a DJ in the corner spinning great songs in between awards and background music for the presenters...
There were also moving moments as well -- a tribute to two filmmakers who recently passed away -- Tony Silver, director of the groundbreaking doc, Style Wars and Nonso Christian Ugbode of the National Black Programming Consortium cut together a tribute to mentor St. Clair Bourne."
Yance Ford at the POV Blog:
"For its first time out, Cinema Eye has done a tremendous service to the documentary community in the same do-it-yourself spirit that gets films made. I overheard the phrase "well, next year" often, and I'm sure that in the coming months, AJ, Thom and Indie Pix (with lots of input, no doubt) will improve upon their model for the 2009 Cinema Eye Awards. My personal suggestion would include a discussion about how films with a limited festival life that go straight to TV might be included in the awards. I'd also like to see the list of craft categories expanded to include composition, writing and sound. I know that these questions and others are on the minds of everyone at Cinema Eye, and I look forward to hearing and contributing to the coming conversations."
Mark Rosenberg at the Rooftop Films Blog:
"As an awards ceremony itself, the event was slick but homey, weighty when it needed to be but generally lighthearted, informative but not ponderous. I particularly loved the mid-ceremony discussion group, which featured the fierce insights of Esther B. Robinson and the goofy dynamism of Jason Kohn. Still, the structure and format felt like just about every other awards ceremony, which is a disappointment for an event that is celebrating narrative craft. Of course, coming from Rooftop Films--where for 12 years we've been trying to stage new ways of presenting films--I would level such a criticism, but I think if the Cinema Eye Honors want to want to break some boundaries and maintain this level of interest in the event itself, in the coming years they would do well to try to stretch the format of their show, much they way the artists they are honoring are challenging the formats of non-fiction filmmaking."
Stu Van Airsdale at The Reeler:
"The Cinema Eyes won't survive out of anger, of course, but they may well survive out of their broader constituency's sense of adventure, experimentation and sacrifice. I wouldn't change much about the presentation, terrifically produced by Pamela Cohn (though the roundtable in the middle could be livelier; if only everyone were as charged up as Robinson and Kohn), and IFC's main auditorium was a surprisingly cozy environment for the format. But the spectrum of documentaries off their radar -- from the trenchant micro-doc MUSICIAN to the appallingly overlooked MY KID COULD PAINT THAT -- defy the instant legitimacy the awards sought to confer. Rather, the Cinema Eyes bowed, for one night anyway, firmly at the center of the establishment orbit. Not the worst place to start, by any means, but certainly no place they'll want to -- or should -- stay."
Alison Willmore at IFC Indie Eye:
"Looking over the many documentarians in the crowd gathered at the first-ever Cinema Eye Honors for nonfiction film last night, awards co-chair AJ Schnack (himself a filmmaker) proclaimed "I don't see journalists, I don't see activists — I see filmmakers and I see artists." Not that there's anything wrong with journalism or activism, but it's a fair point — subject matter so often comes first and foremost when people look at a documentary film, and everyone working behind the camera is relegated to the role of a chronicler. One of the common themes of the evening, and one of the reasons the Cinema Eye Honors were created, was that nonfiction films deserve just as serious a consideration of their craftsmanship, of their art, as narratives, which is why there were awards given out for editing, cinematography and production, in addition to ones recognizing films and directors."
"The yearbook/program alone is a really lovely tribute to 2007's sterling year in documentary film. But the awards show itself was breezy, pleasant, and somehow even inspiring. I say somehow because it felt like every single person who spoke preached the difficulties of surviving in this oft-ignored, uncelebrated genre of moviemaking. Esther Robinson was particularly eloquent in the director's roundtable portion of the evening (a very clever idea, I thought), in which she confessed to having weekly conversations with talented documentarians who are on the cusp of giving up and throwing in the towel. It seemed that everyone had their own harsh truth to impart, but rather than deflating me further, it made me excited to see that so much great work was born out of these seemingly insurmountable odds. It made me believe that our desire to make stuff will somehow continue to triumph, even as it seems to be getting harder and harder to do just that."
Mark Rabinowitz at the Rabbi Report:
"Kohn also had many of the best quotes of the night, including screeds on good docs being over looked and making his film "out of anger." When he was at the Sao Paulo International Documentary Film Festival he saw Marshall Curry's Street Fight screen to a near empty house while patrons were viewing....inferior product, elsewhere and it pissed him off.
He also pointed out that the Honors themselves were themselves born out of anger and he was right. I know, I was there. Over the course of a car ride at last November's Denver Film Festival, as AJ read the list of exceptional nonfiction films that had been excluded from the Academy's documentary short list, the level of disbelief and furor in the car rose. Well, AJ decided to do something about that and like a Busby Berkeley movie, 4 short months later, there we all were, gathered in a theater toasting the excellence in nonfiction filmmaking for 2007."
Ingrid Kopp at Shooting From the Hip:
"The ceremony had just the right touch of rock and roll spirit (because lets face it award ceremonies can be deathly boring, especially when you have to eat food that tastes like it should only be served above 10,000 feet). Everyone seemed really grateful that the craft of documentary filmmaking was finally being recognized, and the need for Cinema Eye is clear when you consider that the American Society of Cinematographers do not even have an award for nonfiction. Looking around the room and seeing so many of my friends and colleagues who are so passionate about documentary did bring the expression “preaching to the choir” to mind but it just means that we need to make that choir bigger so that the producers, directors, cinematographers, editors, graphic designers and everybody else who plays such a vital role in bringing a film into the world get more recognition and so that great films like Manda Bala, The Monastery, Billy The Kid and The King of Kong are seen by more people in more cinemas and beyond."
Stephen Higgins at The Matador's blog:
"The Cinema Eye Awards blasted onto the scene last night, spotlighting great cinematography and editing. Thanks to founder AJ Schnack for that. For his urge to prove that instead of dry treatises on the "right issues," documentary can be "entertaining..can be artistic...can rival narrative as a filmgoing experience."
Hats off to the awards team - including chair Thom Powers (Toronto Film Festival) and David Nugent (Hamptons International Film Festival) for ushering in a time when well-crafted, emotionally powerful non-fiction films rise to the fore.
The Cinema Eye Award will become a coveted prize during these next, expansive years for documentary film."
Bryant Frazier at Studio Daily:
"The mood at the Cinema Eye Documentary Awards, sponsored by IndiePix (www.indiepixfilms.com) and held tonight at the IFC Center in Manhattan, was highly congratulatory and occasionally downright giddy – presenter Barbara Kopple’s demand that awards co-chair AJ Schnack accompany her reading of the names of nominees with music, a capella, was a highlight. The presence of Kopple along with other nonfiction-film luminaries — presenters included Academy Award-winning producer/director Alex Gibney, Paradise Lost directors Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky, and Born Into Brothels director Ross Kauffman — helped give a sense of long-time-coming legitimacy to the event, which aimed to help right some perceived wrongs in the mainstream film community’s treatment of documentary filmmakers."
Brian Liu at ToolboxDC:
"When i arrived to the IFC Center, I actually didn't quite realize the magnitude of what i was witnessing, but it quickly became obvious to me that I was witnessing history in the making. With documentaries having such a rich history and effect on our society, it's sad and mindboggling that to this point there had not been any other organized recognition for docs other than a single Oscar award for Best Documentary."
Finally, I want to point to two lengthy posts that raise questions about the awards. Agnes Varnum wrote (with my encouragement) about her concerns related to Indiepix's sponsorship of the event. Yance Ford writes at length on the ongoing question of television vs. theatrical. I respond to each of their posts at length in the comments section. Also, see my previous post today on questions raised by Stu Van Airsdale, Karina Longworth and Mark Rosenberg related to the eligibility requirements and the winners.
Lots, lots more from Tom Hall, Chuck Tyron, live twittering from Karina Longworth (look for posts on 3-18-08), the original story from Eugene Hernandez at indieWIRE, plus iPOP photos (here, here and here) and all of our own Cinema Eye coverage.
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