New York – The Cinema Eye Honors for Nonfiction Filmmaking today announced the five nominees for its third annual Cinema Eye Heterodox Award, sponsored by Filmmaker Magazine. The Cinema Eye Heterodox Award honors a narrative film that imaginatively incorporates nonfiction strategies, content and/or modes of production.
The five films nominated for the 2013 Heterodox Award are: Paolo and Vittorio Taviani’s Ceasar Must Die (Cesare deve morire), Craig Zobel’s Compliance, Jem Cohen’s Museum Hours, Pablo Larraín’s No, and Terence Nance’s An Oversimplification of Her Beauty.
These films illuminate the formal possibilities of nonfiction filmmaking while raising provocative questions about on-going documentary orthodoxy and the perceived boundaries between narrative and nonfiction filmmaking. Previous winners of the award were Matt Porterfield’s Putty Hill (2011) and Mike Mills’ Beginners (2012).
The 2013 Heterodox Award will be presented at the 6th Annual Cinema Eye Honors for Nonfiction Filmmaking on January 9 at the Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, Queens, New York.
“For the first two years, the Heterodox Award has felt like an exciting experiment,” said Cinema Eye Honors Co-Chair Esther Robinson. “Would there be enough films pushing through the barriers between fiction and non-fiction films to justify the award? Would the filmmaking community embrace this conversation? With the arrival of the third year, we can answer both questions with a resounding ‘yes!’ Filmmakers continue to blend genres, push structures and delight our nominators with work that challenges staid divisions between fiction and nonfiction films.”
Ten finalists for the Heterodox Award were selected in voting by the Cinema Eye Honors Nominations Committee. The ten finalists were then viewed and five nominees selected by the writers and editors of Filmmaker Magazine. A jury will watch the five nominees and choose a winner that will be announced on January 9.
“In the third year of the Heterodox Award, our nominated filmmakers explore the interstices of documentary and fiction in fascinating and diverse ways, from situating their characters within the confines of real-life locations (museums, prisons) to exploring within dramatic contexts the aftermath of real crime and social injustice,” said Filmmaker Magazine Editor-in-Chief Scott Macaulay. “Giving all five of these films their extra kick is our knowledge, and sometimes confusion over, the nature of the reality they represent.”
The Five Nominees for the 2013 Cinema Eye Heterodox Award:
Ceasar Must Die (Cesare deve morire)
Directed by Paolo and Vittorio Taviani
In Paolo and Vittorio Taviani’s bracing and politically astute blend of documentary and fiction, real-life Italian inmates of a high-security prison audition for, rehearse and stage a version of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. Through its fascinating recontextualization of Shakespeare’s classic, Caesar Must Die explores criminal identity while reflecting the larger tensions of Italian society itself.
Compliance
Directed by Craig Zobel
Drawing its dialogue from phone records and real-life court transcripts, writer/director Craig Zobel’s Compliance turns the true story of a prank phone caller and sexual predator into a disturbing meditation on the politics of authority.
Museum Hours
Directed by Jem Cohen
In Jem Cohen’s lovely meditation on culture, friendship, and the dialogue carried across centuries through art, a lonely woman and quiet museum guard strike a quiet bond while while surveying the paintings of Vienna’s Kunsthistorisches Museum. Cohen’s camera captures the subtlety of their interaction while also evoking the majesty of this museum and its collection.
No
Directed by Pablo Larrain
Detailing the 1988 ouster of Chile’s General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte via constitutional referendum, Pablo Larrain’s No uses footage from the referendum’s actual advertising campaign along with an artfully lo-fi U-matic camera aesthetic to recall the politics as well as the media of its era.
An Oversimplification of Her Beauty
Directed by Terence Nance
An Oversimplification of Her Beauty engagingly obsesses over the filmmaker’s “friend-zone’d” relationship with a charismatic young woman, played in the film by the real-life object of his affection. “One-sided non-fiction” is how Nance describes his picture, which mixes multiple formats as well as animation to present an exhilarating portrait of love, longing and artmaking in the digital age.
In addition, Cinema Eye announced that voting is now open for the 2013 Audience Choice Prize, the Cinema Eye Honor that is decided by the votes of the public. Ten films, including a number of the most talked-about and debated documentaries of the year, are amongst this year’s Audience Choice nominees. Last year, more than 10,000 people voted for the award, which went to Cindy Meehl’s Buck.
This year’s nominees for the Cinema Eye are: 5 Broken Cameras (Directed by Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi), Beauty is Embarrassing (Directed by Neil Berkeley), Bully (Directed by Lee Hirsch), How to Survive a Plague (Directed by David France), The Imposter (Directed by Bart Layton), Jiro Dreams of Sushi (Directed by David Gelb), Kumaré (Directed by Vikram Gandhi), Marina Abramović The Artist is Present (Directed by Matthew Akers), Searching for Sugar Man (Directed by Malik Bendjelloul) and Trash Dance (Directed by Andrew Garrison).
The public can vote for the 2013 Audience Choice Prize on the Cinema Eye Honors website at www.cinemaeyehonors.com/audiencechoice2013 or by sending a message to @cinemaeyehonors on twitter with the name of the film of their choice. [For example: @cinemaeyehonors I vote for Buck!]. Voting will be open through Monday, January 7, 2013.