53rd San Francisco International Film Festival 22 April - 6 May 2010

AWARDS/

The Golden Gate Awards were established to augment the San Francisco International Film Festival's tradition of recognizing and promoting excellence in independent and world cinema. For more than five decades, the competition has introduced Bay Area audiences to illustrious filmmakers who have transformed the medium with their award-winning documentary features and animated, narrative, documentary, experimental and youth-produced short films.

The Golden Gate Awards are one of many ways in which the San Francisco Film Society fulfills an essential Festival function: to increase attention and resources given to independent filmmakers, and to support the development of international cinema. This year, there will be close to $100,000 awarded in cash prizes, with $75,000 for feature-length documentary and narrative works and an additional $20,000 earmarked specifically for short filmmakers.

Selected from a wide array of entries, these films truly represent the best of the international filmmaking community. Some past recipients of the Golden Gate Award for documentary feature include Anders Østergaard (Burma VJ), Yung Chang (Up the Yangtze), and Michael Glawogger (Workingman's Death), while local luminaries such as Marlon Riggs, Sam Green and Ruby Yang have been awarded for their cinematic achievements.

The prestige of the Golden Gate Awards is distinguished in large part due to the participation and expertise of the members of our vital and dedicated Bay Area film and video community. Each year, filmmakers, journalists, exhibitors, curators and academics devote hours of their valuable time to screen hundreds of entries. Each submission is evaluated by these individuals who recommend films for Golden Gate Award competition. International juries view these works at the Festival and bestow Golden Gate Awards on documentary features and short films.

Since 1957, the Golden Gate Awards have recognized and honored filmmakers of the highest caliber, and we are especially proud of this year's world-class films in competition.

OFFICIAL SELECTION 2010

DOCUMENTARY FEATURES

Colony
Ross McDonnell, Carter Gunn, Ireland /USA

The Invention of Dr. Nakamats
Kaspar Astrup Schröder, Denmark

Last Train Home
Lixin Fan, Canada/China

Marwencol
Jeff Malmberg, USA

Mugabe and the White African
Andrew Thompson, Lucy Bailey, England

The Peddler
Eduardo de la Serna, Lucas Marcheggiano, Adriana Yurcovich, Argentina

Pianomania
Lilian Franck, Robert Cibis, Austria/Germany

Presumed Guilty (Bay Area)
Roberto Hernández, Geoffrey Smith, Mexico

Restrepo
Tim Hetherington, Sebastian Junger, USA

Russian Lessons
Olga Konskaya, Andrei Nekrasov, Russia/Norway/Georgia

Simonal: No One Knows How Tough it Was
Claudio Manoel, Micael Langer, Calvito Leal, Brazil

Documentary Feature Jury
Emmy-award winner Dayna Goldfine and partner Dan Geller create critically acclaimed multicharacter documentary narratives braiding personal stories into larger portraits of
human experience. Ballets Russes (2005) was honored by both the National Society of Film Critics and the National Board of Review. Goldfine’s work includes Now and Then: From Frosh to Seniors (1999), Kids of Survival: The Art and Life of Tim Rollins + K.O.S. (1996) and Isadora Duncan: Movement from the Soul (1989). Coming soon: Satan Came to Eden: The Galápagos Affair and VC.

As the editor-in-chief, Eugene Hernandez manages indieWIRE, which he cofounded in 1996. He also is the editorial vice president of SnagFilms, which acquired indieWIRE two years ago. Eugene has served as an instructor at the New School in Manhattan and participated as a juror and panelist at numerous international film festivals. As a writer he has contributed to the Wall Street Journal, Variety, Screen International, Filmmaker Magazine and The Hollywood Reporter. He also has served as a consultant to a number of nonprofit film and arts organizations including the Creative Capital Foundation, and as a funding panelist for the NEA and ITVS.

Paul Sturtz is a cofounder and program director of the True/False Film Fest, and cofounder and codirector of the Ragtag Cinemacafe, an independent theater in Columbia, Missouri. A dedicated and visionary community member as well, Sturtz was a founding member of Big Canoe, an organization focused on economic and environmental sustainability and the force behind community gardens in mid-Missouri. With an eye trained toward vehicles for change, Sturtz continues to serve on the Columbia City Council, perhaps the highest office ever attained by a film booker.

DOCUMENTARY SHORT

Coffee Futures
Zeynep Devrim Gürsel, Turkey

The Darkness of Day (Bay Area)
Jay Rosenblatt, USA

Kaden Later (Bay Area)
Harriet Storm, USA

The Shutdown
Adam Stafford, Scotland

Wagah
Supriyo Sen, Germany

NARRATIVE SHORT

The Armoire
Jamie Travis, Canada

Blink
Silas Howard, USA

Diplomacy
Jon Goldman, USA

Embrace of the Irrational (Bay Area)
Jonn Herschend, USA

Laundry (Bay Area)
Danielle Katvan, USA

Meanwhile
Vitor Leite, Brazil

Me Time
Matt Schuman, USA

Sleeping with Her
Wen Chih Yi, Taiwan

Still Birds
Sara Eliassen, Norway

The Translator
Sonya Di Rienzo, Canada

The Visitors
Samina Akbari, USA

ANIMATED SHORT

Alma (Bay Area)
Rodrigo Blaas, USA

The Incident at Tower 37
Chris Perry, USA

Logorama
François Alaux, Hervé de Crecy, Ludovic Houplain, France

Spin
Max Hattler, England

Tussilago
Jonas Odell, Sweden

Vive la Rose
Bruce Alcock, Canada

Voice on the Line
Kelly Sears, USA

NEW VISIONS

Afterimage: A Flicker of Life (Bay Area)
Kerry Laitala, USA

M
Felix Dufour-Laperrière, Canada

One and One is Life
Martha Colburn, USA

Release
Bill Morrison, USA

Wednesday Morning Two AM
Lewis Klahr, USA

Shorts Jury
Robert Abele is a film and television critic/journalist whose work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, LA Weekly, Variety, Premiere, DGA Quarterly, Emmy, the San Francisco Chronicle, the New York Post, the Dallas Morning News, Total Film and Playboy. A graduate of Southern Methodist University’s film program and a former theater critic, he collaborated with Emmy-winning comedian Kathy Griffin on her New York Times bestselling memoir Official Book Club Selection, co-authored the book The Paramount Story and has served on juries for the AFI Film Festival, the USA Film Festival and the PEN Center/USA West Literary Awards.

Kelly Duane de la Vega is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and 2009–10 HBO/FIND fellow. Her feature documentaries have been shown in film festivals around the world and broadcast on PBS stations and on the Documentary Channel. Duane de la Vega produced and codirected See How They Run, a political documentary that premiered at SXSW. Her Emmy-nominated film Monumental: David Brower’s Fight for Wild America, opened theatrically nationwide and was selected by the New York Film Society to screen at Lincoln Center. She is in production on Better This World (with Katie Galloway), a documentary about two young domestic terrorists who were possibly entrapped by a charismatic FBI informant.

Jacques Thelemaque is a writer/director who cofounded Filmmakers Alliance in 1993 and, in 2004, FA Productions, of which he is copresident. He was also the former chief community officer at Withoutabox.com. Thelemaque has written and directed eight award-winning short films and one feature film. He has also produced five feature films and numerous short films. Thelemaque is currently on the board of advisors for the IFP Emerging Filmmaker Lab and the Ashland Independent Film Festival.

Shorts Program Sponsor

WORKS FOR KIDS AND FAMILIES

Cherry on the Cake
Michelle Eastwood, England

Crazy Hair Day
Virginia Wilkos, USA

Leonardo (Bay Area)
Jim Capobianco, USA

The Mouse that Soared
Kyle Bell, USA

Q&A
Mike Rauch, Tim Rauch, USA

YOUTH WORKS

Alisha
Daniel Citron, USA

Blink Another Day (Bay Area)
Eric Wen, USA

Escargots (Bay Area)
William Yarbrough, USA

Moon Shoes
Joel VanZeventer, USA

The Stand
Olivia Chuba, USA