When Change becomes Charge, interview from Cannes. Al Gore was invited to Cannes for the premiere of An Inconvenient Truth, his documentary about climate change. “I know this about politics. The political system has one thing in common with the climate system: it too, is non-linear. It can appear to change only gradually. But it can cross a tipping point, beyond which it moves dramatically, ...

When Change becomes Charge, interview from Cannes.Al Gore was invited to Cannes for the premiere of An Inconvenient Truth, his documentary about climate change. “I know this about politics. The political system has one thing in common with the climate system: it too, is non-linear. It can appear to change only gradually. But it can cross a tipping point, beyond which it moves dramatically,” he tells Andrew L. Urban.On the rooftop terrace of the Cannes Hilton, squinting against the Mediterran...

The 13th Chicago Underground Film Festival (http://www.cuff.org) concluded on Thursday August 23rd with an informal awards party held at the Uncommon Ground coffee house a few blocks from the Music Box Theater.The three person festival jury consisted of former CUFF programmer Brian Mckenndry, Clara Alcott, curator of film, video and installation work at Chicago's Heaven Gallery and Brian Chanken owner of Odd Obsession Video, Chicago's leading video store for alternative cinema. In addition to th...

Ecofilms, the International Film & Visual Arts Festival, awarded its Golden Deers at the Rodon open air theater in Rhodes, Greece after the screening of material from the Greek News Archive featuring the evolution of its host island from 1948 to the 1980s.The jury for the Feature-Length Films shared its first prize (6,000 euro) between 2 movies: Mana: Beyond Belief (USA, 90’) by Peter Friedman and Roger Manley, and Shutka Book of Records (Czech Republic, 78’) by Aleksandar Manic. While the f...

Friday, June 9----Fresh off his tour of the Croisette at the Cannes Film Festival with his film AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH, former Vice President (and current media darling) Al Gore will delivery the Keynote Address at the SILVERDOCS Documentary Film Conference on Thursday, June 15. Gore's film, directed by Davis Guggenheim, a wake-up call on the effects of global warming, has been a media sensation since its debut at the Sundance Film Festival in January, and reached a fever pitch when Gore walke...

It is should be news to no one that the Americans and the French are still locked in their love/hate relationship. We Americans do love the French culture and its emphasis on beauty, refinement and good taste. The French do love our the American can-do attitude and our pioneering spirit. But since 9/11, our different geopolitics has driven a wedge into that relationship that has pushed us both into separate corners. Perhaps that is the reason why so many American films that are openly critical ...

The revolution may not be televised by the major networks or covered by the mainstream press, but it’s certainly playing on screens large and small somewhere near you. On Saturday afternoon at the San Francisco International Film Festival, Susan Gerhard, the editor/bureau chief of the newly launched web film magazine SF360 (www.SF360.org), moderated a panel tagged “The Revolution Now Playing: Film as a Tool for Social and Political Change.” Activist filmmakers Jeff Zimbalist (FAVELA RISING...

The 5th annual Tribeca Film Festival opened on Tuesday evening with the world premiere of a controversial 9/11 docudrama. United 93, which opens nationally in theaters this Friday via Universal Pictures, is a dramatized version of the events that occurred on September 11th, 2001, when Al Qaeda terrorists took over a US airplane that was meant to crash into the White House, on the same day that other airplane hijackings attacked the Pentagon in Washington DC, and brought down New York’s World T...

2006 Full Frame Documentary Film Festival Announces Awards2007 Festival Tenth Anniversary Dates Set for April 12-15, 2007Ninth annual Full Frame Documentary Film Festival came to a close Sunday April 9th with record-breaking attendance. The final ticket number for the 2006 festival was 20,121, with an estimated 2540 additional viewers coming for the films showing post-barbecue bringing the total number of tickets to 22,661 for 2006. Last year, as of Sunday's Southern Style Barbecue and Awards Ce...

Patagonia the innovative outdoor clothing manufacturer, and the South Yuba River Citizens League (SYRCL), one of the nation’s most successful grassroots activist groups have joined forces to present the Wild & Scenic Environmental Film Festival. The festival, founded in 2003 by SYRCL and based in Nevada City, California, uses film to promote and encourage grassroots environmental activism. Patagonia, founded by world –famous climber and environmentalist, Yvon Chouinard uses its business to i...

The Fort Lauderdale Film Festival concluded its 20th edition this past Sunday, with the announcement of its awards. The Festival, which has the distinction of being the longest in the world, running almost 40 days, had a year like none other; having survived a Category 3 Hurricane and a week of no electricity, phone service or internet connection.The Festival, which featured over 200 films, premiered on October 14 with the premiere of THE MATADOR, starring Pierce Brosnan and Greg Kinnear. Closin...

A winner of 13 Australian “Oscars,” a French thriller that played in the prestigious closing night slot at the Toronto and New York Film Festivals, and the latest documentary from the woman who took the doc form into the mainstream are among the more than 50 narrative, documentary and short films to be screened at the 2005 HIGH FALLS FILM FESTIVAL, which takes place in Rochester, NY, November 9-13. High Falls is a festival with a difference – its mission. Susan B. Anthony lived in Roches...

FORT LAUDERDALE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVALOctober 14 - November 20 2005The Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival presents the most compelling and thought-provoking international films, host special tributes and seminars and introduces some of the greatest talents to South Florida audiences. The festival annually screens over 100 films from Boca Raton to Miami and is the longest film festival in the world. Considered one of the most important regional film festivals in the U.S., the Festiv...

Triumvirate of Acclaimed Film Writer/Directors: Claude Lelouch, Costa-Gavras and Bertrand Tavernier Host Premieres of New Films at 9 annual city of lights, city of angels: a week of french premieres in Los Angels. April 11-17, 2005“Men And Women,” the latest offering of veteran writer/director Claude Lelouch, will have its world premiere, opening night of City of Lights, City of Angels Film Festival (COL•COA) on Monday, April 11, 2005. The west coast premiere of writer/director Bertrand T...

Big Sky Documentary Film Festival Announces 2005 Line-upOfficial selections for the 2005 Big Sky Documentary Film Festival are now on-line at http://highplainsfilms.org/festival/selections.html.All screenings will be held at the historic Wilma Theater in downtown Missoula February 17-23, 2005. The festival will showcase over 70 non-fiction films from all styles, formats and production dates. Three separate awards will be presented for the competition films: Best Documentary Feature, Best Documen...

The first Dubai International Film Festival [DIFF] is being organized by the Dubai Media City and will start on Monday December 6th and end on the evening of Saturday December 11th 2004. The festival will feature 80 films, which include 55 main features, 10 sidebar screenings and 15 Arab short films, which will showcase contemporary and classic global cinema. The main venue of the Dubai Film Festival will be the new Madinat Jumeirah, The Arabian Resort of Dubai, but other screenings will take pl...

Jack Valenti steps down from his power position at the Motion Picture Association of America and has named Dan Glickman as his successor. Valenti, 82, will officially retire Sept. 1, Will he celebrate his birthday with Anne d'Ornano during the Deauville Film Festival remains uncertain.Texas born, Harvard educated, Jack Valenti has led several lives: a wartime bomber pilot, advertising agency founder, political consultant, White House Special Assistant, movie industry leader. In his current role ...

On its fourth and fifth day, Ecocinema International Environment Film Festival in Rhodes (Greece) focused on information films that try to raise our awareness on environmental matters. Here is the review of 3 of these documentaries that drew a special attention.Battle’s poison cloud, by Cecile Trijssenaar from the UK (2003, 53 minutes)The first image sets the tone of the documentary as the camera pans over shelves of jars containing monstrously malformed dead foetuses. The sequence graphically...

Politics is the theme of the day at Cannes May 17. Young Austrian Hans Weingartner --brings German film up to speed with 'The Edukators'. "Many young people yearn for radical political change, but there's a real lack of new suggestions," says Hans Weingartner. "We live in a society that's so individualistic that the idea of group action has become impossible, or nearly. 'The Edukators' tells a story of resistance – a story of poetic resistance." Sean Penn was on hand for 'The Assassination of ...

WINNERS FROM OVER 25 COUNTRIES HONORED AT THE HUGOS The Chicago International Television Competition announced the winners of its 40th Annual Hugo Awards at Park West this evening. Ten different countries won awards in this year’s competition, with Silver Hugos being awarded to Australia, Canada, Hong Kong and Slovakia. “This is truly an international event,” said Founder and Artistic Director Michael Kutza. “With hundreds of excellent entries, the jury decisions were extremely diffic...