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CINE Newsletter - May 2006 IN THIS ISSUE: 2006 CINE Awards Event
What
do MSNBC, A & E Networks, "Control Room,” Albert
Maysles, and water all have in common? They were all
big winners at the 47th Annual CINE Golden Eagle Film
and Video Awards this past April. CINE announced the 2006 Masters Series Golden Eagle Award winners on April 18 during its gala Annual Awards Event at the world headquarters of Discovery Communications. Seven films received the awards, which recognize excellence in broadcast, non-broadcast, news, independent and student productions. CINE Masters Series Awards went to the following productions and individuals:
In addition to the Masters Series Awards, CINE also presented a Special Media Award to Producers George Casey and Paul Novros, for the National Geographic Giant Screen Films and Graphic Films’ IMAX production, Forces of Nature. The professional CINE Masters Series Awards are sponsored by Henninger Media Services. Henninger, a longtime sponsor of CINE, awarded $25,000 worth of in-kind services to be shared among the Masters Series Award winners. In addition, Eastman Kodak continued its tradition of supporting student and emerging filmmakers by sponsoring the CINE Award of Excellence, given to the best student film of 2005. The winner, John Dolan of Chapman University, was also given a $1000 product grant from Kodak, while the runner-up, Brenda Brkusic (also of Chapman University) received a $500 grant. The awards ceremony was part of the 47th Annual CINE Golden Eagle Film and Video Awards Gala, hosted by CINE sponsor Discovery Communications. NBC News Today Show National Correspondent Bob Dotson served as Master of Ceremonies for the Event, at which two-time Academy Award® winning filmmaker Barbara Kopple presented the CINE Lifetime Achievement Award to pioneer filmmaker Albert Maysles, often called the “dean of documentary filmmakers.” Earlier in the day, Mr. Maysles served as a member of a panel discussion entitled “Fair Use, Free Speech and Contract Clearance: Year One of The Fair Use Initiative.” Sponsored by the Eastman Kodak Company, this seminar investigated the progress in industry practices since the launch of the “Documentary Filmmakers’ Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use,” a document that outlines approaches to fair use of copyrighted material. Mr. Maysles was joined on the panel by Pat Aufderheide, Professor in the School of Communication and Director of the Center for Social Media at American University; Gordon Quinn, award-winning filmmaker of Vietnam Long Time Coming and Stevie; Peter Jaszi, Professor of Law and Faculty Director of the Glushko-Samuelson Intellectual Property Law Clinic at American University; and Tamara Gould, Vice President for Distribution of the Independent Television Service. CINE also hosted its annual “5 on 5 for 5” seminar, an exciting event where five filmmakers had five minutes to pitch their program ideas to a panel of five industry executives and a live audience. The winning filmmaker, Barbara Jones of Sailor Jones Media, pitched a program concept called Water Boys and received a check for $500 from the event’s sponsor, the Discovery Health Channel, as well as the opportunity to present the winning pitch to programming executives at Discovery Communications. The panel of executives was moderated by Donald Thoms, Vice President, Health& Fitness, Discovery Networks, U.S. Production, and Vice President of the CINE Board of Directors. The panelists were: Margaret Burnette Stogner. Founder, Blue Bear Productions; David McKillop, Vice President, Factual, Discovery Networks, U.S. Production; John Potthast, Executive Producer, WETA; Wendy Douglas, Executive Producer, Discovery Health Channel; and Michael Klein, Vice President, Lifestyle, Discovery Networks, U.S. Production. The afternoon’s program concluded with a series of well-attended and highly informative executive sit-down/networking sessions where ideas were shared among filmmakers and Discovery Communications executives, including Stephen Burns, Executive Vie President, U.S. Networks Production; Eileen O’Neill, Vice President and General Management Director, Discovery Health Channel & Fit TV; Rita Mullin, Program Development, Discovery Health Development; Toni Egger, Vice President, Development, U.S. Networks, Science and Military Channels; Sean Gallagher, Senior Vice President, Production and Development, The Learning Channel; and Bill Smee, Vice President, Production, U.S. Networks, Current Affairs. Interview with CINE Lifetime Achievement Award Winner — Albert Maysles
CINE: How did you get started in the film business? AL MAYSLES: I started as a psychologist in 1955, had already traveled all over Europe by motorcycles and I was very interested in getting a more direct experience of what Russia was all about. So I applied for a tourist visa for months, which I got. And I thought, why don’t I do something like look into mental health. So with that visa and a 16-millimeter camera went to Russia. What I was looking for was a kind of direct contact with Russian people. All during the cold war we didn’t have nearly any direct vision of just ordinary people and that’s what I was looking for. We didn’t have sophisticated equipment that we have now; it was just a wind up camera with 3 minutes of film. And kind of noisy at that but even so I was able to fill it up with stuff that gave me much greater familiarity with ordinary people. CINE: You’ve made some of the most outstanding documentaries ever made. How long did it take to get public recognition of your important work? MAYSLES: It took a long time really. 5 years later we had much more advanced equipment. So a two-person crew could film behind the scenes with great flexibility, but even then the film that we made never got shown, at least at that time. And a couple of my best films, “Salesmen” and “Grey Gardens. “Salesmen” took 35 years before it ever got on public television. And “Grey Gardens,” 25 years. And those two films and “Gimme Shelter” people say rank among the best documentaries ever made. CINE: Did you get discouraged during those early years? MAYSLES: I just kept plugging away. I knew we were on the right course. Confidence is such an important thing in keeping you going and also in establishing a relationship with the people that you’re filming right from the start. Confidence that you really belong there and can do a good job of it. Telling the truth is of vital importance in making a documentary and you must be confident that you can do that. Many well established documentary filmmakers have not done that and I think that appears in their filmmaking. My wife is a family therapist and recently I read a 50-page article that she wrote about a family in therapy. And in her paper she discusses how many of her colleagues have read the manuals and know techniques but unless they do two things they are not going to get very far. One is called the gaze, the way you look at a patient. That is a way of getting or not getting trust. And the following through and empathizing so people feel you like them well enough so that you can do a decent and fair job of representing them and their lives. And those are very important things. It’s also very important to keep in forefront of your mind what’s so special about documentary, what it is that it can do that nothing else can do. It can do two things it can so closely and authentically represent people’s experience when viewer follows experience, that when the viewer follows that experience its as if they experience it for themselves. Along with that is the very special thing of the documentary putting you on the site while it’s going on, so if it’s well done you feel that you’re present. CINE: Have you ever had a situation where you couldn’t sympathize with the people you were filming? MAYSLES: One extreme case was a film on the March on Washington and I went by train from Georgia and train stopped in Thomasville and we changed trains and I mixed with the local people and talked to several guys who were segregationist. I saw two signs behind them saying colored and white while I was talking to them. And one of them who was standing very close to me, eye to eye, said if you’re filming me I’ll kill you, so I felt I had to keep filming. But I also was thinking is there some way he’s going to know that I’m filming, if he looks down at the camera, he’ll see that the pulley is turning so the moment I think he’s turning I have to keep his eyes fastened on mine. The moment he turned I immediately turned the camera off. CINE: Sometimes journalists get people to betray themselves, how do you feel about that? MAYSLES: I don’t think that sort of thing is proper. I go on the principle established by my mother that there’s good in everybody I feel that I can film anybody whether I like them or not and if it’s somebody I don’t like I’ll still look for what’s good. Maybe some kind of evidence of how they got to be that way. CINE: What are you working on now? MAYSLES: There must a half a dozen films. One of them is the “The Gates” the Christo and Jean-Claude Central Park exhibit, another is a film on the Dalai Lama when he visited New York a year or two ago, that’s being put together now. Then I’m trying to raise money for a film that I’ve been trying to make for quite some time, a film called “In Transit” where I travel on long distance trains, trains that take several days of travel and in the course of that trip which I’ll make in half a dozen different countries and in each case I’ll find a story that is about to unfold and then I’ll get off the train with them and film it. I filmed one story already. CINE: Any advice for young filmmakers? MAYSLES: I’d give them the same advice Robert Capa, the still photographer gave young photographers. Get close, get close. With the new equipment, these new video cameras that’s all the more possible. For many reasons, you have the run of a whole hour so you don’t have to keep changing so it doesn’t interfere with you’re getting close. An hour cassette costs less than four dollars. So we live in the best of times for the best of documentaries. Henninger Media Services Presents Post-Production Service Grants to CINE Masters Series Awards Winners
The winners of the 2006 Henninger grants, announced in conjunction with the CINE Golden Eagle Awards Event held on April 8, 2006, are: • Roger Weisberg et al, Public Policy Productions, for “Waging a Living” • Craig Delaval, MSNBC, for the MSNBC Special “Coming Home” • Alan Barnette, A&E Network, for “Faith of My Fathers” • Walter Baas, American Water Works Association, for “Inside the Weather” • Jehane Noujaim and Rosadel Valera, Noujaim Films, for “Control Room” Each recipient will be awarded a $5,000 service grant for use at Henninger during the period of one year after the CINE Awards Event. This includes post production services directly provided by Henninger - such as editing, audio services, graphics, color correction, and standards conversion, at either Henninger's Arlington, VA or Washington, DC sites. “We are extremely pleased to be part of such a great event,” said Rob Henninger, CEO of the company. “Supporting up-and-coming film makers is a vital part of Henninger's commitment to our community. We are looking forward to working with this year’s recipients and towards continuing our relationship with CINE for many more years to come.” CINE Annual Event 2006
CINE's Annual Event kicked off in the
afternoon with three highly engaging sessions. The first
one was a seminar on issues surrounding the question of
Fair Use of archival material. Second, was CINE’s
annual “5 on 5 for 5” Pitch Contest. Third, but no
less exciting, was the opportunity to sit down with Discovery programming
executives in small, freewheeling sessions. Board member Maggie
Stogner provides a brief look at the programs. Pat Aufderheide, Director of American University's Center for Social Media moderated the panel, which included: CINE Lifetime Achievement Honoree Albert Maysles; AU's Washington College of Law professor Peter Jaszi; ITVS executive Tamara Gould; and Kartemquin Films founder Gordon Quinn. The Discussion centered on the gray areas in producing projects with various legal concerns. Confronted with a confusing subject, the panel did a good job of telling filmmakers where we are currently in copyright requirements, and where, perhaps, we are headed. The Center for Social Media also previewed a portion of its new video, “Fair Use and Free Speech in Documentary Film.” For more information, visit the Fair Use Initiative put together by the Center for Social Media late last year. It can be found at http://www.centerforsocialmedia.org/. 5 x 5 x 5 Pitch Session Selected from dozens of submissions, the five diverse pitches were titled; Santa Claus, Citizen Joe, Lunch Money, Water Boys, and Undisclosed Location. Donald Thoms, VP of Discovery Health and Fitness, Discovery Networks, US Production moderated the session. Judges were: John Potthast, WETA; Wendy Douglas, Discovery Health; Bill Margol. Discovery Networks US; David McKillop, Michael Klein, and me, Filmmaker Maggie Stogner. Each of the pitches was original and full of potential. The panel of judges not only picked the winner of the competition, but provided feedback on each pitch on how to improve its clearness, appeal, length, and most of all, its description of a film that could actually be made. The winner? Water Boys from producer Barbara Jones. The smooth professional pitch was both well researched and excellently conceived. Water Boys follows 12 young men from places as diverse as Cape Town and Beijing, in their battle to fulfill their dreams of winning the Americas Cup, the pinnacle of international yacht racing. Sit-Down with Discovery Executives What does it take to meet influential network executives? CINE’s annual Awards Event! After the Pitch Contest, the next hour was devoted small group sit-down sessions with several Discovery executives, featuring frank and interactive discussions on issues facing filmmakers looking for the best ways to develop and present their work. Letter from CINE's President Contact Information
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CINE was thrilled to be to honor the
great documentary filmmaker Albert Maysles at our CINE
Golden Eagle Award on April 18, and to be able to partake
of his wisdom during several of our programs during event
day. We would like everyone
interested in CINE to share in some of Al’s insights. CINE
Board member Leslie Sewell caught up with Al in the midst
of his travels, and they had the following very enlightening
conversation. We think you’ll enjoy it. Thanks
to Leslie and thanks again to Al!
In my personal opinion, next to the Emmys, the
CINE Award is the most prestigious award given to programs
in film and video. The work this year was superb, with CINE
Masters Awards going to the television movie FAITH OF OUR FATHERS
from A&E and another to CONTROL ROOM, the thought provoking
documentary which chronicled life inside Al Jazeera during
the early days of the current Iraqi war.