Reactor Films, Santa Monica, has reached an agreement with feature filmmaker Stephen Sommers (The Mummy, The Mummy Returns, Van Helsing) to direct spots. Sommers has already wrapped Reactor-produced ad fare for Office Depot out of The Kaplan Thaler Group, New York. He is also slated to direct a feature film based on Edwin Balmer’s classic When Worlds Collide for Dreamworks and Paramount Pictures….Chris Sallquist has returned to Seattle-headquartered Digital Kitchen as its client experience director. He comes over from MRM, Los Angeles. During his first tour of duty at Digital Kitchen, Sallquist served as an experience planner in the brand theatre/branded entertainment arena…..Sound designer/composer Juan Sosa has come aboard Creative Bubble, New York. He is looking to reach out to the Hispanic advertising market and propel music production for the editorial/visual effects/design/music/sound/interactive/production company, which maintains New York-based sister shops Burst, Foam and Creative Broadband….Longstanding Dallas-headquartered post house charlieuniformtango has wrapped its first television commercial entailing turnkey services from directing to casting, props, line producing and postproduction. The spot for children’s party salon Sweet and Sassy out of Dallas agency Launch was directed by Jeremy Bartel who recently joined charlieuniformtango. The 22-year-old Bartel had previously been working in the Tulsa area as a freelance film director…
“Atropia” and “Twinless” Win Marquee Prizes At Sundance Film Festival
The war satire “Atropia,” about actors in a military role-playing facility, won the grand jury prize in the Sundance Film Festival’s U.S. dramatic competition, while the Dylan O’Brien movie “Twinless” got the coveted audience award.
Juries and programmers for the 41st edition of the independent film festival announced the major prizewinners Friday in Park City, Utah.
Other grand jury winners included the documentaries “Seeds,” about farmers in rural Georgia and “Cutting Through the Rocks,” about the first elected councilwoman in an Iranian village. The Indian drama “Sabar Bonda (Cactus Pears),” about a city dweller mourning his father in the western Indian countryside, won the top prize in the world cinema competition.
“It’s for my dad,” said writer and director Rohan Parashuram Kanawade. His late father, he said, was the one who encouraged him to pursue filmmaking.
Audiences also get to vote on their own awards, where James Sweeney’s “Twinless,” about the bromance between two men who meet in a twin bereavement support group, triumphed in the U.S. dramatic category. O’Brien also won a special jury award for his acting.
The U.S. documentary audience award went to “André is an Idiot,” a life-affirming film about dying of colon cancer. Other audience picks were “Prime Minister,” about former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, and “DJ Ahmet,” a coming-of-age film about a 15-year-old boy in North Macedonia.
Mstyslav Chernov, the Oscar-winning Associated Press journalist, won the world cinema documentary directing award for his latest dispatch from Ukraine, “2000 Meters to Andriivka,” a joint production between the AP and PBS Frontline.
“Here’s to all... Read More