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The first San Diego World Film Festival wrapped on June 11th after
ten days of screening over 80 independent, studio and foreign
films. As befitted a festival with an Honorary Advisory Board
that included both independent director John Sayles and Sony Pictures
CEO John Calley, the Festival was an eclectic blend of indie films
and special advance screenings of studio product (such as "The
Truman Show"). According to Festival Director Jo Moulton, "We
wanted to come up with a festival format that was unique, that
recognized talent of all types and brought them together, without
distinguishing between the A and B list. At our awards gala, we
had one table with student directors, low-budget feature directors
and the legendary John Frankenheimer all sitting together."
Winning the Audience Award for Best Independent Feature was Chris
ver Wiel's lyrical life/death allegory, "The Waiting Game." Chris
Eyre's "Smoke Signals" took top jury honors, receiving awards
for Best Actor, Screenplay, Director and American Independent
Feature. Tony Gatlif's "Gadjo Dilo" won for Best Foreign Film
while a special jury award was given to Phillipe De Broca's
"En Garde" as well as Andres Heinz's "Origin of the Species."
Corky Quackenbush's "Reinfather" won for Best Short while Rick
Wilkinson's "A Short Wait Between Trains" and Patrick Yu's "A
Spider's Thread" tied for Best Student Film. Val Keller's "Winged"
won the audience award for Best Student Film while David Deblinger's
"The Callback" won the audience award for best short. |
