2007 TFPF Panelists Announced

The Austin Film Society is proud to announce the members of this year's Texas Filmmakers' Production Fund review panel: documentary producer and director Sarah Price (AMERICAN MOVIE, THE YES MEN, SUMMERCAMP!); acclaimed underground Chicago filmmaker James Fotopoulos (MIGRATING FORMS, BACK AGAINST THE WALL, THE NEST); and Rachel Rosen, director of programming for Film Independent and the Los Angeles Film Festival.

With the help of these three panelists, the Austin Film Society this month will give away a record $150,000 in cash awards, goods and services to emerging film and video artists in the state of Texas. The Austin Film Society received 218 applications to the Texas Filmmakers Production Fund this year, the highest number ever and a 60 percent increase from 2006’s 136 applications.

During the panelists' visit, Austin Film Society will present special screenings of Sarah Price's documentary THE YES MEN on Tuesday, August 28, and James Fotopoulos’s feature BACK AGAINST THE WALL on Wednesday, August 29. Both screenings will be at the Regal Arbor Cinema at Great Hills beginning at 9:30 p.m. Admission is free, and tickets may be reserved online beginning Monday, August 20.

Awards will be announced Friday, August 31.

“The grant program has never been more vital, and we look forward to supporting the future of Texas film with a new round of grants this year,” AFS Director of Artist Services Bryan Poyser said.

TFPF success stories from this year include 1996 grant recipient George Ratliff, who sold his psychological thriller JOSHUA to distributor Fox Searchlight for a reported $3.7 million at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival. Austinite Chris Eska premiered his feature AUGUST EVENING, a TFPF grant recipient in 2005 and 2006, at the Los Angeles Film Festival where it won the $50,000 Target Filmmaker Award and sold to start-up distributor Maya Releasing.

Since its creation in 1996, the Texas Filmmakers' Production Fund has given away $600,000 in cash and approximately $75,000 in goods and services to 222 film and video projects. TFPF is an effort to redress the loss of public funds for filmmakers and is funded through revenues from benefit film premieres and private and corporate donations and the Texas Commission on the Arts.

Sarah Price is an award-winning filmmaker whose films include the feature documentaries SUMMERCAMP! (currently in release from Argot Pictures), THE YES MEN (released by UA/MGM in 2004), CAESAR’S PARK (broadcast on the Sundance Channel in 2003), and AMERICAN MOVIE (released Sony Pictures Classics in 1999 and Grand Jury Prize winner for Best Documentary at the Sundance Film Festival in 1999). Additional work includes a music video for Warner Bros. artist Har Mar Superstar, and artist David Robbins’ TV variety show, The Ice Cream Social (the MOMA-Paris, 2004). Other notable credits include co-editor of Chris Smith's AMERICAN JOB (Sundance Film Festival, 1996) and sound on Michael Moore's THE BIG ONE (Miramax, 1997).

Chicago-based filmmaker James Fotopoulos has made more than 100 films and videos. In 2003 Facets Video released his acclaimed first three features (ZERO, MIGRATING FORMS, BACK AGAINST THE WALL) on DVD. His work has been screened at many national and international venues, including the Walker Art Center, the Andy Warhol Museum, the New York Underground Film Festival, the Rotterdam International Film Festival, the Sundance Channel and many others. In 2002 he had a retrospective at the Anthology Film Archives and was exhibited in the 2004 Whitney Biennial. In 2005 he received the Creative Capital Grant for his video on the life of Richard Nixon.

Rachel Rosen is the director of programming for Film Independent and the Los Angeles Film Festival. Previously, Rosen was associate director of programming for the San Francisco International Film Festival where she was a programmer for seven years. She has worked in various capacities for the New York Film Festival, New York’s Film Forum and Tri-Star Pictures. A graduate of Stanford University’s Master of Arts program in Documentary Film, Rosen directed SERIOUS WEATHER, a short documentary that was shown at the Vancouver and San Francisco International Film Festivals. She is an occasional contributor on the subject of documentary film to Film Comment magazine.

Special thanks to TFPF sponsors the Texas Commission on the Arts and Kodak and 2007 sponsors VooDoo Cowboy Entertainment, Regal Cinemas and the Driskill Hotel.