Filmmakers

Announcing the Winners of the Spring 2017 SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grant

We are thrilled to announce the eight winning projects contending in the Spring 2017 round of SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grants! SFFILM /…

Announcing the Winners of the Spring 2017 SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grant

We are thrilled to announce the eight winning projects contending in the Spring 2017 round of SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grants! SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grants are awarded twice annually to narrative features that will have significant economic or professional impact on the Bay Area filmmaking community; in this round, a total of $300,000 has been distributed to narrative feature film projects at various stages, from screenwriting to post-production. More than $4 million has been awarded since the launch of SFFILM’s flagship grant program in 2009.

Applications are currently being accepted for the Fall 2017 round of SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grants; the deadline to apply is July 28. Find out more at sffilm.org/makers

The jury, which included Noah Cowan, SFFILM Executive Director; Patrick House, culture and science writer for Slate and The New Yorker; Caroline von Kühn, SFFILM Director of Artist Development; Shelley Trott, Director of Arts Strategy and Ventures at the Kenneth Rainin Foundation; and Tristen Tuckfield, film finance executive, noted “This group of finalists was exceptionally strong, and we are thrilled to support these eight bold and deeply human films, which collectively represent such a wide range of tones, styles, voices, and artistic visions. These filmmakers showcase the ever-growing talent coming out of San Francisco, and their work will contribute to the growing strength, diversity, and richness of the Bay Area filmmaking community.”

SPRING 2017 SFFILM / RAININ FILMMAKING GRANT WINNERS

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The Continental
Aron Kantor, writer/director; K.M. Soehnlein, cowriter — screenwriting

A young gay Latino immigrant working at New York’s legendary Continental Baths gets swept up in the burgeoning gay rights movement and the early disco scene while navigating an affair with his married boss.

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Jinn
Nijla Mu’min, writer/director; Avril Speaks, producer — post-production

Summer is a carefree, Black teenage Instagram celebrity whose world is turned upside down when her mother abruptly converts to Islam and becomes a different person. At first resistant to the faith, she begins to reevaluate her identity after becoming attracted to a Muslim classmate, crossing the thin line between physical desire and piety.

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Josephine
Beth de Araújo, writer/director — screenwriting

An obedient eight-year-old girl unintentionally witnesses a rape in Golden Gate Park. Unraveling with fear and paranoia, her subsequent violent outbursts put her family and classmates in jeopardy.

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Music Moves Us
Cyrus Tabar, writer/director — screenwriting

In the near future where music is outlawed in an authoritarian state, a passionate woman and her friends in Oakland, California, throw illegal techno dance parties and broadcast on a bootleg pirate radio station to bring people together.

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Refuge
Mohammad Gorjestani, writer/director; Malcolm Pullinger, producer — screenwriting

Set in 2025, a brewing cyberwar between the US and Iran puts Sonia, a young Iranian refugee and activist, at risk of deportation or internment. Her only escape may come at a greater price than she’s willing to pay.

Mohammad Gorjestani and Malcolm Pullinger

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A Rooster on the Fire Escape
Guetty Felin, writer/director/producer; Danielle Dreis, producer — packaging

Upon coming to America, the Celestin family was hoping to leave behind the traumas of the brutal dictatorship of their tropical native land, but the sacrifices they made for their freedom create a dark spiral from which they might not recover.

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Sorry to Bother You
Boots Riley, writer/director; Jonathan Duffy, George Rush and Kelly Williams, producers — production

Sorry To Bother You tells the story of Cassius Green, a black telemarketer who discovers a magical key to telemarketing success, propelling him into a macabre universe where he is selected to lead a species of genetically manipulated horse-people.

Boots Riley, Jonathan Duffy, George Rush, and Kelly Williams

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We the Animals
Jeremiah Zagar, writer/director; Jeremy Yaches and Christina King, producers — post-production

Based on the bestselling novel by Justin Torres, We the Animals explores the beautiful and savage nature of family and the viscerally charged landscape of youth through the eyes of Jonah, the youngest son of a mixed-race working-class couple as he discovers his artistic identity.

Jeremiah Zagar, Jeremy Yache,s and Christina King

Meet the finalists for the Spring 2017 SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grants

We are very excited to announce the 14 finalist projects contending for the latest round of SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grants! SFFILM /…

Meet the finalists for the Spring 2017 SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grants

We are very excited to announce the 14 finalist projects contending for the latest round of SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grants! SFFILM / Rainin Filmmaking Grants are awarded twice annually to narrative features that will have significant economic or professional impact on the Bay Area filmmaking community; in this round, more than $250,000 will be distributed to narrative feature film projects at various stages of production. More than $4 million has been awarded since the launch of SFFILM’s flagship grant program in 2009. Stay tuned for the announcement of the winners in June!

Find out more at sffilm.org/makers

SPRING 2017 SFFILM / RAININ FILMMAKING GRANT FINALISTS

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The Continental
Aron Kantor, writer/director; K.M. Soehnlein, cowriter — screenwriting

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87 Fleer
Alex Tse, writer/director; Matt Parker, Carly Hugo and Kelly McCormick producers — pre-production

In 1990s working-class San Francisco, Tony makes the jump from junior high to high school. His diverse group of friends is splintered by a whole new world of peer pressure and cliques. Alienated and angry, a series of choices send Tony down a dark path in the search for respect.

Alex Tse, Matt Parker, Carly Hugo, and Kelly McCormick

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Freeland
Kate McLean and Mario Furloni, co-writer/directors; Laura Heberton, producer — production

In the last season of black-market marijuana growing on a remote, failed commune, a mother and a daughter must reconcile their differences in order to survive in an increasingly inhospitable world.

Kate McLean, Mario Furloni, and Laura Heberton

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Jinn
Nijla Mu’min, writer/director; Avril Speaks, producer — post-production

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Josephine
Beth de Araújo, writer/director — screenwriting

An obedient eight-year-old girl unintentionally witnesses a rape in Golden Gate Park. Unraveling with fear and paranoia, her subsequent violent outbursts put her family and classmates in jeopardy.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

The Last Black Man in San Francisco
Joe Talbot, writer/director; Khaliah Neal and Carlton Evans, producers — production

Jimmie Fails dreams of buying back the Victorian home his grandfather built in the heart of San Francisco. Now living in the city’s last, dwindling Black neighborhood with his oddball best friend Prentice, the two misfits search for belonging in the rapidly changing city that seems to have left them behind.

Joe Talbot, Khaliah Neal, and Carlton Evans

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Little Woods
Nia DaCosta, writer/director; Rachael Fung and Gabrielle Nadig, producers — post-production

For years, Ollie has illicitly helped the struggling fellow residents of her North Dakota oil boomtown access Canadian health care and medication. When the authorities catch on, she plans to abandon her crusade, only to be dragged in even deeper after a desperate plea for help from her sister, Deb.

Nia DaCosta, Rachael Fung, and Gabrielle Nadig

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The Lusty
Silas Howard, writer/director; Antonia Crane, cowriter; L.A. Teodosio, producer — packaging

In the late ’90s in San Francisco, due to unsavory work conditions, a dynamic group of irreverent, punk, artist, feminist strippers decide to resist sex-worker stigma and confront the exploitative labor practices at The Lusty Lady Peepshow, resulting in the first successful exotic dancer’s union in the world.

Silas Howard, Antonia Crane, and L.A. Teodosio

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Music Moves Us
Cyrus Tabar, writer/director — screenwriting

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Raja
Deepak Rauniyar, writer/director — screenwriting

Raja is a socially rooted police procedural and a race-against-time thriller, as well as a portrait of Nepal, a complex society on the edge of a new future.

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Refuge
Mohammad Gorjestani, writer/director; Malcolm Pullinger, producer — screenwriting

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

A Rooster on the Fire Escape
Guetty Felin, writer/director/producer; Danielle Dreis, producer — packaging

Upon coming to America, the Celestin family was hopping to leave behind the traumas of the brutal dictatorship of their tropical native land, but the sacrifices they made for their freedom create dark spiral from which they might not recover.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Sorry to Bother You
Boots Riley, writer/director; Jonathan Duffy, George Rush and Kelly Williams, producers — production

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

We the Animals
Jeremiah Zagar, writer/director; Jeremy Yaches and Christina King, producers — post-production

‘A Bad Idea Gone Wrong’ Premiere at SXSW

Jason Headley talks the about the laughs and nerves behind a a successful first outing

A Bad Idea Gone Wrong.

It’s possible I was just too dumb to be nervous.

That’s what people kept asking me before my first feature film, “A Bad Idea Gone Wrong,” premiered at SXSW: “Are you nervous?” And I honestly didn’t understand the question. The movie was finished. I’d watched it enough times, building it piece by piece, to have no perspective on it whatsoever. But I still had a low, lingering feeling that I’d made the movie I set out to make. So my work was done. All I had to do was sit in a theater and watch it with a bunch of strangers.

“I’m excited.” That’s what I would tell people. And I meant it.

Then the rain started.

Our world premiere was on a Saturday afternoon and it was raining pretty good. One thing I hadn’t considered was the possibility that I might not watch the movie with a bunch of strangers after all, but with a smattering of wet, grumpy people in a mostly empty theater.

I started to get nervous. There was a lot going on as the doors opened. We were quarantined in a green room underneath the theater for a while, either due to a health scare or because we were being too noisy. (It’s because we were being too noisy.) When we got let out of detention, we had to take various configurations of photos on the red carpet and I honestly had no idea how many people had gone into the theater. Finally free to take a look, I saw nothing but sweet relief: The theater was full. Three hundred people, some of them wet, none of them grumpy.

I was back to being excited.

People were laughing from the very start. The movie is a comedy, so that’s a good thing. Great laughs and gasps in all the right places. It was a true rush listening this bunch of strangers go on the ride. To the point where, near the end, my awareness of all the effort it took to get here — all the failure and rejection and opportunities made and teamwork required — began to cause a disturbance in and around my eyeballs. I was about to cry. Luckily, I come from a place where we stifle our emotions with great rigor and proficiency. I wasn’t about to cry my way through my Q&A. So I pulled it together and just felt some good, old-fashioned joy about the whole thing. A rare indulgence.

Three days later, we all went to the awards ceremony. I was neither nervous nor excited. I felt the same as when I took my brother’s girlfriend to prom: Certain I had no chance. Our film was in Narrative Competition, but it’s a comedy and comedy doesn’t win awards. Even at the Golden Globes, where Comedy has its own category, “The Martian” won. The. Martian. So I was just sitting there, minding my own business, when judge Scott Mantz started talking about our movie. He was talking about a Special Jury Recognition for Best Ensemble. And suddenly we were onstage and I got to sing the praises of my cast — Matt Jones, Eleanore Pienta, and Will Rogers — into a microphone in front of a thousand people.

Jason Headley

It was a superb experience all around. We finished the night at a diner at 3 a.m., too tired to eat but too wired to sleep. Just like that, my first feature was out in the world, all on its own. And I’m ready to get started on the next one.
– Jason Headley

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The Force Was With Peter Nicks at Sundance

A Note From The Doc Director

I remember the first time I went to Sundance. It was 1999. I was a young film student and my head was exploding at all the films taking their first step out into the world: American Movie, On The Ropes, Regret To Inform, Three Seasons, Tumbleweeds. But what really made it special was seeing Jon Else win the filmmaker’s trophy for Sing Faster: A Stagehand’s Ring Cycle. It was in that moment that the seed was planted.

Peter Nicks wins the Directing Award in the Documentary category at Sundance Film Festival.

In the intervening years I attended the festival, but never with a film. In 2012 I submitted my first feature documentary THE WAITING ROOM, but didn’t make the cut. I knew many worthy films didn’t make it in, but still, I wondered what it would be like to stand on the stage at the Egyptian or the Temple. When I finally got the call I was in my garden, pulling weeds in between wrestling with a cut of my new film THE FORCE, a film that resisted completion at every turn. Sundance programmers Caroline Libresco and Harry Vaughn were on the phone. I immediately knew I had gotten into Sundance.

The Force (2017) Photo courtesy of Peter Nicks.

The festival was the culmination of years of work to develop my craft. And it was to a large extent the result of my 5-year collaboration with producer Linda Davis and editor Lawrence Lerew that began with THE WAITING ROOM. They were not just collaborators. They were difference makers. And then there was Dave Eisenberg and Lois Vossen at ITVS and Independent Lens again by my side again as co-producers. And of course it was no accident that Jon Else, who inspired me so many years before — and had become my mentor & friend — was now my executive producer. This is how the film got into Sundance.

The Force (2017) Photo courtesy of Peter Nicks.

The days and nights of the fest were long, and sometimes stressful. A record amount of snow was dumped on this ordinarily sleepy mountain town. I fought off a threatening cold with liberal doses of Dayquil, which seemed to contain magical qualities. My wife Vanna, daughter Karina and son Paolo came for a visit at just the right time, giving me the perspective to understand that we do not do this alone. And then it happened. I was on stage accepting the prize for best director.

These are some of the people and the memories that will sustain me for the remainder of my career. This business of independent filmmakers is brutal, unforgiving, and fulfilling beyond description. And as we turn our attention down the road we’re excited to think about how special the homecoming will be at the San Francisco Film Festival in April. See you then!

Best,
Pete