Final Draft

WIF Foundation Announces Film Finishing Fund Recipients

The Women In Film Foundation (WIFF) is thrilled to announce the successful completion of its 23rd Annual Film Finishing Fund. This year, entries were reviewed by the wonderful team of WIFF, WIF Board volunteers and industry professionals. Finalists were ultimately chosen from a field of applicants from all over the world.

This year, six feature documentaries were chosen. Winners include: Amanda Pope from Los Angeles, CA, for the documentary feature The Legend of Pancho Barnes; Lonnie Lardner from Thousand Oaks, CA, for the documentary feature Angel in the Hood; Heather Ross from Los Angeles, CA, for the documentary feature Girls on the Wall; Jessica Gerstle from New York, NY, for the documentary feature Travels with my Dad; Rebecca Schanberg from Chicago, IL , for the documentary feature Do No Harm; Roberta Grossman from Los Angeles, CA, for the documentary feature Blessed is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh.

The Foundation sincerely thanks Kim Roussel at Cinespace and our amazing panel of judges for their invaluable support.

23rd Annual Film Finishing Fund Recipients:

The Legend of Pancho Barnes
This documentary feature by Amanda Pope and Nicholas Sparks, Los Angeles, CA, chronicles the thrilling and extraordinary times of aviation pioneer Florence Lowe "Pancho" Barnes, an ill-behaved woman who made history.

Angel in the Hood
A documentary feature by Lonnie Lardner, Thousand Oaks, CA, about two tough Latina Gangster girls that discover a powerful source of spirituality and inspiration in one of the world's most celebrated childhood icons: Disney's "Tinker Bell."

Girls on the Wall
This documentary feature by Heather Ross, Los Angeles, CA, follows the teenage girls of Warrenville Prison as they are offered a shot at redemption in a most unlikely form: a musical.

Travels with my Dad
A documentary feature by Jessica Gerstle, New York, NY, that tells the story of Claude Gerstle and his daughter. When Claude, a surgeon and athlete, suffers a bicycle accident that leaves him a quadriplegic, he and his daughter, Jessica, discover hope in a politicized area of science called stem cells. Travels with my Dad is a wheelchair odyssey to understand the science and political discourse of this hot-button issue.

Do No Harm
This documentary feature by Rebecca Schanberg, Chicago, IL, tells the incredible and often outrageous story of two men in a small, southern town who endured relentless attacks in order to draw attention to the plight of the uninsured.

Blessed is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh
This documentary feature by Roberta Grossman, Los Angeles, CA follows the story of Hannah Senesh as she parachutes into Nazi-occupied Europe to help save Hungary's Jews - only to be imprisoned alongside the person she wants to rescue the most - her mother. A harrowing account of the only military rescue mission for Jews during the Holocaust, the film is also a moving mother-daughter tale.

For more information about the WIF Film Finishing Fund, go to www.wif.org

May 13, 2008 1:23 PM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content

2008 Indian FIlm Festival of Los Angeles Announces Winners

The 6th Annual Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles announced its 2008 Award winners with Richie Mehta’s AMAL as the winner of the Grand Jury Prize for Best Narrative Feature and Shivajee Chandrabhushan’s FROZEN receiving a Special Mention in the category. Yunus Vally’s THE GLOW OF WHITE WOMEN was named as the winner of the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary with Liz Mermin’s SHOT IN BOMBAY receiving a Special Mention.

Atul Sabwarhal’s’s MIDNIGHT LOST AND FOUND won the award for Best Short with Audience Awards going to Manish Acharya’s LOINS OF PUNJAB PRESENTS for Narrative, Christopher Mitchell’s SUPER 30 for Documentary and Preeya Nair’s QUAMAR – WORKING TO LIVE for the Short Film category.

Christina Marouda, IFFLA Director, said, “This year’s slate of films represented the most diverse and wide spectrum of style and art being produced by the Indian filmmaking industry today. This year’s festival took a significant step toward not just presenting the filmmakers works to the public but also becoming an important business portal to India. ”

JURY AWARDS:
BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE: AMAL
DIR: Richie Mehta
Cast: Rupinder Nagra, Vic Sahay, Koel Purie, Roshan Seth, Vic Sahay, Naseeruddin Shah, Seema Biswas

SPECIAL MENTION: FROZEN
DIR: Shivajee Chandrabhushan
Cast: Danny Denzongpa, Gauri, Angchuk, Raj Zutshi, Yashpal Sharma, Shakeel Khan, Shilpa Shukla

BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE: THE GLOW OF WHITE WOMEN
DIR: Yunus Vally

SPECIAL MENTION: SHOT IN BOMBAY
DIR: Liz Mermin

SHORT: MIDNIGHT LOST AND FOUND
DIR: Atul Sabharwal

AUDIENCE AWARDS:
NARRATIVE: LOINS OF PUNJAB PRESENTS
DIR: Manish Acharya
Cast: Shabana Azmi, Ajay Naidu, Ayesha Dharker, Darshan Jariwala, Samrat Chakrabarti, Michael Raimondi

DOCUMENTARY: SUPER 30
DIR: Christopher Mitchell

SHORT: QUAMAR – WORKING TO LIVE
DIR: Preeya Nair

The six-day festival was populated by more than 6500 film goers, with over 60 filmmakers attending the screenings of their films. Both numbers demonstrated significant growth from the previous year’s edition with the filmmaker total in particular doubling last year’s number.

After reviewing 350 submissions for the festival, the 2008 IFFLA lineup showcased 21 features (16 narrative and 5 documentary) and 12 shorts for a total of 33 films representing 8 countries.

May 10, 2008 5:59 PM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content

Nevada Film Office's 21st Screenwriting Competition

21: It's the lucky number for blackjack enthusiasts, 20-year-old Americans, and most recently as the title of the box office hit Sony feature. It is a sure bet that the 21st year of the Nevada Film Office’s Screenwriting Competition will be auspicious because of advantageous changes made to the scoring, judging, and compensation elements of the contest.

While the administration of the contest has changed, the rules and criteria are the same. The submission period for this international competition is May 1, through August 1, 2008. Only unsold standard industry format feature length scripts will be accepted. The content must not be pornographic in nature, and 75 percent of locations in the script must be filmable in Nevada. Writers may enter multiple scripts with an entry fee of $15 for Nevada residents and $30 for nonresidents, per script.

Each year the competition draws talent from all over the world. The 2007 competition honored Keith Melcher with the Best Screenplay title, and Alan Donahue and Robert Cochrane with second and third place, respectively. Along with Final Draft screenwriting software and gifts form the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, the winners received a script consultation with acclaimed author and screenwriter, Dan Decker. Once the writers revise their scripts, the Nevada Film Office will send copies to production companies and actors’ agents in L.A., in hopes for project deal.

The new structure of the 2008 competition will better allow writers to hone their talent and gain exposure in the industry. Detailed analysis, expert advice, instructive prize materials, and support in the industry are a few areas of improvement for the 21st NFO’s Screenwriting Competition. Since this is a boutique competition, meaning there are less than 200 entries, writers can expect more judges to read their work, more feedback, more of an opportunity to be recognized, and overall, better odds for hitting the literary jackpot.

For complete rules and details visit www.nevadafilm.com or contact Sarah Bontrager at the Nevada Film Office at (702) 486-2713.

May 6, 2008 8:59 AM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content

Final Draft Newsletter

The new Final Draft Newsletter is now online.

Contents are as follows:
1. Syd Field's Big Break Script Tips
2. Final Draft Software - Friends and Family Discount
3. ScriptXpert: Special Discount Offer for Registered Users
4. Script Magazine Special Springtime Offer
5. Join Final Draft and Script Across the Web!
6. Reseller Spotlight
7. Writers Marketplace

To read the newsletter, go here.

May 1, 2008 10:37 AM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content

Visit Final Draft at the LA Time Festival of Books April 26 & 27

The Festival of Books, held on UCLA Campus April 26th and 27th, is the largest book festival in Southern California and features over 400 exhibitors!

Visit Final Draft at The Writers Store booth #536!

It will be a great event, so don't miss out!

LA Times Festival of Books

Apr 24, 2008 12:22 PM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content

Screenwriter Budd Schulberg to receive WGAw Laurel Award

Acclaimed screenwriter Budd Schulberg (On the Waterfront) will receive the Writers Guild of America, West's 2008 Laurel Award for Screen, honoring lifetime achievement in outstanding writing for motion pictures, at the WGAW's upcoming Honorary Awards Luncheon on April 23 at the Westin Bonaventure Hotel in Los Angeles.

Having penned some of the most memorable films in American film history, Schulberg has carved out a lengthy career as both a screenwriter and novelist. Perhaps best known for his screenplay for 1954's searing working-class drama, On the Waterfront, Schulberg earned a Writers Guild Award for his work on the film (Screen: Best Written American Drama, 1955), as well as an Academy Award (Best Writing, Story and Screenplay) the same year.

His other notable screen credits include A Face in the Crowd (1957), based on his own short story, "Your Arkansas Traveler," and winner of a Berlin Festival Award for Best Screenplay; Wind Across the Everglades (1958); The Harder They Fall (1955), screenplay by Philip Yordan, based on Schulberg's own novel; Government Girl (1943), screenplay by Dudley Nichols, adaptation by Budd Schulberg, based on the published serial by Adela Rogers St. Johns; Little Orphan Annie, screenplay by Budd Schulberg and Sam Ornitz, screen story by Sam Ornitz & Endre Bohem, based on the comic strip by Harold Gray; and Winter Carnival (1939), screenplay by Budd Schulberg and Maurice Rapf and Lester Cole.

On the television front, his past works include the 1981 telefilm A Question of Honor, based on the book by Sonny Grosso with Phil Rosenberg; the documentary Once Upon A Time…Is Now: The Story of Princess Grace (1977); and General Electric Theater TV adaptations of his own short stories, Memory in White and The Legend That Walks Like a Man (both 1960).

Schulberg's father, B. P. Schulberg, was a pioneer film producer who ran Paramount Studios during the 1930's. An entertainment insider raised in Hollywood, a then-young Schulberg created a sensation in 1941 in both the entertainment industry and the literary world when he published his legendary novel-cum-expose, What Makes Sammy Run?, delivering one of Hollywood's most memorable anti-heroes ever in title character Sammy Glick, earning the National Critics Award for Best First Novel, and quickly becoming a runaway best-seller with millions sold in paperback. Over the years, Schulberg has seen his perennially popular book transformed into several well-received television and Broadway productions throughout the '40s, '50s, and '60s. While Hollywood has yet to produce a big-screen adaptation of his scathing take on the industry, several studios have come close in recent years. In 2002, Random House introduced a 50th anniversary edition of Sammy to whole new generation of readers, along with Schulberg's collection of short stories, "Love, Action, Laughter, and Other Sad Tales."

Schulberg’s other works of fiction include Some Faces in the Crowd (2008), his latest collection of short stories published in January; Ringside: A Treasury of Boxing Reportage (2007), culling the best of his work from over five decades of writing on the “sweet science;” his autobiography Moving Pictures: Memories of a Hollywood Prince (2003); and novels including The Harder They Fall and The Disenchanted. His non-fiction works include From the Ashes: Voices of Watts, Loser and Still Champion: Muhammad Ali, The Four Seasons of Success, and an updated version of that book, Writers in America.

A lifelong boxing fan, Schulberg continues to cover title fights for various magazines, first published in Sparring with Hemingway and Other Legends of the Fight Game, and more recently in Ringside. He has been inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame and remains the only non-boxer ever chosen as a Living Legend of Boxing by the World Boxing Association. Schulberg has taught creative writing at Dartmouth College, Southhampton College of Long Island University, and Hofstra University, receiving honorary degrees from all three.

* * *

Awarded to a Writers Guild member who has advanced the literature of motion pictures and made outstanding contributions to the profession of the screenwriter, the Laurel Award for Screen has been received in previous years by such notable writers as Billy Wilder, Horton Foote, John Huston, Blake Edwards, Mel Brooks, David Mamet, Lawrence Kasdan, and last year's honoree, Robert Benton.

To further salute Schulberg on his lifetime achievement, the Writers Guild Foundation is set to host "An Evening with Budd Schulberg" (2008), his latest collection of short stories published in January; (2003); and novels including on Thursday, April 24, at 7:00 p.m. at the Writers Guild Theater (135 S. Doheny Drive) in Beverly Hills. Moderated by F.X. Feeney, this special tribute event – which will begin with a screening of his Oscar-winning classic On the Waterfront – will feature Schulberg on stage, sharing insights and anecdotes on his seven-decade career. A reception will follow. Limited seats are available; for ticket information, please visit www.wgfoundation.org, or call: 323-782-4692. Proceeds benefit the Writers Guild Foundation Shavelson-Webb Library and other WG Foundation programs.

Apr 21, 2008 6:26 PM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content

Milk & Cookies opens Friday at the Sidewalk Studio Theatre

A dead bank teller. A housewife on the run. Milk on the move. All signs point to Montana. If you're anywhere near LA, don't miss the world premiere of Milk and Cookies, a wacky new comedy by Jonathan Dorf, directed by Sal Romeo.

What do you do when your children poison the cookies they gave to the teller at the bank’s drive-through window? If you’re Margaret Nancy Reagan Ballmoth, you run away—to Montana. With the help of milk conspiracy theorist Bruce, will she find the mythical Rufus and get a new identity? What will happen to her allegedly killer kids? And what if the milk conspiracy turns out to be reality…? With a carton of two percent gone missing, payback could be a &@#@!

Dorf, whose plays have been seen throughout the United States and abroad, is the resident playwriting expert for Final Draft and The Writers Store, and author of the popular website, Playwriting101.com.

Performances are Friday and Saturday nights at 8 PM from April 18-May 24 at the intimate Sidewalk Studio Theatre, 4150 Riverside Drive, Toluca Lake (around the corner from Warner Bros. studios). Tickets are $20. Reservations are highly recommended. Call 818-558-5702 or visit http://www.sidewalkstudiotheatre.com/.

Apr 16, 2008 9:32 AM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content

Final Draft Article in Today’s Los Angeles Daily News

Final Draft was written about in today's LA Daily News.

Just Add Words

SCRIPTED: Oscar-winning screenwriter Diablo Cody among fans of Calabasas firm's creative software

Read article by Gregory J. Wilcox here:

http://www.finaldraft.com/company/press/press-mentions/pm-20080414-dailynews.php

Apr 14, 2008 1:53 PM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content

Final Draft Newsletter

Check out the latest Final Draft Newsletter

Apr 8, 2008 8:40 AM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content

Method Fest Youth Day

Final Draft is excited to be a sponsor of this year’s Method Fest in Calabasas.

On Sunday, Final Draft, along with Sony, sponsored Festival Youth Day. The day included a seminar, short film screenings, and a feature film, as well as an acting workshop hosted by Ron Gilbert.

This seminar turned out to be a great opportunity for youth filmmakers and beginning filmmakers of any age to learn from industry professionals, film school graduates, and film school professors. It covered the pros and cons of a degree in film, the paths to entry-level jobs in the entertainment industry, and much more. The panel was moderated by Eric Gersh, Owner of EMG Studios and Video Production Instructor for Las Virgenes School District.

The panelists were, as follows:
• Anthony Grippa, director of "Running Funny" (Method Fest film '08), Rutgers University graduate
• Matt Christensen, producer of "Running Funny" (Method Fest film '08), UCLA graduate
• Jurg Walther: Award-winning cinematographer, Chapman University professor
• Lynn Hamrick: DGA Award-winning director, Chapman University professor, director of Stanley Marshall's Myth (Method Fest film '06)
• Jill Dickerson: Producer/Writer/Story Supervisor/Casting Director, Harvard and NYU graduate
• Todd Baker: Producer/Sound engineer, Cal State Long Beach professor, USC graduate

The Youth Films Lineup, which followed the seminar, included:
• "Goodbye" by Aaron Blum
• "Chope" by Michael Fishbein
• "Hillary and Obama" by Charlie Kaufman
• "The Boy and the Bird" by Erica Leshon, Mor Weizman, Natalie Nacson, Cameron Dutra, and John Garcia
• "Artistic Seclusion" by Justin Lieberman
• "Water Damage" by Kellen Moore
• "Petals of Hope" by Sarah Morcos
• "Winter's Hero" by Alexi Sciutto
• "Sweet Tooth" by Mason Shefa
• "Millie" by Chris Sullivan

The educational and inspiring day was capped off with a screening of the feature film "Running Funny." The film is the story of Michael and Eddie, broke college graduates who rent an "apartment garage" from Stan, an old blind war veteran, and begin their tumultuous transition into the real world.

The Method Festival continues until April 3. For further info, visit http://methodfest.com

Mar 31, 2008 12:11 PM | Link | Comments (0) | Add Comment | Report Content