Previous Filmmakers on the Edge

FILMMAKER ON THE EDGE AWARD WINNERS

· 2007 Todd Solondz
· 2006 Gregg Araki
· 2005 Mary Harron
· 2004 Jim Jarmusch
· 2003 Todd Haynes
· 2002 Gus Van Sant
· 2001 Ted Hope and James Schamus
· 2000 Christine Vachon
· 1999 John Waters

2007 FILMMAKER ON THE EDGE: Todd Solondz

Todd Solondz was born in Newark, New Jersey and grew up in the suburbs. In 1996 WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE, a feature he produced, wrote, and directed, won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival and many other awards. In 1998, HAPPINESS, which he wrote and directed, won the International Critics Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, and was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Screenplay. His next film STORYTELLING premiered at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival, and was named one of the "ten best films of the year" by The New York Times. PALINDROMES premiered in competition at the 2004 Venice Film Festival, as well as at that year's New York and Toronto Film Festivals. Next up is LIFE DURING WARTIME, which Solondz recently described as a sequel to, or riff on, HAPPINESS. "Many of the characters from [my] movies unexpectedly beckoned to me, and so I have explored new ways of enlarging their stories, with the intent to recast them from a fresh perspective." Whatever Solondz makes, we know the world will be watching.

2006 FILMMAKER ON THE EDGE: GREGG ARAKI

One of the most unconventional and relentlessly intruiging voices in independent cinema, filmmaker Gregg Araki emerged on the film scene with a bang with THE LIVING END in 1992, establishing him as one of the key figures in the "New Queer Cinema." Dubbed by many an American-indie Goddard, Araki's films serve as a blueprint for American independent filmmaking over the past decades: from the no-budget guerilla style of his early works to the assured skill of a master, which he displayed in his most recent film MYSTERIOUS SKIN, for which he received a Best Director nomination at the 2005 Independent Spirit Awards. Provocative, controversial, committed, and singularly gifted, Gregg Araki is a unique voice in modern cinema. He was honored with the Festival's highest honor: 2006 Filmmaker on the Edge.

2005 FILMMAKER ON THE EDGE: MARY HARRON

Mary Harron is as controversial as her films. She exhibits an unabashed penchant for telling the truth, however unpopular. Her work maintains feminist overtones with often dark disturbing characters intensified by her acute dedication to casting choices. In her debut feature, I Shot Andy Warhol (1996), Lili Taylor gives a tour-de-force performance as the real-life character Valerie Solanas, a paranoid delusional staunch lesbian feminist who shot and wounded '60s pop artist icon Andy Warhol. The film raised eyebrows for what was considered an overly sympathetic depiction of the main character. Her equally provocative second feature, American Psycho (2000), starred Christian Bale and was based on the legendary Bret Easton Ellis novel about a Wall Street big shot in the 1980's turned murderer. The film was met with much controversy upon its making and release and officially launched Harron into the spotlight for her cinematographic artistry and masterful adaptation of a highly controversial book.

Harron's forthcoming The Notorious Bettie Page (2005) starring Gretchen Mol is much anticipated and slated for release in 2005 by HBO Films. She is currently in pre-production for her next film Please Kill Me , based on Legs McNeil's bestselling book. In addition, Harron has directed some of televisions edgiest shows, including "The L Word," "Six Feet Under," and "Oz". Raised in Toronto, educated at England's Oxford University and currently residing in New York City, Harron began her filmmaking career creating documentaries for British television. Before working in film, she was a journalist in the rock music industry and helped launch the first punk magazine, Punk . She was the first writer to interview The Sex Pistols for an American publication.

2004 FILMMAKER ON THE EDGE: JIM JARMUSCH

Jarmusch 's cinematic achievements over the past three decades include Stranger Than Paradise (1984), Down By Law (1986), Mystery Train (1989), Dead Man (1995), Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999), and his most recent Coffee and Cigarettes (2004).

Appropriately, 2004 was the 20th anniversary of the release of Jarmusch's break-through underground classic Stranger Than Paradise , which won the Camera d'Or for Best New Director at the Cannes Film Festival. In 1987, Jarmusch won the Best Artistic Contribution Prize at Cannes, for Mystery Train .

2003 FILMMAKER ON THE EDGE: TODD HAYNES

Independent filmmaker and director Todd Haynes , whose recent cinematic achievement, Far From Heaven , was in center spotlight at 2003's prestigious Independent Spirit Awards, where it won Best Feature, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Cinematography.

Hayne's work over the past two decades ( Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, Poison, Safe, Velvet Goldmine ) established him as a maverick filmmaker, perpetually pushing the boundaries of cinema and creating stimulating, thought-provoking work.

His feature debut Poison took the Grand Prize at the 1991 Sundance Film Festival. Safe (1995), a compelling story about environmental illness and its destructive effects, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and also showed at the Cannes International Film Festival. Safe was voted by 65 film critics as the best film of the 90's in the 2000 Village Voice Critics' Poll. His third feature as writer/director, Velvet Goldmine , premiered at the 1998 Cannes International Film Festival and earned Haynes a Special Jury Prize for Artistic Contribution. Velvet Goldmine won an Independent Spirit Award for Best Cinematography. It also garnered a British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Award and an Academy Award nomination for Best Costume Design.

While still in high school, Haynes produced his first film, a short about contemporary teenage life. He studied at Brown University, and there directed his first film. After college, Haynes moved to New York where he launched Apparatus Productions, a non-profit organization to support independent films, with Christine Vachon and Barry Ellsworth.

2002 FILMMAKER ON THE EDGE: Gus Van Sant

Acclaimed director Gus Van Sant received the 2002 Filmmaker on the Edge Award. Van Sant's notable films include My Own Private Idaho , To Die For , Good Will Hunting , and Gerry .

His debut film was Mala Noche (1985), a black and white film named by the Los Angeles Times as the year's "Best Independent Film." The director made Drugstore Cowboy (1989), which won an Independent Spirit Award for his screenplay and received great critical acclaim, furthering Van Sant's reputation as a gifted director. Van Sant's next effort, My Own Private Idaho (1991), also won the Independent Spirit Award for best screenplay.

The success of To Die For (1995), Van Sant's first film for a major studio (Columbia), put him on the road to future projects like Good Will Hunting (1997), which was a critical and commercial achievement. The film received several Academy Award nominations, including a Best Director nomination for Van Sant. It won a Best Screenplay Oscar for Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, and a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for Robin Williams.

Van Sant's film career was shaped in his early years, when his family moved frequently. One constant in his childhood was an interest in painting and Super-8 filmmaking. While still in high school, he began making semi-autobiographical shorts. Van Sant's artistic interests took him to the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), where classmates included David Byrne and other members of the Talking Heads. It was also at RISD that Van Sant met avant-garde directors like Stan Brakhage, Jonas Mekas, and Andy Warhol. After some time in Europe, Van Sant secured a job in Los Angeles as a production assistant to writer-director Ken Shapiro, then returned to the east coast to work in a New York ad agency, before beginning his filmmaking career in earnest.

2001 FILMMAKER ON THE EDGE: Ted Hope and James Schamus

Ted Hope and James Schamus are credited with some of the most acclaimed art-house hits of the past decade including many award-winning Ang Lee productions such as The Ice Storm and The Wedding Banquet (James Schamus also co-executive produced and co-wrote the Academy award winning Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon ). Hope and Schamus have had a close professional association having co-founded Good Machine, an acclaimed New York-based film production company. Since 1991 Hope and Schamus have collectively been associated with a wide variety of award-winning independent film projects, launching two pivotal feature debuts in their early years -- Todd Haynes' 1991 Poison (executive produced by Schamus) and Ang Lee's 1992 Pushing Hands (produced by Hope). Over the past decade, they have built a reputation on discovering and nurturing new talent, and developing long-term associations with them along the way. Their combined producing credits go on to include all of Ang Lee's subsequent films. The Wedding Banquet (produced by both) won the Golden Bear Award at the 1993 Berlin Film Festival and was nominated for an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award and six Independent Spirit Awards. Eat Drink Man Woman (associate produced by both) was the opening night selection for the Director's Fortnight at the 1994 Cannes Film Festival, and was nominated for a Best Foreign Film Oscar. Sense and Sensibility (co-produced by Schamus) garnered widespread critical acclaim and won a Golden Globe Award for Best Picture. The 1997 The Ice Storm (produced by both) was also hailed by critics worldwide, and won Best Screenplay at the Cannes Film Festival (Schamus is also credited with adapting the film from the Rick Moody novel). Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon brought mainstream attention to both Ang Lee and James Schamus, sweeping the Academy Awards and winning Best Foreign Film.

Other distinctive Ted Hope/James Schamus productions include Jenniphr Goodman's Sundance hit The Tao of Steve (2000, executive produced by Hope), Todd Solondz's Happiness (1998, produced by Hope), Edward Burns' The Brothers McMullen (1995, executive produced by both and winner of the Grand Jury Prize at that year's Sundance Film Festival), Jill Godmillow's 1994 film version of the performance Roy Cohn/Jack Smith (produced by both), the Hal Hartley films Amateur (1994) and Flirt (1995, both produced by Hope), Todd Haynes' Safe (1995, executive produced by both), and Tom Kalin's Swoon (1992, executive produced by Schamus). In 1994 Hope and Schamus won the prestigious Brian Greenbaum Award for Outstanding Achievement in Producing. Hope is on the Board of Directors for Independent Feature Project and produced the upcoming Todd Solondz film Storytelling , which will premiere at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival. Schamus is author of �The Apparatus Guide to No-Budget Filmmaking� and Associate Professor of film theory and history at Columbia University. Good Machine was recently honored with a 10-year retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

2000 FILMMAKER ON THE EDGE: Christine Vachon

At a special fundraising screening of the much-talked-about film Boy's Don't Cry , The Provincetown International Film Festival announced in the winter of 2000 Christine Vachon as the second recipient of the Filmmaker on The Edge award. Film festival organizers felt that Vachon was a perfect and formidable follow-up award 1999 recipient John Waters. Like John, she has had an important influence on independent cinema, with an extraordinary and remarkable body of work. In her young career, Vachon has master-minded some of the most significant film projects of the last decade, with a strong influence in discovering talented directors such as Todd Haynes, Rose Troche, Mary Harron, and Kimberly Pierce.

As a film producer, Vachon has displayed a keen talent for recognizing and developing provocative and exceptional work. Her career first came to widespread attention with the release of the controversial film, Poison (the feature-debut from director Todd Haynes). That same year, it won the Grand Jury Prize at the 1991 Sundance Film Festival. Vachon went on to develop and obtain the necessary funding for the 1992 release Swoon , based on the infamous Leopold/Loeb murder case. The feature-debut from director Tom Kalin won the coveted Caligari Award at the 1992 Berlin Film Festival. In 1994 Vachon's producer credit was attached to four significant and award-winning art-house releases including Todd Haynes' second feature Safe , Rose Troche's Go Fish , Larry Clark's Kids , and Nigel Finch's Stonewall . In 1995 she produced Mary Harron's I Shot Andy Warhol , in which actress Lili Taylor won a special acting Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. Subsequent films backed by Vachon include noted photographer Cindy Sherman's Office Killer , Kiss Me Guido , Todd Haynes' most recent Velvet Goldmine , and Todd Solondz's Happiness . The release of first-time director Kimberly Pierce's Oscar winning Boy's Don't Cry secured Vachon's status as one of the most important film producer's of the 20th-century. With many accolades, the film also landed on numerous 1999 film critic top-ten lists across the country.

1999 Filmmaker on the Edge: John Waters

The first recipient of the Filmmaker on the Edge Award was renowned filmmaker, artist and author John Waters . Waters, a longtime Provincetown visitor, is best known for his distinctive filmmaking style - celebrating the absurd and always challenging conventional notions of people, lifestyle, and the world. From the notorious Pink Flamingos to Polyester in Odorama to Hairspray and Serial Mom , John Waters' films have spanned over three decades of good bad taste. A native of Baltimore, Waters also has many ties to Provincetown, where he has vacationed regularly for the past 34 years. In the mid-sixties he rented a church in Provincetown to screen his 8mm short film, Eat Your Makeup .

John Waters began his career in the mid-1960s and quickly became a cult figure of underground filmmaking with the release of his first features Mondo Trasho (1970) and Multiple Maniacs (1971), both featuring Divine and Mink Stole. In 1972 he released Pink Flamingos , his most notorious film - also featuring Divine and Mink Stole, the story of the filthiest people alive...their loves...their hates...and their unquenchable thirst for notoriety. Other infamous cult-classics include Desperate Living , Female Trouble , and Polyester . In 1986 Waters became even more renown with the release of Hairspray , a musical comedy starring Divine, Ricki Lake, Debbie Harry, Sonny Bono, and Jerry Stiller. His career continued through the 1990s with the critically acclaimed Cry Baby (starring Johnny Depp, Patty Hearst, Iggy Pop, and Willem Defoe), Serial Mom (starring Kathleen Turner), and more recently Pecker (starring Edward Furlong, Christina Ricci, and Lili Taylor).