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Slamdance Film Festival Awards and Acquisitions

by ScreenCraft Staff on January 24, 2014

Last night marked the wrap of the 20th Annual Slamdance Film Festival and awards ceremony, where Slamdance announced the feature film and short film recipients of this year's winners in the Audience, Jury, and Sponsored Award Categories.

The film Kidnapped for Christ, directed by Kate S. Logan, won the Audience Award for Documentary Feature, while the film Copenhagen, directed by Mark Raso, won the Audience Award for Narrative Feature.

The film Rezeta, directed by Fernando Frias De La Parra, won the Jury Award for Narrative Feature. The film I Play with the Phrase Each Other, directed by Jay Alvarez, received a Jury Special Mention for Original Vision.

The Spirit Of Slamdance Award went to The Greggs, from directors Bruce Bundy, Nigel DeFriez, Rob Malone, Kira Pearson, Alex Mechanik, Jessie Levandov, Jonathan Rosenblit.

"Slamdance is an ongoing experiment which has proven after 20 years that when it comes to recognizing artists and launching careers, our independent and grassroots community can do it themselves. We congratulate this year's winning filmmakers and celebrate the collective talent of Slamdance 2014," said Peter Baxter, Co-Founder and President of Slamdance, in a press release.

In addition, more exciting news came out of Slamdance yesterday. Slamdance Studios, which is the rapidly expanding distribution arm of the festival, announced its acquisition of the 2013 Slamdance Film Festival Grand Jury winner Bible Quiz.

Beginning in March of this year, Slamdance Studios will partner with Virgil Films for the limited US theatrical release of Bible Quiz in New York and Los Angeles, as well as all U.S. and Canadian VOD & DVD distribution rights.

Directed by Nicole Teeny, Bible Quiz follows seventeen-year-old Mikayla as she memorizes thousands of Bible verses on her quest to win the National Bible Quiz Championship and the heart of JP, her quiz team captain. Slamdance said, “this John Hughes-eque documentary explores coming of age in the midst of faith, doubt, fierce competition, and teen love,” said the festival in a press release.

"As we've worked with Nicole at the festival as well as part of our On The Road series we feel that she is a great emerging filmmaking talent and her film will find an even bigger audience," explains Peter Baxter, president of Slamdance Film Festival and Studios, in a press release.

The 2014 Slamdance Film Festival took place from January 17th - 23rd, in Park City, Utah at the Treasure Mountain Inn. The festival runs concurrently every year with the Sundance Film Festival.

This year, Slamdance announced the introduction of its Slamdance Founder’s Award. The award, which is in its inaugural year, was presented to filmmaker and Slamdance alumnus, Christopher Nolan. Nolan is a Slamdance alumni. In fact, his first film, Following, screened at the festival.

“I’m honored to be recognized by a festival that gave me some of my first opportunities to connect with an audience,” Nolan said in a press release. ”Slamdance continues to provide an important forum for emerging filmmakers and I’m proud to be part of their history.”

Check out John Rhodes’ recap of the Slamdance Founder’s Award here.

Also we attended the Sundance Film Festival last weekend and spoke with filmmaker Sydney Freeland, who finally had a chance to develop her feature film with an invitation to the Sundance Labs. Here are the highlights from the interview, which was shot on the balcony of the Sundance Film Festival’s media center, overlooking Main St. in Park City.

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