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Back in 2012, 9.79* aired as part of ESPN’s 30 for 30 franchise. Daniel Gordon’s film focused on the 100-meter final at the Seoul Olympics, a race that was dominated by Ben Johnson, who then abdicated the crown after a positive steroid test, leaving Carl Lewis as the desultory victor.

In an era oversaturated with sports documentaries, the closest we came to a doc focused on Lewis, among the greatest track and field stars ever, was one that was really about The Other Guy.

Even after his career-ending long-jump victory at the Atlanta Olympics offered an opportunity for people to embrace Lewis fully, he was still seen as somewhere between unlikable and unknowable.

That contention is finally put to the test in Julie Anderson and Chris Hay’s new feature documentary I’m Carl Lewis!

Premiering at SXSW, I’m Carl Lewis! gives Lewis his due as an athlete. But more than that,...

Maverick Minds

London’s Raindance Film Festival has unveiled its 13-title longlist for the BIFA (British Independent Film Awards) Raindance Maverick Award, recognizing independent films made with budgets under £1 million ($1.3 million).

The lineup includes “Grand Theft Hamlet,” shot entirely within “Grand Theft Auto,” following two unemployed actors staging Shakespeare in the game’s virtual world, and “Strike: An Uncivil War,” which won Sheffield DocFest’s best documentary audience award for its examination of the 1984/85 miners’ strike.

Raindance founder Elliot Grove said: “The Raindance Maverick Award longlist captures the essence of independent cinema at its purest, rebellious and unapologetic best.”

Full longlist:

“The Ceremony”

“The Flight of Bryan”

“Grand Theft Hamlet”

“King Baby”

“Reawakening”

“Restless”

“Satu – Year of the Rabbit” (Joshua Trigg)

“Silent Men” (Duncan Cowles)

“The Stimming Pool”

“Strike: An Uncivil War”

“Tops”

“Treading Water”

“Witches”

The nominations will be announced Nov. 5, with winners revealed at the BIFA ceremony on Dec.

The British Independent Film Awards (BIFA) has selected 13 documentaries for consideration in its 2024 Raindance Maverick award category. This award highlights innovative independent British films that showcase a variety of topics. The selections range from a film about postpartum depression to one about a historic labor dispute.

One standout selection is “Witches” by director Elizabeth Sankey. It examines how depictions of witches in movies relate to postpartum depression. The film combines interview clips with footage from old films. “Witches” was the only documentary shown at the prestigious Great 8 screenings at the Cannes Film Festival this year. It also screened at festivals in Tribeca, Rio de Janeiro and London.

Daniel Gordon’s “Strike: An Uncivil War” offers a fresh look at the 1984-85 UK miners’ strike. It focuses specifically on the Battle of Orgreave and includes previously unpublished footage and hidden government records. This sheds new light on an important event in British labor history.

The British Independent Film Awards (Bifa) longlist for the Raindance Maverick award includes documentaries Witches by Elizabeth Sankey and Strike: An Uncivil War by Daniel Gordon.

The 13-strong longlist also includes Pinny Grylls and Sam Crane’s non-fiction title Grand Theft Hamlet, about a staging of Shakespeare’s Hamlet inside the Grand Theft Auto videogame.

Scroll down for the full longlist

Witches examines the relationship between cinematic portrayals of witches and postpartum depression, utilising archival film footage alongside personal testimony. Having been the sole non-fiction title in the UK’s Great 8 showcase at Cannes this year, the film premiered at Tribeca in June,...

Pinny Grylls and Sam Crane’s documentary Grand Theft Hamlet, about out-of-work theater actors who try to stage a production of Hamlet within the video game Grand Theft Auto during the Covid lockdown, and Witches, Elizabeth Sankey’s doc that posits a connection between historical witchery and post-partum psychological suffering, are among 13 feature films on the longlist for this year’s Raindance Maverick Award at the British Independent Film Awards, or BIFAs.

Also on the longlist are the likes of Strike: An Uncivil War, the best documentary audience award winner at this year’s Sheffield DocFest that uses personal testimony, formerly hidden government documents, and unseen archive footage to tell the story of the Battle of Orgreave during the British miners’ strike of 1984/85; Treading Water, which tells the story of a man who is newly released from prison and struggling with addiction and mental health issues; and King Baby, “a...

The British Independent Film Awards (Bifas) has unveiled the documentary and international film longlists for its 2024 ceremony, with films including in-videogame title Grand Theft Hamlet and Sean Baker’s Palme d’Or winner Anora.

Grand Theft Hamlet is on the 12-strong best feature documentary list. The film is the debut feature from directorial duo Pinny Grylls and Sam Crane; it premiered at SXSW this year and was recently acquired for a UK-Ireland theatrical release. It follows two struggling actors who find solace from lockdown isolation by staging William Shakespeare’s Hamlet in the online Grand Theft Auto game.

Scroll down...

The Strike documents an intense period in Britain’s industrial past. In 1984-85, miners went on strike, resisting planned pit closures by Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government. This threatened not just jobs but whole communities’ lives. Director Daniel Gordon’s film focuses on pivotal events at the Orgreave coking plant, where thousands of picketing miners faced off against massed police. Amid raised tensions, what happened that day would prove hugely impactful.

Gordon constructs his story through both archive footage and new interviews. We hear miners’ first-hand accounts of their experiences both above and below ground. Their remarks highlight the personal stakes in this iconic labor dispute. Elsewhere, police also reflect on participating in an operation that later faced serious accusations. Through weaving together such contrasting perspectives, Gordon presents a rounded analysis.

The review will now consider key elements of the Strike’s narrative in turn. We’ll look at contextual backgrounds,...

Writing this on the 40th anniversary of what became known as the Battle of Orgreave makes you aware of how time can seem to collapse in on itself sometimes. The thick-rimmed spectacles, mullets and perms in the archive footage may be rooted in the past but in other ways - and especially in terms of political rhetoric - four decades feels almost like a heartbeat away. Certainly that’s how close it seems emotionally for many of the interviewees in Daniel Gordon’s powerful and thorough documentary. The film had its world premiere at Sheffield DocFest, where it won the Audience Award - don’t assume that accolade is simply a result of its relevance to the city, the strength of the testimony in Strike is likely to win people over, wherever it is screened.

The events surrounding a police confrontation with pickets at the South Yorkshire coking plant on...

Tuesday marks the 40th anniversary of a grim day in U.K. history: the Battle of Orgreave when police clashed with striking workers at a coking plant, leaving more 100 people injured.

Those shocking events are investigated in the documentary Strike: An Uncivil War, which on Monday – the eve of the anniversary – won the Audience Award at the 31st Sheffield DocFest. News media, authorities, and the Conservative government of then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher tried to pin responsibility for the violence on the workers, but the film directed by Daniel Gordon lays bare an orchestrated plan by police to attack the strikers.

‘Strike: An Uncivil War’

“We have been overawed by how much audiences have been deeply engaged with films at Sheffield DocFest this year, and this is especially true of Daniel Gordon’s Strike: An Uncivil War,” Sheffield Creative Director Raul Niño Zambrano and Managing Director Annabel Grundy said in a statement.

At The Door Of The House Who Will Come Knocking, The Boy And The Suit Of Lights and No Other Land were the main winners at this year’s Sheffield DocFest.

The festival, which ran from June 12-17, saw public attendance rise by more than 20% compared to 2023.

Update: Strike: An Uncivil War has been unveiled as winner of the audience award. The documentary about a violent confrontation during the UK’s miners’ strike is directed by Daniel Gordon and produced by Embankment Films. Tull Stories will release the film in the UK and Ireland on June 21.

Maja Novaković’s At...

Former miners and police officers recall Orgreave, one of the nastiest events in postwar British history, in Daniel Gordon’s forthright documentary

British schoolchildren are taught that the last full-scale military engagement on their soil was the battle of Culloden in 1746. But this should change: on 18 June 1984 the battle of Orgreave, the subject of Daniel Gordon’s documentary, was the bitterest moment of the miners’ strike of 1984-85. It was the last stand for both sides, a brutal and chaotic confrontation of about 5,000 pickets determined not to let trucks get through to pick up coke for the Scunthorpe steelworks, versus about 6,000 police officers, some mounted, and armed with new shields and batons.

The police were effectively directed by Downing Street, which was determined that the force should not be overwhelmed by force of numbers as they had been during a comparable situation in the 1972 miners’ strike. A paramilitary strategy developed...

Tull Stories will release Daniel Gordon’s documentary feature Strike: An Uncivil War in the UK and Ireland.

The doc tells the story of the year-long miners’ strike of 1984/85 – considered one of the UK’s most violent and divisive industrial disputes. The film pays particular focus to the bloody Battle of Orgreave, which took place on June 18, 1984. The media subsequently appeared to lay blame for the violence at the feet of the strikers, with Gordon’s feature aiming to overturn this.

The film also explores Conservative prime minister Margaret Thatcher’s unrelenting mission to break the role of unions in British working class society.

Exclusive: Embankment Films is making Garbo: Leave Me Alone, a feature documentary about the enigmatic movie star who died in 1990. The doc will have previously unseen archive material including personal photographs of Garbo and letters written by the iconic actress, who is regarded as one of the all-time greats.

Production is underway and the film will have a theatrical release at the end of this year before bowing on Sky in the UK in 2025. It is being made in partnership With Non Stop Entertainment and co-produced with Mylla Films, the Scandi label founded by Patrik Andersson and Jakob Abrahamsson. Fremantle is on board for international sales.

Lorna Tucker, whose previous work includes Katharine Hepburn feature doc Call Me Kate, will direct. “This is a natural follow on to Call Me Kate in a way because it’s a similar era, but it is a very different story because here is...

Embankment Films has landed a miners’ strike feature and an ITV doc on a drug that could treat dwarfism.

Strike: An Uncivil War will be released 18 June, telling the story of the Battle of Orgreave, one of the most violent confrontations between miners and police during the 1984 labor action.

Directed by award-winner Daniel Gordon (Hillsborough), the movie will use powerful personal testimony and previously hidden government documents to describe a conflict that cut right to the heart of Britain’s social and political consciousness – a clash that encompassed class, community, masculinity, the role of women, relationships, marriage and family. The strike turns 40 this year and a number of shows for local broadcasters have also been ordered to commemorate. Gordon’s Verymuchso and Embankment are producing and Rainmaker Content is distributing.

Rainmaker is also selling ITV’s Dwarf Story [working title] from Grierson-nominee Riccardo Servini (A Space in Time).

The one-hour special follows three young people from America,...

Abramorama has acquired the global theatrical rights — with the exception of the U.K. and Ireland — and direct-to-consumers rights to “Getting It Back: The Story of Cymande,” the award-winning music documentary directed by Tim MacKenzie-Smith. Abramorama will launch its U.S. and Canadian theatrical release in early April, following its upcoming U.K. theatrical release.

“Abramorama is honored to bring Tim MacKenzie-Smith’s heartfelt documentary about the band Cymande to fans around the world. Their music has influenced artists of all genres and is as impactful today as it was when first released. Cymande continues to reach new fans and I think 2024 is going to be a huge year for the band, with sold out concerts around the world, a new record coming out soon, and the global release of their documentary,” Abramorama’s president and head of international distribution Evan Saxon said in a statement.

A group of Black...

While advancing technology benefits mankind and contributes significantly to its progress, it can sometimes be considered a curse. For instance, while online financial transactions have simplified our lives, they have also instilled a sense of paranoia—the fear that our security could be breached, and hackers could potentially access our bank accounts at any time. Nowadays, traditional bank robberies are a thing of the past, as hackers now exploit this technology and easily gain access to bank accounts while sitting in the comfort of their own homes. Daniel Gordon’s documentary film, Billion Dollar Heist, explores this unsettling and terrifying crime, which reveals how cybercriminals execute highly skilled and intricate online robberies that can result in the theft of almost a billion dollars from heavily fortified banks. This is exemplified in the Bangladesh case, where a group of hackers targeted an almost billion-dollar heist without leaving any trace for the authorities to pursue them.

Tim Mackenzie-Smith’s feature debut tells the story of the 1970s Black British group.

BFI Distribution has acquired UK-Ireland distribution rights to music documentary Getting It Back: The Story Of Cymande.

It will receive a theatrical release in early 2024. Getting It Back launched at SXSW 2022, before a UK premiere at last year’s BFI London Film Festival, and festival screenings at Doclisboa and Doc ‘n’ Roll Festival.

The feature debut of UK director Tim Mackenzie-Smith, Getting It Back tells the story of Cymande, a group of Black musicians who came to the UK from the Caribbean as children, and formed...

A hit-and-miss documentary often struggles to explain the hows and whys of the Bangladesh Central Bank cyber heist of 2016

Cybercrime, on top of being difficult to detect and even more so to prove, is notoriously tricky to visualize. The impact may be tangible, even devastating – nuclear plants damaged, hospitals disabled, pipelines shut down – but the perpetrators are shadowy and inscrutable, the crime unseen and insidious, the methods vague and indecipherable to lay people without a knack for computer science.

Billion Dollar Heist, a new feature-length documentary, attempts the formidable challenge of turning one of the biggest financial crimes in history – the February 2016 cyber heist of $81m from the US Federal Reserve accounts for the central bank of Bangladesh – into informative entertainment. Director Daniel Gordon employs a range of cinematic techniques – some illuminative, some overly cliched – to get at a highly sophisticated cyber crime involving several countries, time zones and financial institutions.

The Sony Adam Driver sci-fi movie 65 is moving onto the opening weekend of New Line’s Shazam: Fury of the Gods, March 17-19. The Scott Beck-Bryan Woods movie was previously dated for March 10, 2023.

The studio, I hear, has a confidence in the movie, and it’s to give the pic some air from the next Scream sequel on March 10. No rating yet for 65.

In addition the studio is movie its Affirm release of the George Foreman Biopic from March 31 next yera to April 28. The movie moves away from Paramount/eOne’s Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, Uar’s A Good Person, and Focus Features’ A Thousand and One to a weekend where there’s Lionsgate’s feature take of Judy Blume novel Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.

65’s logline: After a catastrophic crash on an unknown planet, pilot Mills (Driver) quickly discovers he’s actually stranded on Earth…...

Cymande was an early ‘70s group of Black British musicians who released three albums, split in 1975 and largely faded from view — until years later when, in a now-familiar story, their records began being sampled by hip-hop, house, drum n’ bass and other DJs and producers. The Fugees’ “The Score,” Wu-Tang Clan’s “Problems,” De La Soul’s “Change in Speak,” Epmd’s “U Got Shot” and many others have used elements from their songs.

Now, the group is back in a big way, with a documentary, reissues of their albums and even several upcoming gigs at the South by Southwest conference next week — dates, times and details are below.

Such artists, DJs and producers as Mark Ronson, Kool DJ Red Alert, DJ Maseo of De La Soul, My Morning Jacket’s Jim James and Louie Vega all appear in “Getting It Back: The Story Of Cymande,” which was directed by...

In an online ceremony hosted by Tom Felton, the winners of the 2020 British Independent Film Awards (BIFAs) were announced yesterday with Sarah Gavron’s ‘Rocks’ taking home five awards.

Best British Independent Film was awarded to coming-of-age drama Rocks by Zendaya with actress Kosar Ali also taking home the awards for both Best Supporting Actress and Most Promising Newcomer with her young co-star D’Angelou Osei Kissiedu winning Best Supporting Actor. The four awards on the night took the film’s BIFA tally to five with Lucy Pardee winning the award for Best Casting sponsored by Casting Society of America and Spotlight when the craft award winners were announced in January.

British horror His House was awarded two BIFAs on the night with Remi Weekes winning Best Director and Wunmi Mosaku winning Best Actress. Anthony Hopkins’ poignant portrayal of an ageing man in The Father won him Best Actor amongst three wins.

Sarah Gavron’s Rocks and Remi Weekes’ His House scooped five and four awards respectively, while Anthony Hopkins won Best Actor for The Father, at tonight’s British Independent Film Awards, held virtually this year. Scroll down for the full list of winners.

Rocks was crowned Best British Independent Film, beating strong competition from the likes of Saint Maud and The Father. The film, a social drama about a group of schoolgirls and shot largely with non-actors, also took Best Supporting Actress (Kosar Ali) and Best Supporting Actor (D’Angelou Osei Kissiedu), as well as Most Promising Newcomer (Kosar Ali again) and Best Casting (Lucy Pardee).

It was also a great night for the claustrophobic horror His House, with Remi Weekes picking up Best Director, Wunmi Mosaku winning Best Actress, and the film picking up two below-the-line prizes: Best Effects (Pedro Sabrosa and Stefano Pepin) and Best Production Design (Jacqueline Abrahams...

Watch the ceremony live here.

The British Independent Film Awards for 2020 are taking place online tonight (February 18), hosted by Tom Felton.

Screen will be posting all the winners below on this page and on Twitter as they are announced; you can watch the live-streamed ceremony via YouTube below.

Scroll down for the winners.

The ceremony starts at 20.00 UK time and finishes at approximately 20.50.

Winners in the nine craft categories were revealed last month, with His House and Misbehaviour receiving two prizes each.

Saint Maud set a record total of 17 when nominations were announced in December, followed by His House with...

Watch the ceremony live here.

The British Independent Film Awards for 2020 are taking place online tonight (February 18), hosted by Tom Felton.

Screen will be posting all the winners below on this page and on Twitter as they are announced; you can watch the live-streamed ceremony via YouTube below.

Scroll down for the winners.

The ceremony starts at 20.00 UK time and finishes at approximately 20.50.

Winners in the nine craft categories were revealed last month, with His House and Misbehaviour receiving two prizes each.

Saint Maud set a record total of 17 when nominations were announced in December, followed by His House with...

Pursekey Productions director and principal producer Michaela Perske is the Australian International Documentary Conference (Aidc) Stanley Hawes Award recipient for 2021.

Perske’s recognition was announced today alongside the 20 nominees for the inaugural Aidc awards.

Designed to recognise the “outstanding completed works of new Australian documentary and factual content”, the awards will be presented in person across eight cities, as well as livestreamed to Aidc delegates.

Originally trained as a journalist, Perske has over 20 years of media experience across radio, print and TV.

Since turning her hand to factual content, she has produced films including Girls Can’t Surf, Black Divaz, After the Apology, and Destination Arnold.

In announcing the award, the Aidc said it wanted to acknowledge “her outstanding contribution to the Australian documentary and factual sector”.

Australian practitioners had the opportunity to submit across six categories for the Aidc Awards: Best Feature Documentary, with a $5,000 cash prize presented by Doc...

Shannon Murphy’s Babyteeth, Leigh Whannell’s The Invisible Man and Daniel Gordon’s Adam Goodes documentary The Australian Dream may all end up in contention at this year’s BAFTA Awards.

The British Academy announced the longlist for its annual film awards on Friday, ahead of the nominations to be announced on March 9.

Babyteeth has been longlisted in the direction, adapted screenplay and casting categories, which means potential nods for Murphy, writer Rita Kalnejais and casting director Kirsty McGregor respectively.

Starring Eliza Scanlen, Toby Wallace, Ben Mendelsohn and Essie Davis, Babyteeth was Murphy’s debut feature, with Kalnejais adapting her 2012 Belvoir St stageplay for the screen. Dubbed a “bittersweet comedy”, the film produced by Alex White and EP’d by Jan Chapman premiered at the Venice Film Festival in 2019, going on to win acclaim and a slew of awards, including nine AACTAs.

Australian Kitty Green, who helmed #MeToo drama The Assistant,...

This morning British actors Holliday Grainger and Micheal Ward announced the list of nominations for the 2020 British Independent Film Awards (BIFAs) which sees Rose Glass’s psychological horror lead the pack with 17 nominations.

‘Saint Maud’ will be taking on Remi Weekes’ ‘His House’, which has 16 nominations across the Director, Screenplay, debut and technical categories. Weekes’ powerful debut also received nominations in Best Actress and Best Actor for Wunmi Mosaku and Ṣọpẹ́ Dìrísù.

‘Rocks’, Sarah Gavron and Anu Henrique’s fresh, poignant and genuinely uplifting take on life as a marginalised British teen has 15 nominations, including double nominations for stars Bukky Bakray and Kosar Ali in Best Actress and Supporting Actress and Most Promising Newcomer. D’angleou Osei Kissiedu is nominated for Best Supporting Actor.

Stefan Pape sat down with BIFA nomination announcers Holliday Grainger and Micheal Ward to talk about the bright future of British Film.

We also sat down...

Rose Glass’ psychological horror “Saint Maud” leads the charge at the 2020 British Independent Film Awards (BIFAs) with 17 nominations.

“Saint Maud” is up for best British independent film, screenplay and director, and also features in the debut categories — producer, director and screenwriter. Morfydd Clark is nominated for best actress and Jennifer Ehle for supporting actress. The film also features heavily in the technical categories.

Close behind is Remi Weekes’ “His House,” which contrasts asylum seekers’ real life horrors with those of the supernatural kind. It has 16 nominations across the director, screenplay, debut and technical categories, and acting nominations for Wunmi Mosaku and Ṣọpẹ́ Dìrísù.

Elsewhere, “Rocks,” Sarah Gavron and Anu Henrique’s take on life as a marginalized British teen, has 15 nominations, including for stars Bukky Bakray, Kosar Ali and D’angleou Osei Kissiedu.

Nick Rowland’s “Calm With Horses” has 10 nominations while Riz Ahmed has four BIFA nominations this year,...

The 2020 British Independent Film Awards nominations were revealed Wednesday morning by British actors Holliday Grainger (“The Borgias”) and Micheal Ward (“Lovers Rock”). Leading the list of nominees this year is Rose Glass’ horror movie “Saint Maud” with an impressive 17 nominations. A24 has U.S. distribution rights, but canceled a spring 2020 release due to the pandemic. While the film managed to open in the UK, it has yet to grace stateside screens outside of film festivals.

Another horror movie, Remi Weekes’ refugee nightmare story “His House,” trails close behind with 16 nominations. That film is available to stream on Netflix. With 15 nominations is Sarah Gavron’s teen tale “Rocks.” “Calm with Horses,” titled in the U.S. as “The Shadow of Violence,” has 10 nominations, while “Mogul Mowgli” starring Riz Ahmed has seven. Florian Zeller’s Oscar hopeful “The Father,” with Anthony Hopkins, also is ahead of the pack with six nominations.

The Richard Harris Award,...

Saint Maud leads nominees for the 2020 British Independent Film Awards (BIFAs) with 17 nods. Scroll down for the full list of nominees.

Rose Glass’ lauded psychological horror is nominated for Best British Independent Film, Best Screenplay and Best Director, as well as in the debut categories: Breakthrough Producer, Debut Director and Debut Screenwriter. Morfydd Clark is nominated for Best Actress and Jennifer Ehle for Supporting Actress. It also scored a host of technical nominations.

Saint Maud will be taking on Remi Weekes’ His House, which has 16 nominations including for Best Actress and Best Actor for Wunmi Mosaku and Ṣọpe Dirisu, respectively, Rocks, which has 15 nominations, including double nominations for stars Bukky Bakray and Kosar Ali in Best Actress and Supporting Actress and Most Promising Newcomer. D’angleou Osei Kissiedu is also nominated for Best Supporting Actor.

Director Nick Rowland and producer Daniel Emmerson’s first feature Calm With Horses has 10 nominations...

Update: This story is being updated this week as the new longlists are unveiled. Today (November 20) the Best Documentary longlist has been published, see below.

Previously, November 17: Organizers of the British Independent Film Awards have confirmed their upcoming ceremony will delay from its traditional end-of-year dates to February, 2021, moving in line with this year’s major awards shows.

This week, the BIFAs will unveil its various longlists of awards, which will be whittled down to its final nominations, to be revealed on December 9.

Today, the New Talent awards longlists have been unveiled, featuring a total of 46 directors, writers and producers. Each of the below will participate in BIFA’s Springboard scheme, a tailored program of professional development and peer to peer support.

Best Documentary

The Art Of Political Murder Paul Taylor, Teddy Leifer, Regina K. Scully

The Australian Dream Daniel Gordon, Stan Grant, Sarah Thomson, Nick Batzias, Virginia Whitwell,...

‘The Reason I Jump’, ‘White Riot’ also make the list.

Films about Irish singer Shane MacGowan and natural historian David Attenborough are among the 13 titles on the best documentary longlist for the 2020 British Independent Film Awards.

The longlist is the final of four to be announced this week, following lists for new talent, most promising newcomer and international film.

Julien Temple’s Crock Of Gold: A Few Rounds With Shane MacGowan is a look at the celebrated Irish punk musician and singer, combining archive and family footage with animation. It debuted at San Sebastián in September; Altitude has the rights for the UK and Ireland,...

Exclusive: Libby Geist, one of the architects of ESPN’s growing documentary business and exec producer of The Last Dance and O.J: Made In America, is leaving the Disney-owned sports network.

Deadline understands that Geist, who is Vice President and Executive Producer, ESPN Films and Original Content, will work through to the end of 2020. It is understood that her departure is not connected to the recent layoffs introduced by the company and that she is leaving to move closer to production.

She is the latest top-level exec set to leave ESPN and comes after it emerged that content chief Connor Schell is leaving the company in the new year to set up his own production company.

Geist has been with ESPN for 12 years in a variety of roles. She has worked on more than 120 feature-length projects in various capacities and has overseen the docs department since 2016.

She has overseen development,...

The BBC has deleted from Twitter a trailer for an ESPN original documentary series on South African Paralympian Oscar Pistorius after it failed to mention the name of his dead wife Reeva Steenkamp.

The BBC press office posted The Trials Of Oscar Pistorius trailer at 10Am local time on Tuesday, but following a backlash, the broadcaster removed the promotional clip and expressed regret at the matter.

In a statement, the BBC said: “We regret that the original trail did not refer to Reeva Steenkamp directly. We are aware of the upset it has caused, which was never the intention

“We have removed the trail and it will be replaced by something more representative of the series, which examines in detail a number of complex issues connected to her murder.”

We have removed the trail for 'The Trials of Oscar Pistorius' that was posted on social media earlier today: https://t.

Fresh off the success of its Emmy award-winning Michael Jordan documentary, The Last Dance, ESPN launches a new series this weekend that tracks the rise and fall of South African sprinter and disability advocate, Oscar Pistorius.

The Life and Trials of Oscar Pistorius streams live on ESPN+ this Sunday, and it’s the latest installment in ESPN Films’ successful 30 for 30 series. The four-part documentary follows the story of Pistorius, a Paralympic sprinter whose success on the track thrust him into the international spotlight, before a murder investigation quickly changed the trajectory of his career.

"Why would a man kill a woman that he loves?" ESPN has revealed an official trailer for the latest "30 for 30" documentary The Life and Trials of Oscar Pistorius, about the infamous Olympic runner. It will always be one of the most shocking stories in the history of sports; An international hero who had inspired millions with his determination and refusal to be denied the chance he felt he deserved—suddenly in the midst of a murder investigation. And the circus that ensued around the tragedy made just as many headlines as his initial rise to glory. That is the tale of Oscar Pistorius, a saga told definitively in director Daniel Gordon’s four-part "30 for 30" film The Life and Trials of Oscar Pistorius. Featuring interviews with more than a dozen of the figures closest to the story, the film covers the entire case, the heartrending trial, the media frenzy that surrounded it all,...

Exclusive: Soccer ace Wayne Rooney, England’s all-time leading goal scorer, is to be the subject of an official documentary biopic from Maradona producer-financier Lorton Entertainment.

Production is underway on the film about the life and career of the former Manchester United, Everton and DC United star, who currently plays for Derby County.

Directed by BAFTA-winner Matt Smith (Rio Ferdinand: Being Mum and Dad), the access doc will feature personal archive footage and interviews with talking heads from across the world of football and beyond.

Rooney burst onto the scene after making his professional debut for Everton aged 16. In a glittering career, not without its bumps along the way, the forward went on to become Manchester United and England’s record goalscorer. The film will track Rooney’s path to the present day and ask what next for the Liverpudlian superstar.

Rooney said: “I’m excited to be the subject of this documentary.

Embankment Films also reveals a raft of upcoming feature documentaries as part of a fresh push into factual.

Embankment Films has revealed the top-line cast of feelgood feature The Miracle Club and a key pre-sale, and boarded a raft of documentaries as part of a major push into factual.

Downton Abbey star Maggie Smith will be joined by fellow Oscar-winner Kathy Bates and Ozark star Laura Linney in the story of working-class women from Dublin who embark on a pilgrimage to Lourdes.

Directed by Thaddeus O’Sullivan (Ordinary Decent Criminal), the film is set to begin shooting in Ireland in April...

It’s easy to forget that, back in the late 90s, David Beckham was something of a pariah. Having waved a leg at an Argentinian opponent, the Manchester United star had perhaps cost his country dearly at the France World Cup, and on returning home, was met with burning effigies and irate headline writers.

Beckham figured out how to ride the wave of outrage and restore his place in the hearts of the nation. But over in Australia, for the man often dubbed the Aussie David Beckham thanks to his ability to transcend his sport, Adam Goodes went through an ordeal that wasn’t too far removed from that of Becks. Only it was much, much worse.

Goodes is an Aboriginal Australian, who, in 1997, just a few months before Beckham’s fateful kick, was drafted into the Aussie Football League side, Sydney Swans, where he became one of the most popular players around.

“Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom” — the story about a young displaced teacher who travels to Bhutan and is taught his own life lessons from the happy and kind locals (including a yak) — won the Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature at The Palm Springs International Film Festival (Psiff), it was announced Sunday.

“Gay Chorus Deep South” — a documentary following the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus as the group embarks upon a high-risk tour of the Deep South to spread a message of tolerance — won the Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature.

“Parasite” screenwriters Bong Joon Ho and Han Jin Won won the Fipresci Prize for International Screenplay for their tale about two Korean families — one wealthy and one poor — whose live intersect in the most unexpected way.

Among the acting awards, Bartosz Bielenia from “Corpus Christi” and Helena Zengel from “System Crasher” took top honors.

Also Read: Palm Springs: Renée Zellweger,...

Updated with Audience Award winners: The 31st annual Palm Springs Film Festival has named the Bhutan drama Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom the winner of its Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature, and Gay Chorus Deep South its Audience Award for Best Documentary.

The news Sunday comes after the fest yesterday revealed its juried award winners at a luncheon at the Hilton Palm Springs. There, Russian pic Beanpole took the Fipresci prize, while Bong Joon-Ho’s Oscar favorite Parasite copped the Fipresci Screenplay prize.

Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom, from director Pawo Choyning Dorji, was filmed on location at more than 16,000 feet in one of the most remote villages in Bhutan. The pic centers on a young displaced teacher who is taught his own life lessons from the happy and kind locals.

David Charles Rodrigues’ U.S. docu Gay Chorus Deep South follows the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus...

The Palm Springs International Film Festival, which began just after the New Year and wraps January 13, screened 188 films; 51 of them were submitted for the Best International Feature Film Academy Award. The Palm Springs Film Festival prize winners announced Saturday over brunch at the Hilton included a handful of these films. See the full list of winners below. Audience awards will be announced on Sunday.

Fipresci Prize for Best International Feature Film: “Beanpole” (Russia), Director Kantemir Balagov.

Fipresci Prize for Best Actor in a International Feature Film: Bartosz Bielenia from “Corpus Christi” (Poland).

Fipresci Prize for the Best Actress in a International Feature Film: Helena Zengel from “System Crasher” (Germany).

Fipresci Prize for International Screenplay: “Parasite” (South Korea), Screenwriters Bong Joon Ho and Han Jin-Won.

Fipresci Prize for International Screenplay Special Mention: “Antigone” (Canada), Screenwrier Sophie Deraspe.

The Fipresci jury members were film critics Pamela Biénzobas, Alferov Gavrylyshyn, and Tina Hassannia.

The Palm Springs Film Festival has announced its juried winners, with “Beanpole” taking the Fipresci prize for films in the international feature film Oscar submissions program. The documentary award went to “Talking About Trees.”

Acting prizes went to Bartosz Bielenia from “Corpus Christi” for actor and Helena Zengel from “System Crasher” for actress. “Parasite” won the screenplay prize from the Fipresci jury of international film critics.

The festival, held from January 2-13, screened 192 films from 81 countries.

The New Voices New Visions award for first and second time filmmakers went to “Song Without a Name,” while “Monos” received the Ibero-American Award for films from Latin America, Spain or Portugal.

Other prizes included the local jury award to “Adam,” the Young Cineastes Award to “Corpus Christi,” and the Bridging the Borders award to “Advocate.”

The audience prizes will be announced Sunday.

A complete list of winners follows:

Fipresci Prize for Best International...

‘Ride Like a Girl.’

The Australian films and feature docs released in cinemas last year, including minor contributions from holdovers, generated more than $40.2 million.

While that trailed the 2018 total of $57.4 million, there are several positives for the screen production industry.

The not-so-good news for the broader screen sector is that the 2019 calendar year B.O. seems certain to fall below $1.2 billion for the first time since 2014.

Ten titles including three feature docs – Damon Gameau’s 2040, Richard Lowenstein’s Mystify: Michael Hutchence and Daniel Gordon’s The Australian Dream – each grossed more than $1 million.

Rachel Griffiths’ Ride Like a Girl was the stand-out, raking in $11.5 million. Arguably, Wayne Blair’s Top End Wedding ($5.2 million), Shawn Seet’s Storm Boy ($5 million) and Rachel Ward’s Palm Beach ($4.4 million) fulfilled their potential and reaped the benefits of wide releases and hefty marketing campaigns – a level of support denied to numerous local films.

With racism in sports front-page news in Britain, Dogwoof has scored all U.K. rights to “The Australian Dream,” the acclaimed feature documentary about Adam Goodes, an indigenous Australian rules football star who took on the racists. The film just had its local premiere at the BFI London Film Festival and will be released in U.K. movie theaters next year

Goodes twice won the Brownlow Medal, awarded to the fairest and best player in the Australian Football League, and was named Australian of the Year in 2014. Having spoken out about racism, he faced hostility from booing fans inside stadiums while playing and from some quarters of the media. He quietly retired in 2015.

Daniel Gordon (“Hillsborough”) directed the film, which was written by Australian journalist Stan Grant. It traces Goodes’ his meteoric rise in football through to his bowing out of the sport. Goodes is interviewed, and the film features archive footage.

Wang Xiaoshuai‘s ‘So Long, My Son‘ secures a record six nominations.

Chinese films dominate the nominations for the Asia Pacific Screen Awards (Apsa) which will be held in Brisbane, Australia, on Novemer 21.

Scroll down for full list of nominations

Films from 22 countries will be represented at the awards but while the likes of India, Japan and Russia have picked up a handful of nods, Chinese films have more than double that of any other country with 13 nominations across seven features.

Wang Xiaoshuai‘s family drama So Long, My Son has secured a record six nominations, including best feature where...

‘Buoyancy’.

Two Australian films – Rodd Rathjen’s debut feature Buoyancy and Daniel Gordon’s feature documentary The Australian Dream – are nominated for Asia Pacific Screen Awards (Apsa).

Some 37 films for 22 countries are nominated for the 13th iteration of the awards, which will be presented in Brisbane in November. Overall, films from China received the most nominations; 13 in total across seven films – the country is represented in all but one category.

Wang Xiaoshuai’s So Long, My Son (Di Jiu Tian Chang) leads the tally with nominations across six categories: actor (Wang Jingchun), actress (Yong Mei), screenplay, cinematography (Kim Hyunseok), directing (Wang Xiaoshuai) and Best Feature Film.

Fellow nominees for Best Feature Film are Pema Tseden’s Balloon; Kantemir Balagov’s Beanpole, Ridham Janve’s The Gold-Laden Sheep and The Sacred Mountain and Bong Joon-ho’s Palme d’Or winning Parasite.

Announced today alongside the nominations was the Asia Pacific Screen Forum,...

‘Ride Like a Girl’.

Rachel Griffiths’ Ride Like a Girl will take the crown of highest grossing Australian film on home soil this year.

Meanwhile the low visibility and modest returns from limited releases including Kim Farrant’s Angel of Mine, Sophie Hyde’s Animals and Rodd Rathjen’s Buoyancy have prompted renewed calls from exhibitors to address the challenges facing most Aussie films in the crowded theatrical market.

Griffiths’ biopic starring Teresa Palmer as ground-breaking jockey Michelle Payne pocketed nearly $4 million in its first eight days, including $317,000 on Thursday.

So the Transmission Films release co-starring Sam Neill as Payne’s father Paddy and her brother Stevie Payne as himself will overtake Palm Beach’s $4.4 million this weekend and will zoom past Top End Wedding’s $5.2 million and Storm Boy’s $5 million.

Exhibitors are confident the film is heading for upwards of $10 million and could reach Ladies in Black’s $12 million.

‘Hearts and Bones’ stars Andrew Luri, Bolude Watson, director Ben Lawrence and star Hugo Weaving.

For director Ben Lawrence, the reaction to his feature debut Hearts and Bones at the Toronto International Film Festival (Tiff) was both “emotional and overwhelming”.

Lawrence reports the standing ovations at every screening and the outpouring of praise for the cast, particularly for South Sudanese immigrant Andrew Luri in his acting debut, made a huge impact.

Of the film’s Canadian reception, Liane Cunje, Tiff Discovery and International programming associate said: “I’ve run the gamut of audiences reactions here at Tiff for films we programme from around the world, and I’ve never witnessed such an emotional celebration after a screening as the one I saw after Hearts and Bones.”

The film, which made its world premiere in competition at the Sydney Film Festival in June, screened as part of the Tiff Discovery program,...

The story of Afl superstar and Australian of the Year-recipient Adam Goodes should resonate for Americans who’ve been following the crusade of former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick. From his minority background, stalwart fight against injustice, and the resulting sports-wide fan backlash—their similarities are endless. The people loved Goodes because he left everything on the field and checked every “gladiator” box as far as playing through debilitating injuries to carry a team on his back towards a championship. They loved him so much that they initially let him have a soapbox to speak-up for the aboriginal community of which he’s a member. This was his incentive to score. Bleed for us first and then champion the unfortunate. But you better not dare place their ills at our feet.

That’s the rub, right? My family is Middle Eastern and yet even they fall prey to the white trappings...