ATLFF '16 Jury & Audience Award Winners Announced!

Photo: Border Union Photography

2016 Jury Award Winners

• Narrative Feature Jury Award - HUNKY DORY (directed by Michael Curtis Johnson)
• Documentary Feature Jury Award - DRIVING WITH SELVI (directed by Elisa Paloschi)
• Documentary Feature Special Jury Award - JUANICAS (directed by Karina Garcia Casanova)
• Narrative Short Jury Award - THUNDER ROAD (directed by Jim Cummings)
• Documentary Short Jury Award - KRAINA (directed by Christina Tynkevych)
• Animated Short Jury Award - SHELL ALL (directed by Zaven Najjar)
• Music Video Jury Award - "Dove" performed by Pillar Point (directed by Jacob Krupnick)
   
• Filmmaker-to-Watch Award - ZELOS (directed by Thoranna Sigurdardottir)
• New Mavericks Award (presented by SPANX & The Sara Blakely Foundation) - DRIVING WITH SELVI (directed by Elisa Paloschi)
• Southern Spotlight Award (presented by Cineverse) - QUE SERA (directed by Robyn Hicks)
• Seed&Spark Award (for Crowdfunded Films) - EAT WHITE DIRT (directed by Adam Forrester) and THE NEW ORLEANS SAZERAC (directed by James Martin)

2016 Audience Award Winners

• Audience Award Feature - THE FOUNDERS (directed by Charlene Fisk & Carrie Schrader)
• Audience Award Short - HOTEL CLERMONT (directed by Heather L. Hutson)

ATLFF's first Filmmaker to Watch: Moon Molson

By Nick Stevens

With a fantastic lineup and a number of hugely talented filmmakers in this year’s festival, the Backers Jury has awarded Moon Molson and his short film, “The Bravest, The Boldest” the inaugural Filmmaker To Watch Award. This isn’t Molson’s first time here at the Atlanta Film Festival. His highly acclaimed short film “Crazy Beats Strong Every Time” was an official selection at the festival last year and his screenplay, “Meadowlandz”, earned him the Best Screenplay Award in the Festival’s Screenplay Competition.

Molson has been busy writing, directing, producing and editing his own work as well as contributing to various other projects for more than a decade. This year, Molson will be attending the Atlanta Film Festival with his award winning narrative short. Much like his past films, “The Bravest, The Boldest” is a heavy, dramatic piece that focuses on family, loss and facing harsh realities.

 Molson, who grew up writing, and reading graphic novels, quickly gravitated to film as he realized it combined everything he loved about art. After studying film at Dartmouth and attending grad school at Colombia University, he made his first short film, “Pop Foul”. The short earned 41 awards at various film festivals.

Molson’s second short film, which was partially funded by Kickstarter, was “Crazy Beats Strong Every Time."  Molson filmed "Crazy Beats," his longest film to date, in black and white and credits Kickstarter for saving the film after experiencing some production problems early on. The film went on to earn him 9 awards and was an official selection in more than 40 film festivals across the country, including Atlanta.

Molson has attended film festivals for years. His first festival experiences were at Urban World in New York, The Student Academy Awards, and the Colombia Film Festival. 2014 marks his second time attending and his third time in competition at the Atlanta Film Festival.

Molson's third and most recent film is “The Bravest, The Boldest”. After the project floated around for several years, Molson was brought on to direct and rework some of the script. An official selection at Sundance and several other festivals, “The Bravest, The Boldest" brings Molson back to Atlanta to share the film and to receive The Filmmaker to Watch Award. He will accept the award at the Awards Brunch on April 5 and attend a screening of the film on Sunday April 6 in the Shorts Winners Block.

Molson is excited to be a part of the Festival this year and to connect with the Atlanta audience. He values the festival routine and sees each one as an opportunity to connect and show his work to new groups of people. The director views every audience as its own creature and says Atlanta seems to “understand” his films. ATLFF is thrilled to once again have such a talented and promising filmmaker come and share his work and we can’t wait to see what Mr. Moon Molson does next!

Backers Jury gives 2014 ATLFF Filmmaker to Watch Award to "The Bravest, The Boldest"

The polls are closed, the votes have been tallied, and the backers jury has decided: Moon Molson's: The Bravest, The Boldest is the winner of the 2014 ATLFF Filmmaker To Watch Award. As part of the award, Molson will receive a travel stipend to come to Atlanta and accept the award at the Awards Brunch on Saturday April 5.

The Bravest, The Boldest, will screen as part of Drama Shorts 1 at 7 Stages Theatre on Sunday, March 30 at 3:45 PM. The film follows a woman around her apartment building as she tries to avoid the Army Casualty Notification Officers who have obviously come there to bring her some bad news.

Molson checked in from across the internet to thank the jury.