Slamdance, the indie film festival which runs January 20-26 in Park City and considers itself the counter to the big, Hollywood infused Sundance Film Festival, has now announced its slate of films for 2012. It’s an interesting and diverse mix of drama, comedy and other staples of the indie world and should offer attendees and judges lots of good choices.

Here’s the slate:

NARRATIVE FEATURE COMPETITION

BINDLESTIFFS – Director: Andrew Edison, Screenwriters: Andrew Edison, Luke Loftin. (USA)

World Premiere. Three smart-mouthed high school virgins, suspended from school on a graffiti charge, flee to the inner city to live out the plot of The Catcher in the Rye. Cast: Andrew Edison, Luke Loftin, John Karna

Comforting Skin – Director: Derek Franson, Screenwriter: Derek Franson. (Canada) US Premiere. A lonely young woman’s desperate need for emotional and physical companionship draws her into a surreal and ultimately destructive relationship with a shifting and whispering tattoo she has willed to life on her skin. Cast: Jane Sowerby, Tygh Runyan, Victoria Bidewell

Doppelgänger Paul – Director: Dylan Akio Smith, Kris Elgstrand, Screenwriter: Kris Elgstrand. (Canada) US Premiere. The unlikely relationship of two lonely men whose connection sets off a chain of events resulting in the loss of a thumb, the theft of a manuscript, and two appearances on a popular morning talk show. Cast: Brad Dryborough, Tygh Runyan

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When mainstream Hollywood is busy making billions of dollars on rereleases of animated classics upgraded for 3D or movies with Morgan Freeman and a dolphin, it’s true independent cinema that holds some of the best stories and visuals.

That’s why we are seeing more and more film festivals pop up over the past few years, giving accolades to the up and coming filmmakers and writers who will one day run the town and bring art back to the theaters.

Shriekfest is one in the Los Angeles area that has been doing so for years. Since 2001, the international film fest has been bringing awareness to the lesser-known horror and science fiction filmmakers with films and shorts that easily surpass some of the movies we spend $10 to see every weekend.

This year’s winners have some of the most talented folks we’ve seen in some time, with aliens and monsters galore. Check out the full list of this year’s winners after the jump, and get the head start on checking out these films over at Shriekfest.com before your friends tell you about them first.

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It has been an exciting couple weeks at the Cannes Film Festival, which a number of talented filmmakers showcasing a high number of films to be excited for.  Last night, the official jury for the 64th Festival de Cannes revealed the prize winners during the closing ceremony.

Some highlights from the list include Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life winning the most prestigious award, the Palme d’Or, despite half the crown booing at the screening while the other half cheered with enthusiasm, Kirsten Dunst winning Best Actress after her film’s director Lars von Trier made some anti-Semitic comments at a press conference earlier this week, and Nicolas Winding Refn winning best director for his film Drive, starring Ryan Gosling, proving that he is one of the most prominant up-and-coming directors.

He previously directed Bronson, starring Tom Hardy. Take a look at the full list of winners and award winners after the jump.

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Like most folks who attended the last screening of Natural Selection, I was catching the film mostly due to its winning both the audience and jury awards at SXSW. I hadn’t heard of it either, but then there were a ton of films on the venue, and I stuck to the ones I probably wouldn’t get screening invites to later (read “documentaries”).

So the hype for Natural Selection was ample, foremost among its champions was/is my Chicago colleague, the great Roger Ebert. And I can see why: It’s a tender, sweet story, the performances are terrific, and it’s all-around original, funny, and (forgive the use of this word) fresh.

Rachel Harris (whose eclectic credits range from The Hangover to Stuart Little 2 to SeaQuest DSV) plays the infertile, sexually frustrated, and very Christian housewife Linda White. Since she can’t produce a child and since she and her husband Abe Abe (John Diel) are such dedicated Christians, the two haven’t had sex in about a quarter of a century.

Abe finds a loophole in the only-sex-for-procreation by making weekly donations to the local sperm bank, something Linda is unaware of (as it would only compound her frustration at not being able to likewise relieve herself) until Abe suffers a stroke during one session and subsequently reveals to her that years ago one of his donations grew into a 23-year-old son Raymond (Matt O’Leary). He tasks Linda with tracking down Raymond so he can see the lad before he dies, and, like the dutiful wife she is, Linda accepts.

However, Raymond is the polar opposite of Linda—blasphemous, crooked, and, as the opening scene discloses, a fugitive. At first he resists her request, but after spying the opportunity to run some sort of grift on this gullible, overly patient woman, he accepts.

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(Even though it’s been over for a while, there’s still some reviews to squeeze out of SXSW!)

The opening scene of Fambul Tok is as powerful as any documentary could hope for: A few dozen Sierra Leone villagers circle a campfire—the social center of their tiny community—one of them stands and accuses another, her own uncle, of slaughtering her family during the 1991 civil war. The gathering becomes a tribunal as the leader reiterates the charges and then asks the accused if they are accurate. And then, instead of handing down a sentence, the leader asks the man’s accuser if she forgives him. She does.

It’s everything an opening scene should be: engaging, tense, and a capsulation of the film.

Fambul Tok, which is Sierra Leonean for “family talk,” refers to this process, where, instead of charging one with a crime and judging him with a jury of his peers, justice is replaced with forgiveness in the hope of fostering peace. This method, its application and merits, are the focus of the film as explored by director Sara Terry and her guide John Caulker, himself a victim of the Sierra Leonean atrocities.

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The world of the Horror-Comedy subgenre is a pretty hard egg to crack. Once the road was paved by Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead trilogy back in the late 80s, it has been very difficult for up and coming filmmakers to try to break ground and get away with the same charm and timelessness that the Evil Dead films have.

A brand new film that definitely has potential to join that club is DeadHeads, a road comedy with zombies that has heart and will get you to laugh pretty hard. The film was a hit at last week’s Newport Beach Film Festival, selling out two of its three screenings. Newport seems to just be the start for this film in its plan for global domination.

Word is now coming in that DeadHeads has been picked up Splendid Films for international rights (not something you normally see with an indie comedy) and will also be making its way to the Cannes Film Festival. Here’s the synopsis:

The story follows two zombie slackers, Mike and Brent, who find themselves surprisingly reborn from the dead amid a disastrous zombie outbreak. After discovering an engagement ring in his coat pocket, Mike enlists his new found zombie pal, Brent, to embark on a quest in search of his lost love. What ensues is a hilarious cross country road trip as these two reformed flesh-eating pals hitchhike cross country as they are pursued by a team of zombie killin’ bounty hunters!

See exactly what we’re talking about with the brand new international trailer after the jump. Visit DeadHeadsTheMovie.com for more news as these zombies hit the road to Cannes.

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Even with the proliferation of Film Festivals, some still stand above the others in terms of credibility and prestige. One of those is the Tribeca Film Festival, which takes place each year in the Tribeca section of new York.

Founded in 2001 by Robert De Niro, Jane Rosenthal and Craig Hatkoff, the festival was created to spur the economic and cultural revitalization of the lower Manhattan district through an annual celebration of film, music and culture. The Festival’s mission is to help filmmakers reach the broadest possible audience, enable the international film community and general public to experience the power of cinema and promote New York City as a major filmmaking center.

In that spirit, the festival announced the winners of this year’s awards. And, here they are:

WORLD NARRATIVE COMPETITION CATEGORIES:

The jurors for the 2011 World Narrative Competition were Souleymane Cissé, Scott Glenn, David Gordon Green, Rula Jebreal, Art Linson, Jason Sudeikis and Dianne Wiest.

• The Founders Award for Best Narrative Feature – She Monkeys (Apflickorna), directed by Lisa Aschan, written by Josefine Adolfsson and Lisa Aschan (Sweden). Winner receives $25,000 and the art award “Anna Christie Entering the Bar, 1965-1967” by Robert De Niro Sr. Sponsored by AKA Hotel Residences. The award was given by Jane Rosenthal and Robert De Niro and Larry Korman from AKA Residences.

• Best Actor in a Narrative Feature Film – Ramadhan “Shami” Bizimana as Yvan in Grey Matter (Matière Grise), directed and written by Kivu Ruhorahoza (Rwanda, Australia). Winner receives $2,500. The award was given by Rula Jebreal.

• Best Actress in a Narrative Feature Film – Carice van Houten as Ingrid Jonker in Black Butterflies, directed by Paula van der Oest, written by Greg Latter (Germany, Netherlands, South Africa). Winner receives $2,500. The award was given by Rula Jebreal.

• Best Cinematography in a Narrative Feature Film – Luisa Tillinger, Artificial Paradises (Paraisos Artificiales) (Mexico). Winner receives $5,000 and $50,000 in post production services provided by Company 3. The award was given by Rula Jebreal.

• Best Screenplay for a Narrative Feature Film – Jannicke Systad Jabobsen, Turn Me On, Goddammit (Få meg på, for faen) (Norway). Winner receives $5,000. The award was given by Rula Jebreal.

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Last week the official selection for the 64th Cannes Film Festival was announced.  49 films will be screened this year across all four categories: Competition, Un Certain Regard, Out of Competition, and Special Screenings.  But out of all that, which of these films should you be most excited to see?

Here is my list of the top 5 film to be stoked about:

1. The Tree of Life - dir: Terrence Malick

2. Sleeping Beauty - dir: Julia Leigh

3. Midnight in Paris - dir: Woody Allen

4. Melancholia - dir: Lars von Trier

5. Restless - dir: Gus Van Sant

Please continue after the break for a full breakdown of these films.

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Kill List suffers from a case of schizophrenia. It tries to be a jack of all trades, but masters none of those said trades during the course of the film. Though I personally found the film gratifying, I was sorely disappointed in the disjointed quality of the final product.

The film starts out a fairly interesting character study of a semi-retired hit-man (Neil Maskell)  and his oddly complacent wife (Myanna Buring). Turns out she is quite capable, having been a member of the Swedish army. She understands the demands of his unconventional job, and encourages him to return to the lifestyle in order to keep their family afloat.

I liked the aspect of her not only knowing about, but encouraging, his amoral lifestyle. An old acquaintance shows up for dinner with his mysterious girlfriend, and just like that, he is thrust back into the hitman lifestyle.

After a heated domestic argument ruins the evening, he takes an assignment to off a few pesky people, hence the title, “Kill List”. Even though he’s been out of the biz for a while, it takes precious little time to jump back in the saddle, offing his victims so sadistically that his partner finds it disturbing.

There are hints of a pedophilia/snuff/pornography ring. When Jay watches a video featuring one of the people on the list, his reaction to what he sees upsets and enrages him to the point that he offs those responsible in horrible ways.

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In the interest of full disclosure, I had the good fortune to meet Becoming Santa’s star, Jack, on the shuttle ferrying us from the horrendous labyrinthine beast of the Austin Convention Center to the heavenly outpost that is the Alamo Drafthouse. Yes, I know I’m mixing mythologies there, so bite me.

Anyway, I met and chatted with Jack before knowing whom he was or even that he had a documentary in the festival, and for those fifteen minutes we conversed, he was just as charming and articulate fellow as he comes across in Jeff Myers’ sweet little documentary.

So I met and liked the guy and ended up watching and liking his film, too. But the two likes are separate from each other; rest assured I’d tear it apart like an eel on a horse head if it were bad (as I well some other films whose directors I likewise met).

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Of the three films I’ve been most excited to see at SXSW, two of them were documentaries, and the two documentaries that pretty much everyone else has been the most excited to see: Werner Herzog’s Cave of Forgotten Dreams and Errol Morris’s Tabloid.

Of the two, the one I was a little unsure of was Morris’s. I know Morris to be somewhat of an acquired taste, and I find his films to lag some, but his is a master of interview and editing: No line of dialogue, no word, uttered by a subject in a Morris documentary, is uninteresting.

And Tabloid is no exception—in fact, it may well be the best introduction to Morris and is certainly his funniest.

The story was new to me: Joyce McKinney is a former beauty queen who fell in love with a man who took up with the Mormon faith and left her to perform his required mission trip in London. Joyce tracked him down, supposedly kidnapped him, and further supposedly spirited him away to a cottage in Devon where she (even further) supposedly chained him to a bed and had her way with him.

That’s not the whole story, of course, and one of the best jokes of Tabloid is just how far the story of Joyce McKinney, the tabloid Joyce McKinney keeps going, and going, and going, and shows no intent of slowing down, right up to the now.

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More news from Austin! This time it’s the closing-night films, and they’re a pretty notable bunch at that. Headlining the bunch is the world premiere of Billy Bob Thornton’s Willie Nelson documentary, The King of Luck. In addition to that, they’ll also be featuring the work-in-progress Bridesmaids, directed by Paul Feig, written by Kristen Wiig, and produced by Judd Apatow; the Harmony Korine short Umshini Wam; and P. David Ebersole’s documentary of Hole drummer Patty Schemel, Hit So Hard. The full list and descriptions follow:

Headliners

The King of Luck
Director: Billy Bob Thornton
This is a documentary about Willie Nelson: the man, the songwriter, the friend, the father, legendary performer and champion of the family farmer. (World Premiere)

Special Events

Bridesmaids (Work In Progress)
Director: Paul Feig, Writers: Annie Mumolo & Kristen Wiig
Kristen Wiig leads the cast as Annie, a maid of honor whose life unravels as she leads her best friend, Lillian (Maya Rudolph), and a group of colorful bridesmaids (Rose Byrne, Melissa McCarthy, Wendi McLendon-Covey and Ellie Kemper) on a wild ride down the road to matrimony.

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