SXSWORLD

2012 Grand Jury Prize Winners Embody Resolute Indie Aesthetic by Eric Kohn revered around the world, and nabbing the Grand Jury Prize at the SXSW Film Festival. An Academy Award usually results from millions of dollars spent on marketing campaigns, as well as the decisions made by hundreds of voters. Th e Palme d'Or goes to an even smaller list of contenders lucky enough to be a part of the insider club known as the Cannes Film Festival. SXSW plays by a diff erent set of rules. Th e kind of low budget, DIY movies championed E very fi lmmaker dreams of winning an award, but there is a diff erence between landing an Oscar or the Palme d'Or, glossy trophies for Best Narrative Feature went to a movie that wasn't just made with a DIY aesthetic; it embodied that exact ethos in its plot. Gimme the Loot, a fi rst-time eff ort from director Adam Leon, follows a pair of Bronx teens (Tysheeb Hickson and Tashiana R. Washington) who spend their days tagging rooftops and stealing graffi ti canisters. Together they dream of tagging the Home Run Apple in Citi Field (home of the New York Mets) — an uncon- ventional goal among young movie protagonists who usually yearn to go to college or strike it rich. Singled out by SXSW jury member J. Hoberman at the awards ceremony for avoiding the tendency to ste- reotype young African American protagonists on fi lm, Gimme the Loot transcends racial boundaries by simply ignoring them and focusing on the characters' naive worldview. Leon, who accepted the award with his entire cast standing behind him, could not have been more pleased. "SXSW kicks ass," he says. "Th at's my overall perception. It's huge, which can be daunting, and it's not always easy to get around, but did I mention that it takes ass and kicks it? Because it does." For the New York-based fi lmmaker, who got his start working as a by SXSW are fundamentally separate from a lot of larger scale projects, and the award winners typically epitomize this tendency. Last year, fi rst-time director Robbie Pickering's Natural Selection took home the Grand Jury Prize for Best Narrative Feature, at which point a sleeper hit suddenly became the most talked about movie at the festival. Dragonslayer, a punk rock skater documentary that arrived at the festival with neither publicist nor sales agent, won the docu- mentary prize, kickstarting a successful life on the festival circuit. In both cases, resolutely small, per- sonal movies triumphed above celebrity-driven fare, which is the underlying appeal of the festival. Th is year was no exception. Th e Grand Jury Prize production assistant for Woody Allen, SXSW provided the momentum he needed when the movie showed up a few weeks later at the Film Society of Lincoln Center for the New Directors/New Films showcase. By that time, it had already landed distribution with Sundance Selects. "So much has happened for the movie already in the last month, but we will never forget that the team at SXSW were the fi rst people to take a chance on our completely unknown movie," Leon says. But even as Leon refl ects fondly on the experience, he didn't have the 40 SXSW ORLD / M AY 2012 Cast and crew of the Best Narrative Feature winner, Gimme the Loot. From left: Meeko Gattuso, director Adam Leon, Tashiana Washington, Zoë Lescaze, Ty Hickson, and Sam Soghor. "It was overwhelming. I was just blown away and speechless. What took me off guard is that I'm never speechless, and I didn't know what to say...." Mr. Baker, his portrait of Ginger Baker, the cantankerous former Cream drummer, that took home the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary. Th e movie opens with Baker smacking Bulger in the face with his cane, breaking the director's nose, but Bulger may have had an even more sig- nifi cant experience at the festival. "I watched the fi lm at the premiere," he says. "It was overwhelming. I was just blown away and speechless. What took me off guard is that I'm never speechless, and I didn't know what to say. It took me over four years to make the fi lm, so I just had so many emotions running through me at once." But the screening and award weren't Bulger's only defi nitive moments at SXSW. "I wanted to meet Richard Linklater and Mike Judge," he says. "Done and done. Th ey're my heroes." He speaks glowingly about the festival as a whole. "I made a music fi lm, so having musicians playing at the level of my subject, in this day and age, was a gratifying thing to witness." But his subject didn't share that same enthusiasm when Bulger told him about the prize. According to Bulger, "He said, 'Good job,' and hung up the phone." ■ See the full list of award winners on sxsw.com/fi lm easiest time at fi rst. "I was so hyped up to watch the movie at the pre- miere and really thought I was going to have a blast, but instead I was fairly miserable," he said. "I just ended up being nervous and felt that I was sending out that vibe into the theater, so I walked out." After taking a quick walk, he returned for the fi nal 20 minutes of the movie. "People were laughing, so it was all good from then on," he says. Documentarian Jay Bulger had a similar experience with Beware of BRADLEY E. DUGDALE III

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