Savannah Film Festival Announces Its 2013 Slate

Savannah, GA (PRWEB) October 03, 2013

In addition to previously announced honoree Alexander Payne and Cannes Best Actor award winner Bruce Dern, Academy Award-nominated actor Terence Stamp (The Limey, Billy Budd) will receive a Lifetime Achievement Award and actress Natalie Dormer ("Game of Thrones") will receive the Discovery Award as part of the 16th Annual Savannah Film Festival, which will take place from October 26th to November 2nd. Alec Baldwin, Miles Teller and James Toback are among the special guests attending the festival.

Premiere special screenings this year include Payne’s Nebraska, John Wells’ August: Osage County, John Turteltaub’s Last Vegas, James Toback’s Seduced & Abandoned, Brian Percival’s The Book Thief, Stephen Frears’ Philomena, Asghar Farhadi’s The Past, Justin Chadwick’s Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, Ralph Fiennes’ The Invisible Woman and David Frankel’s One Chance.

Multiple Emmy and Golden Globe award winner Alec Baldwin and Oscar nominated writer/director James Toback will premiere and discuss their HBO documentary Seduced & Abandoned. Bruce Dern, the star of Nebraska—and previous Savannah Film Festival honoree—will present Alexander Payne with his honor.

Previous "Discovery Award" honoree Miles Teller will host a special screening of The Spectacular Now with director James Ponsoldt and screenwriter Michael Weber. Other special guests include "The Walking Dead" actors Norman Reedus and Emily Kinney, "The Vampire Diaries" stars Nina Dobrev and Candice Accola, Tony Award-nominated director Christopher Ashley, actors Zach Gilford and Kiele Sanchez, and director Ti West.

Other special screenings taking place include: Kevin McDonald’s How I Live Now, Andrew Adamson’s Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away (a special presentation with RealD), Stephen Frears’ Muhammad Ali’s Greatest Fight, Brad Coley’s East of Acadia (World Premiere),Ti West’s The Sacrament, and a special ‘work in progress’ presentation of Christopher Ashley’s Lucky Stiff.

In addition to the special screenings, there are 58 films in competition in the categories of Narrative Feature, Documentary Feature, Professional Shorts, Student Shorts, and Animated Shorts. As well as 2 new Shorts categories: Historical and Super! (under 6 minutes) Shorts. The competition films are competing for more than $80,000 in cash and prizes this year.

The jurors for this year’s competition are Sharon Badal, head of shorts programming at Tribeca Film Festival, Tony Award-winning and Emmy nominated actor John Benjamin Hickey ("The Big C"), writer/director Gary Lennon ("Orange is the New Black"), director/producer Scott Lochmus (The Joneses), and Academy Award nominated producer Allison Owen (Elizabeth).

Hosted by the Savannah College of Art and Design, the Savannah Film Festival has become one of the largest entertainment events in the Southeast. SCAD offers the only major film program in the United States integrated within an acclaimed art and design university. In the past eight years, the university has been one of the top 10 U.S. film schools in producing Student Academy Award finalists.

Past festival attendees and honorees include: Peter O'Toole, Michael Douglas, Oliver Stone, Jane Fonda, Sidney Lumet, Diane Lane, Ian McKellen, Isabella Rossellini, Lily Tomlin, Ellen Barkin, Liam Neeson, Vanessa Redgrave, Matt Dillon, Norman Jewison, James Marsden, Tommy Lee Jones, John Waters, James Franco, Alec Baldwin, Ray Liotta, Aaron Eckhart, Roger Ebert, Terrence Malick, Sydney Pollack, Malcolm McDowell, and Milos Forman.

Single tickets and passes for the festival are available now. For more information on the Savannah Film Festival and a complete schedule of events, please visit filmfest.scad.edu or follow us on Facebook and Twitter at @savfilmfest.

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