Award Night at Athena Film Festival

Roxy Toporowych, Gale Anne Hurd, Christina Kotlar

On Thursday, February 7, a cold and crisp Awards Night at the third annual Athena Film Festival set the stage for celebrating women and leadership in the film and television industry within a prestigious academic setting at Barnard College Columbia University, New York City. It was a festive opening for the four day event despite warnings of an impending blizzard heading for the Northeast.

Thank goodness there was live music going on in the foyer with a very cool Jazz group performing for arriving guests. Not so lucky for the auditorium where the Awards were set to begin, where a pedestrian minded DJ blasted dance music before and after the award ceremony not allowing conversation for the milling guests. Despite the back beat pounding, it was a good crowd representing friends and supporters of the awardees and their place in the biz.

A joint project of Barnard’s Athena Center for Leadership Studies and Women and Hollywood, the evening began with an introduction by two students, Julia Kennedy and Lauren Gillette ready to hand off the awards followed by a welcome address from Debora Spar, President of Barnard College.

Melissa Silverstein, Festival Co-Founder and Founder of Women and Hollywood, a blog that raises awareness about the contribution women make to the entertainment industry, introduced the first recipient, Molly Haskell, film critic and author of an important book From Reverence to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies.

As a well respected film critic, Ms. Haskell lectured widely on film and the roles of women. She taught at Barnard, Columbia and Sarah Lawrence and fell right into the role providing fascinating tidbits from years of research and interpretation. I wished there could have been more time set aside for her engaging accounts, but as with most Awards shows, there’s a schedule to keep.

Introduced by Kathryn Kolbert, Festival Co-Founder, Rose Kuo, executive director of the Film Society of Lincoln Center stepped on stage recalling her first introductions to other cultures as stereotypically middle class that eventually turned her into a conduit for outreach of diversity presenting international, classic and cutting-edge independent cinema to a revitalized New York Film Festival. I was very impressed with the recent NYFF and had the opportunity to chat briefly with her before the evening’s award giving began.

Rose Kuo asked me straight out what film I like best. I confess I was trying to think, hard and fast since the recent Sundance Film Festival lineup of female filmmakers was still burning in my brain. I came up with the Kubelka film on pure cinema as it was when it first began because it was so surprising that it was the subject of conversation for weeks after the festival. I have to mention the Masterworks section where I was impressed with the extraordinary work of French filmmaker Catherine Breillat and call it a bold, bold, bold handling of a powerful subject of female sexuality.

What we both agreed on another powerful film screened, Beyond the Hills and wondered what influences Romanian director, Cristian Mingiu had in his life that caused him to find and bring out the female voice so strongly and accurately in his characters. I look forward to more from Rose Kuo’s direction in the upcoming NYFF.

Festival Co-Chair and 2011 recipient Greta Gerwig presented Ava DuVernay, director of Middle of Nowhere and founder of the African-American Film Festival Releasing Movement (AFFRM) and the first African-American woman to win the Best Director prize at Sundance Film Festival in 2012. She also introduced Pat Mitchell, president and CEO of the Paley Center for Media who was unable to attend being on a mission to the Congo; however, an inspiring acceptance speech was shown on the big screen.

Trying to catch up on time, Diablo Cody is Co-Chair of the Athena Film Festival who In 2007 earned a WGA Award, an Independent Spirit Award, and an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for Juno, raced through much of the introduction for this year’s recipient of the Laura Ziskin Lifetime Achievement Award, Gale Anne Hurd.

One of the most respected film and television producer in the industry (The Walking Dead, The Abyss, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, The Hulk), Gale Anne Hurd was poised and unhurried as she displayed a level of graciousness unsurpassed in acknowledging the work of Laura Ziskin (1950-2011) whose leadership, vision and courage set the standards for this award as one who blasted through Hollywood’s impenetrable inner circle to become an A-list producer of independent and studio films.

A trailer of Hurd’s film clips underscored her working methods showing an apparent ease, dedication to the highest level of filmmaking yet with an in-control-of-the-situation that is reminiscent of another great cinema pioneer and first woman film director, Alice Guy Blache. The students here are fortunate to have programs with mentors who set the standards for others to emulate. Kudos to Gale Anne Hurd for ending on a high note.

With concluding remarks from Debra Martin Chase, Producer and Festival Co-Chair, the evening was a wonderful prelude for this weekend and a young film festival finding what it wants to become in just three years and going strong. Cheers.