05.02.09
Winner: 2009 Heineken Audience Award
By The Editors
It's YOUR award. The people's choice this year? Smart and poignant New York City comedy City Island. Read on to find out how you can see this film, plus runners-up Racing Dreams and Midgets Vs. Mascots, at special screenings!
The votes are in! This year's Heineken Audience Award has been a thriller of a competition. The standings were hotly contested, changing by the minute and by the screening, with a variety of heartwarming docs (P-Star Rising, Racing Dreams, Soul Power) and hilarious narratives (A Matter of Size, Midgets Vs. Mascots, The Swimsuit Issue) battling it out.
But now we officially have the winner: City Island!
Congratulatious to director Raymond De Felitta and his talented cast and crew, who also won a $25,000 prize from Heineken. Second Place went to the TFF 2009 Best Documentary Feature Racing Dreams, and coming up in Third Place is the laugh-out-loud mockumentary Midgets Vs. Mascots. Together, these three films make for a diverse, hilarious trio.
All winning films will screen at the AMC Village VII on Sunday, May 3. Click here for more information. Make it a marathon!
A list of the three Award Winners follows.
TFF 2009 Heineken Audience Award Winner:
City Island
Raymond De Felitta's family comedy takes us on a trip to a sleepy harborside New York that you've never seen before, with Andy Garcia and Julianna Margulies as the heads of a troubled household with secrets that are about to burst. Alan Arkin and Emily Mortimer round out the cast of this crowd-pleasing winner.
Catch up with director De Felitta on his enthusiastic blog.
Panel: City Island.
City Island screens Sunday, May 3, at 12:30 pm and 6:30 pm, in addition to a previously scheduled screening at 4:45 pm.
TFF 2009 Heineken Audience Award Second Place:
Racing Dreams
Not every film gets a five-minute standing ovation at the end of its premiere, but Marshall Curry's Racing Dreams is no ordinary NASCAR documentary. Curry, whose Oscar-nominated Street Fight won the TFF '05 Audience Award, delves into NASCAR culture, following the lives of ordinary tweens who have an extraordinary hobby: go-kart racing ("the Little League of NASCAR"). You will smile, cry, and cheer at TFF 2009's Best Documentary.
Q&A: Racing Dreams.
Tribeca Kids Access Blog and Photos.
Racing Dreams screens Sunday, May 3, at 3:00 pm and 7:30 pm, in addition to its two Best Documentary Award Winner screenings.
TFF 2009 Heineken Audience Award Third Place:
Midgets Vs. Mascots
One of the most-talked-about films at the Festival, Midgets Vs. Mascots will get you in the door on the title alone, where said little people (including, yup, Gary Coleman and In Bruges' Jordan Prentice) battle Mascots (including Gator and Taco) in events like milk-drinking, bull-riding, door-to-door-sales, and a whole ton more for a prize of one million dollars. Celebrate your inner Jackass with Ron Carlson's hilarious mockumentary, which is certain to shock and amuse.
Q&A: Midgets Vs. Mascots.
Midgets Vs. Mascots screens Sunday, May 3, at 4:30 pm and 9:00 pm, in addition to a previously scheduled 10:30 pm screening.
Congratulations to all the winners!
