TheWrap s Top 50 Film Schools of 2021 thewrap.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from thewrap.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Directors Close-Up: Stretching Budgets and Ambitions with the 2021 John Cassavetes Noms
Of all the various Film Independent Spirit Award categories, the
John Cassavetes Award is one of the most special, shining a bright light on creative teams making their films truly within an economy of means–specifically, with production budgets under $500,000.
The award is given to the lead creative roles of the awarded film: writer, director and key producers to recognize the work it takes by a core team of dedicated storytellers to deliver an artfully crafted piece of microbudget cinema, very often catching soon-to-be important filmmakers on the early side of their careers; for example, Miguel Arteta and Mike White (
Film Independent
Phew! Honestly, we’re not used to staying up this late to wrap our awards season (although to be fair, we
have been this drunk). But if nothing else, 2020/21 has certainly been a year of firsts. Including our first and hopefully last pandemic-era Film Independent
Spirit Awards. And while we miss our big cacophonous beach tent, it’s hard to imagine having any more fun than we did tonight with host Melissa Villaseñor and this wholly unforgettable 2021 Spirit Awards.
So congrats again to all of this year’s nominees and winners including those of our inaugural TV/streaming categories. And whether you watched this year’s show on IFC, streamed it on AMC+ or joined us for our first-ever Virtual Show experience, we can’t say it enough:
ICYMI: Catching Up with Our March Directors Close-Up Panels
two weeks away–Thursday, April 22, airing LIVE on at 10:00 pm ET / 7:00 pm PT and hosted by SNL’s Melissa Villaseñor. Which also means there are only two more sessions left in our all-Spirit Awards edition of the 2021 Film Independent
Directors Close-Up. Here’s what’s happened so far…
Best Director nominees Lee Isaac Chung (Writer/Director,
Minari), Emerald Fennell (Writer/Director,
Promising Young Woman), Eliza Hittman (Writer/Director,
Never Rarely Sometimes Always), Kelly Reichardt (Writer/Director,
First Cow), Chloé Zhao (Writer/Director/Editor,
Nomadland); moderated by Josh Welsh (President, Film Independent.) Read our full recap