Disney and Marvel Entertainment’s The Avengers, directed by Josh Whedon, produced by Kevin Feige and with visual effects from VFX supervisors Janek Sirrs and Jeff White, will receive the “Hollywood Visual Effects Award” at the 16th Annual Hollywood Film Awards.
Hollywood, CA --
The 16th Annual Hollywood Film Awards, presented by the Los Angeles Times, is pleased to announce that writer/director/producer Judd Apatow will be given the “Hollywood Comedy Award”; actor John Hawkes will receive the “Hollywood Breakout Performance Award”; actress Quvenzhane Wallis will receive the “New Hollywood Award”; cinematographer Wally Pfister, A.S.C. will receive the “Hollywood Cinematographer Award”; and Disney and Marvel Entertainment’s The Avengers, directed by Josh Whedon, produced by Kevin Feige and with visual effects from VFX supervisors Janek Sirrs and Jeff White will receive the “Hollywood Visual Effects Award.”
“We look forward to celebrating these exceptionally talented filmmakers and artists for their outstanding work and creative vision,” said Carlos de Abreu, Founder and Executive Director of the Hollywood Film Awards.
The Hollywood Film Awards Gala Ceremony will take place at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills on October 22, 2012. The event honors cherished stars and up-and-coming talent, and traditionally kicks off the film awards season with the biggest stars and top industry executives in attendance.
“We are very proud to be the first stop of the awards season. In the last nine years, a total of 85 Oscar nominations and 32 Oscars were given to the honorees of the Hollywood Film Awards,” said de Abreu.
Last year's awards show reached a total TV audience of more than 41 million media impressions, in addition to more than 300 million online and print readers' impressions.
Aside from celebrating accomplishments on screen, the Hollywood Film Awards established the “Hollywood Gives Back” program to expand and continue highlighting and assisting important local and national charities to raise funds. Over the years, the Hollywood Film Awards has contributed to such charities as the following: The Art of Elysium, Artists For Human Rights, Artists for Peace and Justice, MatchingDonors.com, Children's Hospital Los Angeles, the Enough Project, and Variety The Children's Charity of Southern California, among others.
Further, the Hollywood Film Awards selects individuals to be recipients of their “Hollywood Humanitarian Awards” in recognition of their contribution to the betterment of their communities or society at large. Prior recipients include Nobel Peace Prize winner and ex-President of East Timor, Dr. Jose Ramos-Horta, Nobel Laureate Jody Williams, Father Rick Frechette, and actor and activist Sean Penn.
Audiences will get to experience Judd Apatow's next film, This Is 40, when it is released by Universal Pictures on December 21, 2012.
An original comedy that expands upon the story of Pete (Paul Rudd) and Debbie (Leslie Mann) from the blockbuster hit Knocked Up, we will see first-hand how they are dealing with their current state of life. The film also stars John Lithgow, Megan Fox, Iris Apatow, Maude Apatow, Jason Segel, Melissa McCarthy, Robert Smigel, Charlene Yi and Albert Brooks.
Initially aspiring to become a professional comedian, Apatow eventually stopped performing in favor of writing. After writing on a few award shows, cable specials, The Larry Sanders Show and The Ben Stiller Show (which he co-created), Apatow served as an executive producer on NBC's critically-acclaimed Freaks and Geeks.
He then made his feature-film debut as a director with 2005's The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Co-written by Apatow and the film's star, Steve Carell, The 40-Year-Old Virgin opened at number one at the box office.
In 2007, he directed, wrote and produced Knocked Up, which grossed more than $200 million internationally. He followed this up by producing the hit comedies Superbad, Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Pineapple Express and writing and directing 2009's Funny People. Additional producing credits include The Cable Guy, Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, and Get Him to the Greek.
In 2011, he produced the most successful R-rated female comedy of all time, Bridesmaids, which received Oscar® nominations for Best Original Screenplay and Best Supporting Actress (Melissa McCarthy), as well as numerous other awards. Apatow is currently in production on the HBO series Girls, and recently produced The Five-Year Engagement, the latest comedy from director Nicholas Stoller.
John Hawkes has been working non-stop since his critically acclaimed performance as Teardrop in Winter's Bone, the role which earned him an Independent Spirit Award win and an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Next, Hawkes will be seen in Ben Lewin's The Sessions, the story of a man confined to an iron lung who is determined - at age 38 - to lose his virginity. He also recently completed production on Lincoln, Arcadia and The Playroom.
Hawkes' additional film credits include Higher Ground, Contagion, Martha Marcy May Marlene, Me and You and Everyone We Know, American Gangster, Miami Vice, Identity, The Perfect Storm, Small Town Saturday Night, Hardball, Wristcutters: A Love Story, The Amateurs, From Dusk Till Dawn, and A Slipping-Down Life. On the small screen, Hawkes starred as Sol Star in HBO's critically lauded drama Deadwood and now plays Danny McBride's brother Dustin in the comedy Eastbound and Down.
At the age of five, Quvenzhané Wallis, a Louisiana native, was cast as the lead in Benh Zeitlin's critically acclaimed feature film Beasts of the Southern Wild. Her portrayal of Hushpuppy, a young girl growing up in the flood plagued bayous of Louisiana, is being recognized as one of the best performances by a child actor in over a decade. The film went on to win the Grand Jury Prize at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival and the Caméra d'Or at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. Wallis recently wrapped production on Steve McQueen's highly anticipated film Twelve Years A Slave, in which she will play the daughter of a man kidnapped from New York City in the early 1800s and sold into slavery.
Wally Pfister's ascent as a director of photography began when he shot Christopher Nolan's Memento in 1999. That work earned him a Spirit award nomination for cinematography. Since then, he has joined the ranks of the top Hollywood cinematographers, earning 3 Academy Award nominations, and one win for his work. The first nomination came for 2005s Batman Begins, for which he was also honored, by his peers, with an American Society of Cinematographers Award nomination.
The following year, he was nominated for his cinematography work on The Prestige, and in 2009, for Christopher Nolan's record-breaking blockbuster, The Dark Knight. He won his Oscar in 2010 for Inception also directed by Nolan. He also served as director of photography on the thriller, Insomnia, for Nolan, The Italian Job, directed by F. Gary Gray, as well as Laurel Canyon, and Moneyball. Films that Pfister has photographed on have grossed over three-billion dollars worldwide. In between feature films, Pfister also works as Director/Cameraman on Commercials. He is currently in pre-production on his feature film Directorial debut, which is due to begin filming in early 2013.
Janek Sirrs is a respected VFX veteran, whose credits include The Matrix, I am Legend, Batman Begins, and Iron Man 2.He won the Best Visual Effects Oscar for The Matrix and was nominated for Iron Man 2.
Jeff White joined ILM in 2002 as a creature technical director. He has a Masters of Fine Arts from the Savannah College of Art and Design, and has spent the last five years as Associate VFX Supervisor on the Transformers franchise. The Avengers marks his first time at the helm as Visual Effects Supervisor.
Source: Hollywood Film Festival
Formerly Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Network, Jennifer Wolfe has worked in the Media & Entertainment industry as a writer and PR professional since 2003.
