Austin at SXSW 2011: The Features

The SXSW Film Festival always has a great showing of documentaries and narrative shorts and features from Austin filmmakers. A number of films are also shot in the Central Texas area. It's starting to feel like it wouldn't really be SXSW without a shot of the Frost Bank Building in at least one movie. Austin films aren't merely limited to the Lone Star States category, either -- you can find them in many of the fest's offerings.

Here's the best list we've been able to compile of Austin connections in SXSW films this year. If we missed your film, please let us know in the comments. We will update the list if needed when the SXFantastic and Midnighters films are announced this week. We'll also do a separate article for short films after they are announced.

A note to filmmakers: If your movie has some link to Austin, we would love to interview you about it and see the film. Please drop us a line ASAP so we can set something up before the fest begins.

Headliners

• The Beaver -- Jodie Foster directs Mel Gibson in a movie written by Kyle Killen, a local screenwriter (the TV series Lone Star).

Documentary Feature Competition

• Where Soldiers Come From -- Austin filmmaker Heather Courtney, whose doc Letters from the Other Side played SXSW 2006, is back at the fest with this look at small-town young men enlisting in the military. The film is produced by Megan Gilbride (Lovers of Hate) and David Hartstein (The Happy Poet), and is co-edited by former Austinite Kyle Henry (FourPlay).
• Better This World -- This documentary is set in Midland, but cinematographer David Layton is from Austin. The film focuses on the "Texas Two" -- two Midland childhood friends who end up entangled in a scheme that lands them domestic terrorism charges.

Narrative Feature Competition

• Natural Selection -- A Christian wife who's led a sheltered life in small-town Texas finds out her dying husband has an illegitimate son. Shot in Austin, Bastrop and Smithville. Writer/director Robbie Pickering is from Jersey Village, Texas (near Houston). The cast includes Rachael Harris and Jon Gries.

Lone Star States

• Blacktino (pictured at top) -- Aaron Burns' film got some attention during Fantastic Fest last year with fake movie posters and a trailer for Citizen Jane, a fictitious movie starring Michelle Rodriguez that somehow figures into blacktino. The Austin-shot movie is about an overweight nerd trying to find his place in the world. The cast includes Danny Trejo, Jeff Fahey, Daryl Sabara and Dana Wheeler-Nicholson, and the movie's produced by Elizabeth Avellan.
• Building Hope -- Local actor/filmmaker/activist Turk Pipkin, whose movie Nobelity played SXSW 2006, returns to the fest with his third documentary in a series about ways we can help improve the world. Pipkin and The Nobelity Project travel to Kenya to build a high school in an impoverished rural area. Pipkin's movies don't disguise the fact that they are calls to action, but they are beautifully shot and worth seeing in a theater for that reason alone.
• Five Time Champion -- This narrative feature from Austin writer/director Berndt Mader won a 2009 Texas Filmmakers Production Fund grant. It was shot in Austin and Smithville. The cast includes Dana Wheeler-Nicholson (that's two SXSW '11 films for her), Jon Gries (and for him too) and Betty Buckley. Local musician Graham Reynolds composed the score.
• Incendiary: The Willingham Case -- Slackerwood has been keeping an eye on this film from Steve Mims ever since it won a 2010 Texas Filmmakers Production Fund grant. Mims and Joe Bailey, Jr. co-directed the documentary about Cameron Todd Willingham, convicted and executed for murder by arson in a case that has become quite controversial. You can still watch the "sneak peek" footage at the Texas Tribune, along with an interview with the filmmakers.
• My Sucky Teen Romance -- Local teenage filmmaker Emily Hagins makes it to SXSW with her third feature, about a group of teens trying to save a science-fiction convention from being overrun with actual vampires. The film was shot in Austin. The cast includes Tina Rodriguez, whose brother Robert is a well-known local filmmaker; and John Gholson, who once designed an alternate logo for Slackerwood (you can see it on our Facebook page). And producer Paul Gandersman has contributed photos to Slackerwood in the past. Austin sure is a small world sometimes.
• Otis Under Sky -- This movie is described on IMDb as a "feature-length unscripted, partially web-based experimental narrative about a hapless recluse web artist, Otis, who falls into unrequited love with Ursula, an impulsive kleptomaniac." Okay, I'm hooked. Local filmmaker Anlo Sepulveda has a Kickstarter campaign going to get the film completed and promoted for its SXSW premiere.
• Wuss -- Shot in Dallas, we're claiming this as an Austin film because writer/director Clay Liford just moved back to town. Read Jenn's interview with him for more details about the movie. The cast includes Austin actor/filmmaker Alex Karpovsky, as well as Tony Hale (Chuck) and filmmaker Jonathan Lisecki (Gayby).

24 Beats Per Second

• Outside Industry: The Story of SXSW -- As Slackerwood reported earlier, a documentary about SXSW itself has been in the works, and that film is premiering at the festival this year. It focuses on the early years of SXSW, back when it was a music festival. Local filmmaker Alan Berg of Arts+Labor is the director.

Special Events

• The Cameraman -- No, Buster Keaton isn't from Austin. (Too bad.) But the band Bee vs. Moth is, and they will be performing their original score to accompany the screening of this 1928 silent film.