Slackery News Tidbits: June 3, 2013

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Here's the latest Austin film news. 

  • Austin Film Society recently announced the participants in its inaugural Artist Intensive, a program designed to mentor narrative feature writers/directors in the development stages of their projects. Last weekend, Austin and New York-based independent bigwigs, like Amy Hobby (producer of Gayby) and Austinite Jeff Nichols (Mud), mentored six filmmakers, which included Austinites Mallory Culbert and Carlyn Hudson with The Big Spoon; 2012 Texas Filmmakers' Production Fund recipients Andy Irvine and Mark Smoot with Lovers Crossing; 2011 TFPF recipient Daniel Laabs with an untitled project about the aftermath of a fatal car accident in Pennsylvania; and the Texas revenge thriller Seize The Body by James M. Johnston and Todd Connelly. 
  • The Houston Film Commission has announced this year's Texas Filmmaker's Showcase, a selection of short films representing the Lone Star State. The showcase will be screened in Los Angeles on June 30 for producers, agents and studio reps. It includes several films from Austinites: Kat Candler's short Hellion; Russell O. Bush's documentary Vultures of Tibet (which won TFPF grants in 2011 and 2012); Craig Whitney's The Garden and the Wilderness; and Tony Costello's Little Lions. Other selections include Cork's Cattlebaron by Dallas filmmaker Eric Steele (watch online) and documentary Vincent Valdez, Excerpts for John, by San Antonio filmmakers Angela and Mark Walley (watch online).
  • Fantastic Fest will host an international co-production market for genre films called Fantastic Market/Mercado Fantastico, which aims to connect international genre film projects with potential production partners, sales agents and distributors. The market will premiere in conjunction with this year's Fantastic Fest. Austinite Robert Rodriguez's El Rey network will collaborate with Mexican production and distribution outlet Canana Films to produce the Fantastic Market. Film submissions will be accepted until July 15. Representatives from the projects, selected by industry insiders mid-August, will be invited to make pitches to a jury that will include Rodriguez and Fantastic Fest/Alamo Drafthouse co-founder Tim League, who will select and award the top three.
  • Speaking of Alamo Drafthouse, its distribution arm Drafthouse Films has acquired the North American rights to the Dutch thriller Borgman at this year's Cannes Film Festival. It's about a strange man who turns the lives of a rich family into a psychological nightmare. A U.S. theatrical and VOD/digital release is scheduled for next year.
  • In more Drafthouse news, former Austinite Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy of local filmmaker Richard Linklater's Before Midnight break the fourth wall to address theatergoers of the chain's "no talk and text" rule.