With the Oscar-nominated documentary If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front, co-directors Marshall Curry and Sam Cullman turned their camera on an issue that is at once historical and current: The Earth Liberation Front (ELF), a '90s environmental activist group made up of once-peaceful protestors who took to committing acts of arson after the non-violent demonstrations they had been participating in were ignored by the government and often met with brutality by the police. Though the film resonates with the protest movements that have sprung up since its release, Curry didn't make the film with any particular agenda—environment, political or otherwise—in mind. Instead, he was intrigued by the story of Daniel McGowan, a former ELF member facing life in prison for his acts of what the government considers terrorism.

In case you haven't heard, the economy hasn't been doing that well for the past few years. No country has felt the economic crisis so keenly as Iceland, where the collapse of a once-soaring economy left citizens feeling betrayed by their politicians. Against this backdrop rose an unlikely political hero: Jón Gnarr, the comedian who ran for mayor of Reykjavík as a joke… and won. His campaign—in which he promised to build a Disneyland in the city and refused to talk to his opponents if they hadn't watched "The Wire"—was filmed, from start to finish, by Gaukur Úlfarsson for his feature documentary Gnarr.

Something about procedural cop dramas makes them inherently powerful, and director Oren Moverman’s Rampart is no exception. Millenium Entertainment brings this intense feature film—about an arrogant, macho cop (played by Woody Harrelson) on an emotional downward spiral—to theaters this Friday, February 10th. Many of the reviews to have come out since the film’s premiere at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival focus on Harrelson’s gritty performance as the corrupt cop Dave Brown. But much of the grittiness of the film itself comes from its visual style, which took Moverman and DP Bobby Bukowski a special creative approach to achieve.

There’s a circular pattern to the careers of many directors: Their early films tend toward rough experiments. Then they mature and develop their own distinct artistic voice. Finally, secure in their success, they drive off into the sunset of their career, all too often trading in the fame they had at their peak for something more like the obscurity they started with. The decline of a director’s work at the end of their career is an all-too-common trend, but it's one that Hungarian director Bèla Tarr, with his final film The Turin Horse, has managed to avoid. With The Turin Horse coming out on Friday, we're taking a look at three other directors who refused to leave their legacy poorly wrapped.

It's not time for the Oscars yet, but the Annies have already rolled into town. Last Saturday saw the Annie Awards, which honors the year's highest achievements in (you guessed it) animation, take place in UCLA's Royce Hall in a ceremony hosted by actor Patton Oswalt. The night's big award—Best Animated Feature—went to Rango, which is regarded as the frontrunner for that same award at this year's Oscars.

Last month, Josh Gibson went to the Slamdance Film Festival with his short film Kudzu Vine… and came back with his very own Panasonic AG-AF100, a full HD camcorder that retails for $4,995.00. Gotta say, not too shabby. For Gibson, an associate director and instructor of film at Duke University, the boon came courtesy of Panasonic's Five Flavors of Filmmaking contest, held in cooperation with Slamdance. The contest called upon five teams to use the AF100, the official camera of the festival, to create a one-minute film based on a flavor. Gibson chose to interpret the flavor he was assigned—watermelon—with an experimental film that brought to life three haiku poems by the 17th century Japanese poet Basho.

New releases Chronicle and The Woman in Black each took in a higher-than-expected haul over Super Bowl weekend, though it was the former film that managed to climb to the top with a weekend gross of $22 million. Still, The Woman in Black wasn't that far behind, pulling in $21 million over the weekend. Last week's surprise box office victor, The Grey, slid to number three, while new release Big Miracle's weekend take of $8.4 million was only enough to land it at spot number four. Rounding out the top five was Underworld: Awakening.

Creaky floorboards. Rattling window shutters. Creepy noises in the attic. What could be scarier than a lonely old house on a dark and stormy night? The haunted house subgenre has been around for a long time and has proven to be endlessly fascinating to moviemakers and audiences alike. With the two newest entries in this enduring subgenre—The Woman in Black and The Innkeepers—hitting theaters today, MM is taking a look back at some of the scariest haunted house movies of all time.

Now in its 14th year, Scriptapalooza remains unlike any other screenplay competition. When you submit your script to Scriptapalooza, it will be read by the elite of the film industry: Over 90 producers, managers and agents with the power to turn your script into a feature film. With the next deadline—March 5th—looming on the horizon, MM recently caught up with Scriptapalooza president/co-founder Mark Andrushko to find out more about this year’s competition.

Let's not beat around the bush: Directing a movie with ten major characters sounds pretty tough. Directing a movie with ten major characters, a bunch of non-professional actors and three massive animatronic whales that can only be reached for repairs by diving into some pretty chilly water? Even tougher. Shooting in Alaska, where one of the only weather conditions that stays consistent from day to day is the freezing cold? Was Big Miracle director Ken Kwapis nuts?!

Techies rejoice! A new toy is hitting the market. Of course, JVC's GY-HMQ10, the world's first handheld 4K camcorder, isn't a toy, per se; the high-tech wonder captures, records and plays video at a resolution that trumps the 1080p image quality of high-definition television four times over.

A hefty check of $10,000 and year-round support from one of indie film’s leading role models? This fantastic prize has been awarded to four moviemakers courtesy of the Mahindra Global Filmmaking Award, presented by India-based conglomerate the Mahindra Group in cooperation with the Sundance Institute. Designed to recognize and support moviemakers from around the globe, the award provides its winners with financial support, mentoring from creative advisers, participation in a Sundance Institute Directors or Screenwriters Lab, attendance at the Sundance Film Festival and additional support over the course of the year.

The Sundance Film Festival ♥s New York. At the 2012 edition of the celebrated festival, which wrapped up its ten days of indie mayhem yesterday, one in three of the films screened was impacted in some way by a graduate of New York University's (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts in the form of a director, producer, writer, editor, set designer, cinematographer or actor who graduated from the world-renowned film school.

The box office went to the wolves this weekend, with Joe Carnahan's The Grey beating out last week's reigning champ Underworld: Awakening to land at the number one spot. The man vs. nature actioner did better than expected, earning $20 million in its first weekend; meanwhile, the latter film's weekend haul of $12.5 million brings its total gross to $45.1 million.

It's like a bad nightmare: Being stranded in the wild with scant resources and no guarantee of survival, your very existence hanging in the balance. What can you eat? How do you make it out alive? How do you manage to hang on to your humanity? This harrowing scenario has provided grist for many movies over the years. The latest of these is The Grey, in which Liam Neeson plays a man stranded in the Alaskan wilderness and hunted by a pack of hungry wolves. With the film hitting theaters today, it seems a perfect time to take a look back at some of the most thrilling man vs. nature movies from the past 40 years.

Distribution is the sole source by which film revenue is earned, but between the advent of digital theatrical distribution, the rise of Netflix and VOD and the collapse of the DVD market, recent years have seen some radical changes in how films are distributed. It makes sense that independent moviemakers, always been on the cutting edge themselves, should be the ones to race to exploit emerging distribution methods.

To be fair, some great films came out before the advent of sound cinema. Still, when the link between sound and image was formed by the coming of the first "talkies," the art of moviemaking made a mad dash to achieve levels silent features could only dream of. A tribute to the value of sound can be seen at many major awards ceremonies in the form of a Best Sound Editing award... but when it comes to something as important as sound, a dedicated awards ceremony is well-deserved. That's where the Motion Pictures Sound Editors (MPSE) comes in.

This morning saw the announcement of the 2012 Academy Award nominations, and while many of the films to have their names called out by nominee presenters Jennifer Lawrence and Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) president Tom Sherak came as no surprise, there were (as always) some additions and snubs that have Oscar pundits scratching their heads.

The Artist continued its intermittent awards season domination on Saturday, winning the Producers Guild of America (PGA) Award for Best Feature Film and shoring up its chances for Best Picture victory come Oscar night. While Steven Spielberg and co-producer Kathleen Kennedy didn't take home an award for War Horse, nominated in the Best Feature Film category, the producing duo didn't go home empty-handed; their The Adventures of Tintin was named the year's Best Animated Film. In the documentary category, director Michael Rapaport's Beats Rhymes & Life: The Travels of a Tribe Called Quest was the surprise winner.

Underworld: Awakening took a bite out of the box office last weekend, earning $25.4 in its first three days and beating out second-place finisher, fellow new release Red Tails, by a substantial margin. Last week's number one film, Contraband, fell two spots to number three, while Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close celebrated its first weekend in wide release—it hit select theaters across the country over Christmas weekend—with a weekend gross of $10.5 million. Rounding out the top five was the newest from Steven Soderbergh, Haywire, which earned $9 million over its first weekend.

With the 2012 Sundance Film Festival now in full swing, we've asked some Park City-bound moviemakers one burning question: Why Sundance? Here's what they had to say.

It’s pretty much impossible to escape vampires these days. The Twilight movies are as insanely popular as ever, the HBO series “True Blood” has a large and dedicated fanbase and Justin Cronin’s best-selling novel The Passage looks poised to kick off the next must-read vampire series. The newest piece of vampire pop culture to sink its teeth into movie audiences’ necks is Underworld: Awakening, out in theaters today. With so many blood-suckers baring their fangs, vampires have started to feel a bit tired and clichéd. But never fear, MM is here to save the day. We’ve come up with a selection of ten films that put wonderfully original spins on vampire mythology.

Haskell Wexler is simply one of our greatest living cinematographers. He’s in a class by himself as much for his fearless sense of justice as for his groundbreaking technical innovations, but it’s his lifelong commitment to putting his lens where his mouth is—as with his second film as a writer-director, 1985's stunning Latino—that makes Wexler such a unique source of inspiration to so many moviemakers.

In Coriolanus, out in theaters tomorrow, director and star Ralph Fiennes brings to the screen one of Shakespeare's least-adapted plays. Replete as it is with guns, tanks and army fatigues, Fiennes' directorial debut is a decidedly modern take on a story that was originally set in pre-Imperial Rome. Still, even with all its modern accoutrements, Coriolanus is actually fairly traditional adaptation of the Bard's work... at least compared to some of the more off-the-wall approaches that other directors have taken in years past.

My documentary Old School New School explores the nature of creativity, all within the context of storytelling through various crafts, including acting, cinematography, music, theater, dance and poetry. The film is an extension of many conversations I’ve had over the years with my artist friends. We’d meet in a café to talk about life, art and philosophy. They were stimulating discussions that ultimately segued to the obligatory question all serious artists eventually examine: How can we, as creative people, grow in the direction we want to grow?

Though Tomas Alfredson's Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy has been notably absent from much of the awards season hoopla, the spy drama's dry spell may now be over. Its 11 nominations in this year's British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Awards, announced today, place it on the top of the heap; the only film to receive more nominations is The Artist, with 12. Martin Scorsese's Hugo also cleaned up with nominations in 11 categories, including Best Director.

It’s been more than 10 years since MovieMaker began citing the best cities to be an independent moviemaker—those places that go the extra mile in welcoming lower-budget productions just as much as they do the “big guns.” With more and more moviemakers opting to shoot in their own backyards, a city’s ability to offer a sustainable, creative community in addition to production support, tax incentives and local and experienced crew bases has never been more important to the indie industry. Read on to discover which cities topped our list for 2012.

Edward Burns is no stranger to the world of indie film. He launched his career with the $25,000 The Brothers McMullen at the Sundance Film Festival back in 1995, during the dark, pre-digital days of 16mm cameras and now-foreign concepts like optical houses and film prints. In 2010, after seven larger-budget features as a writer-director, Burns returned to the low-budget arena with Nice Guy Johnny. He bypassed traditional distribution methods by releasing the film himself, first with a short festival tour and then with a simultaneous day-and-date rollout on VOD, DVD and Pay-Per-View. Now Burns is taking this new model even further with Newlyweds, which he produced for a staggering $9,000 sum.

Crime drama Contraband had a better-than-expected opening weekend run at the box office, earning $24 million in three days and outpacing second-place finisher, Beauty and the Beast 3-D, by a substantial amount. The re-released Disney classic earned $18.4 million over the weekend—less than the 3-D release of The Lion King earned on its opening weekend last September, but still pretty good for a movie that's only one year shy of being able to buy itself alcohol.

At last night's Golden Globes, it was Oscar frontrunner The Artist that came out on top, winning three awards, including Best Picture—Comedy or Musical. Still, it's probably best to keep the film's name written in pencil on your Oscar ballot for now; though it was one of only two films to win multiple awards, the winner in the Best Picture—Drama category (this year, The Descendants) historically has a better chance at victory come Oscar night. Additionally, The Artist missed out in both the Best Screenplay and Best Director categories, in which Midnight in Paris and Hugo, respectively, walked away with the gold.

Three days after receiving a Directors Guild of America (DGA) Award nomination for Hugo, Martin Scorsese has picked up another nomination from the guild, courtesy of his documentary George Harrison: Living in the Material World. Scorsese's competition in the Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Documentary category consists notably of Steve James for The Interrupters. James' Hoop Dreams was famously snubbed by the Academy in 1995; this year, The Interrupters, despite receiving near-universal critical acclaim, was not included on the Academy's shortlist for Best Documentary nominees.

When Christopher Thompson came across a work of art by Banksy—the infamous, anonymous street artist whose work sells for hundreds of thousands of dollars—he saw his acquisition as a twofold opportunity. First, there was a potentially huge amount of money to be made in selling the piece. Second, the effort it would take to find a buyer—getting it restored, authenticated and evaluated, all of which would require gate crashing the business world that's sprung up around the counterculture icon—would make for an interesting documentary. Four years later, co-directors Thompson and Alper Cagatay's debut film, How to Sell a Banksy, is finally complete.

Martin Scorsese's Hugo takes audiences on a 3-D journey inside an underground train station in Paris during the 1930s. The story revolves around a 12-year-old orphan named Hugo, who makes a home for himself behind a wall at the station after his father dies. Hugo interacts with the owner of a small toy booth in the station, an eccentric girl, passengers on the platform and a mechanical man that his father created.

Mark Friedberg has served as production designer on some of the most visually striking films to come out in recent years, among them Wes Anderson's The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou and Julie Taymor's Beatles-infused musical Across the Universe. With his recent work on Taymor's The Tempest, Friedberg faced the challenge of rendering the magical island that serves as the locale for Shakespeare's strangest play using natural settings and locations. To celebrate the recent home video release of The Tempest, MM spoke with Friedberg about working with Taymor and creating a magical setting from a barren landscape.

Since the early 1990s, as the late season award contenders still linger in most cinemas, awaiting a surge in audiences as their prizes accumulate, a mid-winter onslaught of goofy genre fair begins to appear in cinemas the weekend after New Year's Day. The next couple of months generally become a veritable dumping ground for all sorts of sub-par studio projects, from would-be prestige films that just don't fit in the award season paradigm to other assorted misfits within the corporate conglomerates' tight-fisted slates.