London Raindance Festival Awards Adds To Lexus Short Film’s Game’s Oscar Potential
Success for Lexus Short Film director Jeannie Donohoe in London’s Raindance Festival has helped her movie’s chances of gaining an Oscar nomination.
The American movie-maker’s feature GAME has been named winner of the festival’s Best Short award, confirming its potential as a possible contender in next year’s Academy Awards.
Donohoe travelled to London to join Friday night’s (30 September) awards celebrations for the Raindance Festival, Europe’s largest showcase and competition for independent film. GAME, produced by Lexus and The Weinstein Company for the third season of Lexus Short Films, helped raise the curtain on the festival with an opening night screening at the Vue Cinema in London’s West End.
Reacting to news of the award, she said: “It’s such an honour to receive this award for GAME at Raindance, I am very grateful to the festival for selecting our film. I saw such interesting, beautifully made short films this week, so it’s an especially big honour to be recognised among them and my huge thanks go to the jury.
“A terrific team made our film happen, starting with the incredible support from Lexus through Lexus Short Films in collaboration with The Weinstein Company. We had a dream cast and a creative and technical crew whose contributions all made the story what it is on the screen. This award is for everyone who helped bring the script to life, and for all the girls who test the limits and dream big.”
The plot of GAME follows a student bidding for a place on a high school’s championship-winning basketball team. On court the player demonstrates all the right skills to earn selection, but has a secret which takes the storyline to another level.
The film has qualified for Oscar consideration thanks to its theatrical release this summer; by winning an award at Raindance it has met an additional qualifying criterion. Its formal submission to the Academy is due to take place today (2 October).
GAME is available to watch in full from LexusShortFilms.com
Submissions for the fourth Lexus Short Films series are currently under consideration by the programme’s selection committee, which this year includes leading industry figures Patty Jenkins, director of the recent Warner Bros. and DC Comics Wonder Woman movie, Antoine Fuqua, best known for directing The Magnificent Seven (2016), The Equalizer and Training Day, and actor-writer Taylor Sheridan. They are joined in the reviewing process by senior executives from Lexus International and The Weinstein Company. Joey Horvitz with The Weinstein Company will again be producing the films.
