SUNDANCING IN MARCH...
Jason Kohn accepting his award at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival.
Just spent a very nice evening with the up-and-coming filmmaker Jason Kohn, whose debut film Manda Bala (Send a Bullet) won top documentary honors at this year's Sundance Film Festival. After a special screening of the film, we chatted over dinner about its haunting story, which examines the horrors of daily life in parts of modern Brazil; his future projects, which do not include any additional documentaries; and other assorted items, such as why he believes Apocalypto was the year's best film and why Mel Gibson deserves a break. Kohn, who is quite a character, spent some time a few years ago working for the great documentary filmmaker Errol Morris, whose longtime editor Brad Fuller joined us for dinner. (Incidentally, Fuller reports that Morris' next film, which is about the Abu Ghraib scandal and is tentatively titled S.O.P.: Standard Operating Procedure, should be ready to go by May. Like Manda Bala, it has to be on everyone's early radar for the 2007 Best Documentary Oscar.)
