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January 19, 2012
For two documentary makers, the Oscar phone call that may or may not come
Independent Weekly
by Craig D. Lindsey
Well, we're down to the wire, folks. Next Tuesday morning, the Academy Award nominations will be announced, and people in the motion picture industry will likely have spent the night wide awake and wondering if a film they worked on, or if they themselves, will be nominated for that most golden of statues. While the well-lauded likes of Meryl Streep will perhaps be content to sleep in, for others, a nomination could have a galvanizing effect on their films and careers.
In this latter category are two documentary filmmakers with Triangle ties. Nancy Buirski, director of The Loving Story, and Michael Galinsky, who co-directed Battle for Brooklyn with his wife Suki Hawley, may be around that morning to first receive the news. Or they may be notified secondhand, like when they heard last November of their films being on the shortlist for documentaries eligible for Oscar contention.
"Someone wrote to me to congratulate me," remembers Buirski. "I wasn't sure what it was about."
As for Galinsky, he found out via the social network grapevine. "Someone posted it on my Facebook page," he says. "I screamed so loud, I scared the interns. I did!"
It makes sense for Buirski and Galinsky to be shocked and surprised by the news. For both filmmakers, it's only been their first time out making a theatrical, documentary feature—and already, there is the possibility that they could become Oscar nominees, a designation that would be an extraordinary reward for the time and effort they put into their flicks.
Posted by eric at January 19, 2012 10:21 AM