25 New Faces of Independent Film

Filmmaker Magazine unveiled its “25 New Faces of Independent Film” in its latest issue. The 12th annual list spotlights “up-and-comers poised to shape the next generation of independent film.”

We were pleased to see how many are applying their talents and energies to non-fiction films.

Here's a sampling:

“War Don Don," a documentary by Harvard Law School grad Rebecca Richman Cohen (pictured), won a Special Jury prize at this year’s SXSW and will be broadcast September 29 on HBO.

CalArts graduate Jason Byrne‘s experimental documentary “Scrap Vessel” has played numerous festivals this year.

Photojournalist-turned-documentary film director Danfung Dennis is currently in post on his first feature, “Hell and Back Again,” which follows a Marines sergeant from the frontlines in Afghanistan home to North Carolina, where he tries to recover from his injuries and return to his unit.

With their collaborative project, “Sparrow Songs”, director and editor Alex Jablonski and D.P. Michael Totten have been making one short documentary film a month and premiering them on their website. They are currently planning their first documentary feature.

Co-founder of the True/False Film Festival, Missouri-based David Wilson directed this year the well-received short documentary, “Big Birding Day."

You can read full accounts of the 25 filmmakers and their work here.

SnagFilms Expands Documentary Offerings

The documentary film industry just got a big shot in the arm from SnagFilms, the online company founded two years ago by Ted Leonsis, best known for his role in boosting AOL's phenomenal growth.

Its online library of about 1,500 full-length documentaries can be viewed for free -- on about 90,000 Websites that stream them, ranging from the Miami Herald to Hulu -- thanks to ad revenue support (and an initial $10-million in investments from AOL founder Steve Case, and the Knight Foundation).

Now SnagFilms is branching into the paid video-on-demand arena, and forging partnerships with distributors such as Comcast, Apple and Netflix. Leonsis is looking to build an online library of 100,000 accessible non-fiction films.

And that's just part of his master plan to bring more documentaries into the mainstream with wider distribution, marketing and promotion -- especially those that espouse worthwhile social and political causes.

Read more details on SnagFilms Website, and on NYTimes.com.