PROGIE NOMINEES ANNOUNCED ON THOM HARTMANN’S SHOW

The Awards Honor Outstanding Movies of Conscience and Consciousness

Los Angeles, Dec. 28, 2008 – The James Agee Cinema Circle have announced the nominees for the 2008 “Progie” Awards at 11:00 a.m. (PST), December 29th on Thom Hartmann’s Air America radio program. The Progies recognize features, documentaries and filmmakers for their outstanding achievement in promoting human rights and providing a voice for people of color, women, the working class, immigrants, gays, the environment and against war, censorship and political repression.

The Progies are awarded in several categories, including: THE RENOIR: The Progie Award for Best Anti-war Film, named after the French filmmaker Jean Renoir, director of 1937’s anti-militarism masterpiece “Grand Illusion.” THE BRANDO: The Progie Award for Best Progressive Film Activist, named after Marlon Brando, champion of Native peoples and other underdogs. THE DZIGA: The Progie Award for Best Progressive Documentary, named after Soviet filmmaker Dziga Vertov, director of 1929’s “The Man With the Movie Camera.” THE TRUMBO: The Progie Award for Best Progressive Picture, named after screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, one of the Hollywood Ten, who broke the Blacklist in 1960 by receiving screen credit for “Spartacus.”

The Progies premiered last December, when The Progressive Magazine published online an article recognizing films for their political consciousness, conscience and content (see: http://www.progressive.org/mag_rampell122607.) This inspired the creation of an international association of leftist film critics, reviewers, historians and scholars dedicated to spotlighting Hollywood, indie and foreign progressive pictures -- the James Agee Cinema Circle, named after the onetime film critic for Time and The Nation.

JACC participants include: Dan Bessie, culture critic and son of one of the Hollywood Ten; Paul Buhle and Dave Wagner, co-authors of “Radical Hollywood”; Gerald Horne, author of “The Final Victim of the Blacklist” and “Class Struggle in Hollywood”; Bill Meyer, People’s Weekly World reviewer; Luis Reyes, co-author of “Hispanics in Hollywood”; Jack Shaheen, author of “Reel Bad Arabs” and “Guilty”; etc.

The 2008 election year was a rich period for progressive pictures, such as Clint Eastwood’s “Changeling”, Ron Howard’s “Frost/Nixon”, Oliver Stone’s “W.”, Michael Moore’s “Slacker Uprising”, Steven Soderbergh’s “Che”, Courtney Hunt’s “Frozen River”, etc. For a comparable period in Hollywood history one must go back to 1940 and 1941, when Best Picture Oscar nominees included: “The Grapes of Wrath”, “The Great Dictator”, “The Philadelphia Story”, “Citizen Kane” and “How Green Was My Valley.”

The results of the James Agee Cinema Circle democratic vote for Progie nominees have been announced December 29, 2008. Following a second vote the Progie Award winners will be announced in early February 2009, prior to the Academy Awards ceremony.

L.A.-based film historian/critic Ed Rampell, author of “Progressive Hollywood, A People’s Film History of the United States”, and WBAI film critic Prairie Miller, producer of “The WBAI Arts Magazine” on N.Y.’s Pacifica Radio affiliate, are available for interviews, as are other JACC participants.