An independent feature film produced in the Isle of Man has won the overall ‘Best in Festival’ award at the 2012 SoCal International Film Festival.
‘The Paddy Lincoln Gang’ has been written and produced by local screenwriter Alistair Audsley who raised finance independently. The film, which is about a fictional rock band in Los Angeles, also scooped the ‘Best Actor’ award for Dean Jagger as well as the ‘Best Actress’ award for Amy Lawhorn. Both actors are based in LA.
Named as one of MovieMaker magazine’s Top 20 festivals, the SoCal (Southern California) is at Huntington Beach, CA and, with its professional jury, has developed a reputation for discovering new film talent and award-winning films.
‘The Paddy Lincoln Gang’ had its theatrical premiere at SoCal on Saturday September 29th and also won the ‘Audience Replay Award’ based on popularity, to gain a second theatrical showing.
Mr Audsley said: ‘We were delighted to even get an Official Selection for SoCal and a theatrical showing, so to win the outright “Best-in-the-Fest” award was amazing. I thought we had a chance with the acting awards as the performances were so good, but to get the outright award was a real surprise, given that we were up against some $2-3m films from all over the world. There were even some short films entered which had a bigger budget than our feature!’
Event director Brian Barsuglia said: ‘SoCal 2012 has a jury panel of 30 top film academics and industry leaders. This year we had more than 1,000 entries. We chose 40 films for screening, but only six made it through to award nominations. That should give some indication of this achievement for “The Paddy Lincoln Gang.”’
SoCal 2012 was well attended by the film media and the cast and crew were interviewed by LA Talk Radio, Access Hollywood and FilmFans.com, who described ‘The Paddy Lincoln Gang’ as ‘phenomenal’.
Manager of Isle of Man Film Hilary Dugdale said: ‘We are delighted that Alistair has achieved this terrific accolade. We hope this win will lead on to more success for Alistair, not only with “The Paddy Lincoln Gang” but with the other productions he is currently working on.’
The film has been boarded by UK/US sales agent Stealth Media Group who will represent the film at the upcoming American Film Market.
www.thepaddylincolngang.com
www.socalfilmfest.com
Photo caption - Pictured in California at the SoCal 2012 International Film Festival awards evening are Best Actor winner Dean Jagger, left and Isle of Man-based screenwriter Alistair Audsley with the overall ‘Best-in-the-Fest’ award.
