For only the second time in the 19-year existence of the Best Documentary Filmmaking Emmy category, HBO (which has clinched the gold 10 times) doesn’t have a horse in the race. The same is true of Netflix, which achieved its 2018 victory for “Strong Island” in HBO’s absence. As a result, there is a great deal of pressure on two of the 2023 entries: “The Accused: Damned or Devoted?,” which could bring PBS its second consecutive and sixth overall filmmaking win, and “The Territory,” which would be the third National Geographic property to prevail here.
The documentary filmmaking award differs from most other Emmys in that it is juried, meaning that after each entry is exclusively reviewed by members of the TV academy’s documentary peer group, it must obtain unanimous support from them in order to officially be deemed worthy of a win. This also means that the four programs...
The documentary filmmaking award differs from most other Emmys in that it is juried, meaning that after each entry is exclusively reviewed by members of the TV academy’s documentary peer group, it must obtain unanimous support from them in order to officially be deemed worthy of a win. This also means that the four programs...
- 8/7/2023
- by Matthew Stewart
- Gold Derby
“All That Breathes,” a documentary about two brothers who run a refuge for birds that have been injured by the pollution in New Dehli, has been named the best nonfiction film of 2022 at the 16th annual Cinema Eye Honors ceremony, which took place on Thursday night at the Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, Queens, New York.
“All That Breathes” previously won the top award at the International Documentary Association’s IDA Documentary Awards, the other major award devoted to nonfiction film. It is also on the 15-film shortlist for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
Laura Poitras won the award for directing for “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed,” while “Navalny” won the award for production.
Also Read:
‘All That Breathes’ Director Shaunak Sen on Breaking Nature Doc Clichés While Filming Hospitalized Birds
In the craft categories, a distinctive feature of the Cinema Eye Honors, the immersive...
“All That Breathes” previously won the top award at the International Documentary Association’s IDA Documentary Awards, the other major award devoted to nonfiction film. It is also on the 15-film shortlist for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
Laura Poitras won the award for directing for “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed,” while “Navalny” won the award for production.
Also Read:
‘All That Breathes’ Director Shaunak Sen on Breaking Nature Doc Clichés While Filming Hospitalized Birds
In the craft categories, a distinctive feature of the Cinema Eye Honors, the immersive...
- 1/13/2023
- by Steve Pond
- The Wrap
Click here to read the full article.
In the midst of a golden age for documentary films, there is no shortage of docs worthy of being seen and discussed. But the directors of only six of 2022’s standouts could be represented on The Hollywood Reporter‘s Documentary Roundtable when it convened in November: Peabody Award winner Margaret Brown (Netflix’s Descendant), Oscar nominee Matthew Heineman (Nat Geo’s Retrograde), Oscar winner Laura Poitras (Neon’s All the Beauty and the Bloodshed), first-time filmmaker David Siev (IFC’s Bad Axe), two-time Sundance grand jury prize winner Ondi Timoner (MTV’s Last Flight Home) and Emmy nominee Ryan White (Amazon’s Good Night Oppy). The sextet discussed the origins of their projects, hot-button debates in the doc community and more.
When someone asks you about your film and you have just a few seconds to hook them, what do you say?
David Siev...
In the midst of a golden age for documentary films, there is no shortage of docs worthy of being seen and discussed. But the directors of only six of 2022’s standouts could be represented on The Hollywood Reporter‘s Documentary Roundtable when it convened in November: Peabody Award winner Margaret Brown (Netflix’s Descendant), Oscar nominee Matthew Heineman (Nat Geo’s Retrograde), Oscar winner Laura Poitras (Neon’s All the Beauty and the Bloodshed), first-time filmmaker David Siev (IFC’s Bad Axe), two-time Sundance grand jury prize winner Ondi Timoner (MTV’s Last Flight Home) and Emmy nominee Ryan White (Amazon’s Good Night Oppy). The sextet discussed the origins of their projects, hot-button debates in the doc community and more.
When someone asks you about your film and you have just a few seconds to hook them, what do you say?
David Siev...
- 12/12/2022
- by Scott Feinberg
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
This story originally appeared in the Guild & Critics Awards/Documentaries issue of TheWrap’s awards magazine.
In 2021, director Ondi Timoner’s ailing 92-year-old father, Eli Timoner, who had been partially paralyzed since he had a stroke at the age of 53, announced that he wanted to end his life with medically assisted death. Timoner filmed his final weeks in a tender and startlingly intimate film.
How did you decide to start filming?
When my father went into the hospital for breathing problems, it wasn’t to do with Covid, but it
was during Covid. So there was no seeing him. And after a few days in bed as a paralyzed person
who was 92 and wasn’t going to walk again, he declared that he really wanted to die. He was the
most tenacious person any of us ever knew, so we never expected that he would suddenly make this
choice. But there was no wavering.
In 2021, director Ondi Timoner’s ailing 92-year-old father, Eli Timoner, who had been partially paralyzed since he had a stroke at the age of 53, announced that he wanted to end his life with medically assisted death. Timoner filmed his final weeks in a tender and startlingly intimate film.
How did you decide to start filming?
When my father went into the hospital for breathing problems, it wasn’t to do with Covid, but it
was during Covid. So there was no seeing him. And after a few days in bed as a paralyzed person
who was 92 and wasn’t going to walk again, he declared that he really wanted to die. He was the
most tenacious person any of us ever knew, so we never expected that he would suddenly make this
choice. But there was no wavering.
- 12/7/2022
- by Libby Hill
- The Wrap
Documentary maker Ondi Timoner follows her desperately ill father, and his family, after he decides to exercise his right under Californian law
Ondi Timoner’s home-movie memoir is a heartbreaking and unexpectedly complex film about her elderly father in his final days. Eli Timoner was a swashbuckling entrepreneur who founded the budget airline Air Florida in the 1980s, became a stroke survivor in middle age, and finally, facing terrible ill-health, opted to end his own life under a Californian law that enforces a 15-day grace period in which the patient has time to reflect before the fatal drugs are administered. In fact they are self-administered: the applicant has to drink the hemlock-equivalent themselves, and there are wrenchingly tense scenes in which Mr Timoner tremblingly practises holding a cup in his hand. If he can’t, the whole thing is off.
The camera movingly witnesses his family paying visits and assembling...
Ondi Timoner’s home-movie memoir is a heartbreaking and unexpectedly complex film about her elderly father in his final days. Eli Timoner was a swashbuckling entrepreneur who founded the budget airline Air Florida in the 1980s, became a stroke survivor in middle age, and finally, facing terrible ill-health, opted to end his own life under a Californian law that enforces a 15-day grace period in which the patient has time to reflect before the fatal drugs are administered. In fact they are self-administered: the applicant has to drink the hemlock-equivalent themselves, and there are wrenchingly tense scenes in which Mr Timoner tremblingly practises holding a cup in his hand. If he can’t, the whole thing is off.
The camera movingly witnesses his family paying visits and assembling...
- 11/23/2022
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Paramount+ has set a Nov. 29 premiere date for a slate of new titles from MTV Documentary Films.
The slate spans two feature documentaries and five documentary shorts, all of which are executive produced by Sheila Nevins, executive producer at MTV Documentary Films and the former boss of HBO Documentary Films.
The line-up spotlights the story of a family saying goodbye to their patriarch in “Dig!” director Ondi Timoner’s “Last Flight Home,” as well as the portrait of an artist working against all odds in “Art & Krimes by Krimes.”
Meanwhile, the doc shorts delve into everything from the Louisiana State Penitentiary known as Angola in “Angola Do You Hear Us? Voices From A Plantation Prison,” and the Black Sea, where a Russian activist and mother buries her child in “Anastasia.”
Also premiering is the doc short “As Far As They Can Run,” an intimate look at children with intellectual disabilities...
The slate spans two feature documentaries and five documentary shorts, all of which are executive produced by Sheila Nevins, executive producer at MTV Documentary Films and the former boss of HBO Documentary Films.
The line-up spotlights the story of a family saying goodbye to their patriarch in “Dig!” director Ondi Timoner’s “Last Flight Home,” as well as the portrait of an artist working against all odds in “Art & Krimes by Krimes.”
Meanwhile, the doc shorts delve into everything from the Louisiana State Penitentiary known as Angola in “Angola Do You Hear Us? Voices From A Plantation Prison,” and the Black Sea, where a Russian activist and mother buries her child in “Anastasia.”
Also premiering is the doc short “As Far As They Can Run,” an intimate look at children with intellectual disabilities...
- 11/21/2022
- by Manori Ravindran
- Variety Film + TV
Click here to read the full article.
Late in Last Flight Home, Ondi Timoner’s heartbreaking documentary about the last two weeks of her father’s life, the director and her sister, Rachel, sit beside their dad, Eli, as he confesses what he believes are his greatest sins. He reaches for decades-old memories, dusts them off and lays them in front of his daughters. Rachel, a rabbi tasked with spiritual soothing, quietly lets Eli re-present old wounds and past shames. Timoner has a harder time bearing witness. Just as her instinct to reframe kicks in, her sister stops her. “The exercise is not to give him narration. The exercise is to draw from him his feelings about the things he fell short on,” Rachel says. “Not to make it better.”
How haunting those words are. How truthful, too. The urge to narrativize the lives of our loved ones is a great one.
Late in Last Flight Home, Ondi Timoner’s heartbreaking documentary about the last two weeks of her father’s life, the director and her sister, Rachel, sit beside their dad, Eli, as he confesses what he believes are his greatest sins. He reaches for decades-old memories, dusts them off and lays them in front of his daughters. Rachel, a rabbi tasked with spiritual soothing, quietly lets Eli re-present old wounds and past shames. Timoner has a harder time bearing witness. Just as her instinct to reframe kicks in, her sister stops her. “The exercise is not to give him narration. The exercise is to draw from him his feelings about the things he fell short on,” Rachel says. “Not to make it better.”
How haunting those words are. How truthful, too. The urge to narrativize the lives of our loved ones is a great one.
- 10/31/2022
- by Lovia Gyarkye
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Vladimir Putin may prefer that people forget about imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, but the Cinema Eye Honors isn’t.
The awards show dedicated to the art and craft of documentary film today announced its 2023 Unforgettables list of the most memorable subjects of nonfiction films this year, and Navalny’s name was front and center. The story of the lawyer and anti-corruption crusader, who was almost killed in a Kremlin poisoning plot in 2020, is told in the award-winning film Navalny, directed by Daniel Roher.
Joining Navalny on the Unforgettables list is another political leader — Gabby Giffords, the former Congresswoman from Arizona who was severely injured in an assassination attempt in 2011. Her difficult road to recovery and return to activism is told in Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down, directed by Betsy West and Julie Cohen.
Artist Nan Goldin
Nan Goldin, the artist at the center of the Laura Poitras...
The awards show dedicated to the art and craft of documentary film today announced its 2023 Unforgettables list of the most memorable subjects of nonfiction films this year, and Navalny’s name was front and center. The story of the lawyer and anti-corruption crusader, who was almost killed in a Kremlin poisoning plot in 2020, is told in the award-winning film Navalny, directed by Daniel Roher.
Joining Navalny on the Unforgettables list is another political leader — Gabby Giffords, the former Congresswoman from Arizona who was severely injured in an assassination attempt in 2011. Her difficult road to recovery and return to activism is told in Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down, directed by Betsy West and Julie Cohen.
Artist Nan Goldin
Nan Goldin, the artist at the center of the Laura Poitras...
- 10/26/2022
- by Matthew Carey
- Deadline Film + TV
Towards the end of his life, when Eli Timoner’s weakened body was failing him, he called his daughter, the filmmaker Ondi Timoner, and told her he was ready to go.
“If they can give me goodbye powder, I’d take it,” he said. “I just want to be in the ground.” He pleaded with Ondi, “Help me go there and end all this agony.”
As a resident of California, Timoner could avail himself of the state’s End of Life Option Act, a law that “allows a terminally-ill adult… to request a drug from his or her physician that will end his or her life,” as the UCLA Health website describes it. “People who choose to end their lives this way, and who carefully follow the steps in the law, will not be considered to have committed suicide.”
The state reported that 486 people took life-ending drugs under these circumstances...
“If they can give me goodbye powder, I’d take it,” he said. “I just want to be in the ground.” He pleaded with Ondi, “Help me go there and end all this agony.”
As a resident of California, Timoner could avail himself of the state’s End of Life Option Act, a law that “allows a terminally-ill adult… to request a drug from his or her physician that will end his or her life,” as the UCLA Health website describes it. “People who choose to end their lives this way, and who carefully follow the steps in the law, will not be considered to have committed suicide.”
The state reported that 486 people took life-ending drugs under these circumstances...
- 10/20/2022
- by Matthew Carey
- Deadline Film + TV
When Ondi Timoner’s 92-year-old father told her that he was determined to end his life, the acclaimed documentary filmmaker naturally decided to capture his final weeks on camera — to record the 15-day waiting period mandated by the California End of Life Option Act. Deep within her grief a few weeks later, she found herself assembling this most intimate home video footage into something intended for other people to see: a (relatively) commercial product that would premiere at a festival and play in select theaters before living in perpetuity on VOD.
On paper, that might sound like a morbid and/or cynical exercise in mining public content from private loss. On screen, however, The director’s camera encourages her family to make themselves vulnerable and meet the moment head-on, while legal euthanasia offers them enough control over the timeline to let go of their precious Eli with love in both hands.
On paper, that might sound like a morbid and/or cynical exercise in mining public content from private loss. On screen, however, The director’s camera encourages her family to make themselves vulnerable and meet the moment head-on, while legal euthanasia offers them enough control over the timeline to let go of their precious Eli with love in both hands.
- 10/6/2022
- by David Ehrlich
- Indiewire
Film-maker Ondi Timoner captures her family in a transitional phase, approaching death head-on in Last Flight Home, after her father requests the right to die
In late January 2021, Eli Timoner was hospitalized with difficulty breathing. It had been a long, slow physical decline. The 92-year-old entrepreneur and father of three had been paralyzed for 40 years after a stroke when he was 53; during the isolation of Covid, his mobility worsened, putting a great strain on his wife of 55 years, Elissa. Now, due to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and congestive heart failure, he was permanently bedridden. Reached by phone in the hospital by his daughter, the documentary film-maker Ondi Timoner, Eli reports that he feels finished, is “just waiting to die”.
“Waiting to die?! I thought you were waiting to see me today,” a shocked Ondi responds. But Eli is adamant: “If they could give me goodbye powder, I’d take it.
In late January 2021, Eli Timoner was hospitalized with difficulty breathing. It had been a long, slow physical decline. The 92-year-old entrepreneur and father of three had been paralyzed for 40 years after a stroke when he was 53; during the isolation of Covid, his mobility worsened, putting a great strain on his wife of 55 years, Elissa. Now, due to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and congestive heart failure, he was permanently bedridden. Reached by phone in the hospital by his daughter, the documentary film-maker Ondi Timoner, Eli reports that he feels finished, is “just waiting to die”.
“Waiting to die?! I thought you were waiting to see me today,” a shocked Ondi responds. But Eli is adamant: “If they could give me goodbye powder, I’d take it.
- 10/6/2022
- by Adrian Horton
- The Guardian - Film News
"Even though he ran an airline, he would get the kids to school. We were a happy five-some…" MTV Doc Films has revealed an official trailer for the indie doc film Last Flight Home, a very personal story from acclaimed doc filmmaker Ondi Timoner. This first premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, and just stopped by the prestigious Telluride Film Festival this month. In his final few days, we discover Eli Timoner and an extraordinary life of wild achievements, tragic loss and most of all, enduring love. Last Flight Home shares a stunning verité account of a courageous family confronting life and death. The film is about a man who decides to terminate his own life and in the 15-day waiting period recounts his stories, which Ondi has turned into this doc. "As they open up their lives to offer an enlightening view of a universal experience,...
- 9/11/2022
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
A selection at Sundance Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, and London Film Festival, Ondi Timoner’s latest documentary Last Flight Home takes a personal look at her own family’s search for closure. Set for a release on October 7 from MTV Documentary Films, the first trailer has now arrived.
On an unremarkable suburban street, we find Eli Timoner in his final days and discover an extraordinary life, one filled with wild achievements, tragic loss and, above all, enduring love. His daughter Ondi shares an unforgettable and stunning verité account of a family courageously, and joyously, facing both life and death.
John Fink said in his review, “In her most personal and intimate film, master documentarian Ondi Timoner turns an intended family tribute for a virtual memorial into a moving, bittersweet feature. In Last Flight Home, the Timoner family and immediate friends gather in Los Angeles to send off their father Eli Timoner.
On an unremarkable suburban street, we find Eli Timoner in his final days and discover an extraordinary life, one filled with wild achievements, tragic loss and, above all, enduring love. His daughter Ondi shares an unforgettable and stunning verité account of a family courageously, and joyously, facing both life and death.
John Fink said in his review, “In her most personal and intimate film, master documentarian Ondi Timoner turns an intended family tribute for a virtual memorial into a moving, bittersweet feature. In Last Flight Home, the Timoner family and immediate friends gather in Los Angeles to send off their father Eli Timoner.
- 9/8/2022
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
MTV Documentary Films has boarded new projects about an all-girl Afghan robotics team, a #MeToo crime story, an imprisoned mural artist and a community of disabled children in Pakistan. The documentaries join a slate that includes Ondi Timoner’s Sundance title “Last Flight Home,” which will be screening at Telluride this week in a rare double festival act.
The fledgling division, which was Oscar-nominated for the film “Ascension” earlier this year, was set up in 2019 by legendary HBO Documentary Films boss Sheila Nevins, and ViacomCBS executives Liza Burnett Fefferman and Nina L. Diaz. Nevins was at HBO for 38 years and won 34 Emmys in that period. Her credits include “Citizenfour,” “Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief” and “Paradise Lost.”
The slate spans four feature-length documentaries and six short films (full details below), with Timoner’s “Last Flight Home” serving as a centrepiece.
The “Dig!” director’s acclaimed film follows...
The fledgling division, which was Oscar-nominated for the film “Ascension” earlier this year, was set up in 2019 by legendary HBO Documentary Films boss Sheila Nevins, and ViacomCBS executives Liza Burnett Fefferman and Nina L. Diaz. Nevins was at HBO for 38 years and won 34 Emmys in that period. Her credits include “Citizenfour,” “Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief” and “Paradise Lost.”
The slate spans four feature-length documentaries and six short films (full details below), with Timoner’s “Last Flight Home” serving as a centrepiece.
The “Dig!” director’s acclaimed film follows...
- 9/2/2022
- by Manori Ravindran
- Variety Film + TV
Plans afoot for autumn theatrical release and awards campaign.
MTV Documentary Films has acquired worldwide rights to two-time Sundance grand jury prize winner Ondi Timoner’s Sundance 2022 entry Last Flight Home in what sources said was a highly competitive situation.
Screen review: ’Last Flight Home’
The Interloper Films production received its world premiere as a Special Screening during the online festival last month and sees veteran documentarian Timoner present a loving account of her ailing father Eli Timoner’s life as he expresses his desire to end his life.
Ondi Timoner, who won Sundance grand jury prizes for Dig! in...
MTV Documentary Films has acquired worldwide rights to two-time Sundance grand jury prize winner Ondi Timoner’s Sundance 2022 entry Last Flight Home in what sources said was a highly competitive situation.
Screen review: ’Last Flight Home’
The Interloper Films production received its world premiere as a Special Screening during the online festival last month and sees veteran documentarian Timoner present a loving account of her ailing father Eli Timoner’s life as he expresses his desire to end his life.
Ondi Timoner, who won Sundance grand jury prizes for Dig! in...
- 2/25/2022
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
MTV Documentary Films has acquired worldwide rights to Ondi Timoner’s “Last Flight Home,” a moving and deeply personal portrait of family dealing with the last days of their patriarch. The documentary had several bidders and the sale was highly competitive.
“Last Flight Home” was a favorite with critics after it premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. MTV Documentary Films is planning a theatrical release in the fall along with an awards campaign. “Last Flight Home” was written, directed and edited by Ondi Timoner, the filmmaker behind “Dig!” and “We Live in Public.” She also produced the film with David Turner.
The film follows Eli Timoner, a suburban man and business leader whose meteoric rise was impacted by health struggles. It charts his last remaining days, while celebrating an extraordinary life, one filled with wild achievements, tragic loss and enduring love from an incredibly close-knit family. Eli Timoner...
“Last Flight Home” was a favorite with critics after it premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. MTV Documentary Films is planning a theatrical release in the fall along with an awards campaign. “Last Flight Home” was written, directed and edited by Ondi Timoner, the filmmaker behind “Dig!” and “We Live in Public.” She also produced the film with David Turner.
The film follows Eli Timoner, a suburban man and business leader whose meteoric rise was impacted by health struggles. It charts his last remaining days, while celebrating an extraordinary life, one filled with wild achievements, tragic loss and enduring love from an incredibly close-knit family. Eli Timoner...
- 2/25/2022
- by Brent Lang
- Variety Film + TV
In Jan. 2021, Eli Timoner, 92, decided to make use of California’s End of Life Option law. His daughter, the award-winning documentary director Ondi Timoner (“We Live in Public”) did not start out to make a feature about Eli’s and her family’s journey to the end, but she has. “Last Flight Home,” which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, is many things, all of them compelling. It is a tribute, a grappling with mortality, an exercise in self-surveillance, a messy home movie, a brief account of aviation history and a lesson in letting go and grief.
In 1982, Eli Timoner had been flying high. His wife, Elissa and their kids — Rachel, Ondi and David — were thriving. Air Florida, the regional carrier he’d co-founded and was president of had grown considerably. In February of that year, he appeared on “Good Morning America” with host David Hartman asking him questions about his ambitions for the company.
In 1982, Eli Timoner had been flying high. His wife, Elissa and their kids — Rachel, Ondi and David — were thriving. Air Florida, the regional carrier he’d co-founded and was president of had grown considerably. In February of that year, he appeared on “Good Morning America” with host David Hartman asking him questions about his ambitions for the company.
- 1/28/2022
- by Lisa Kennedy
- Variety Film + TV
In her most personal and intimate film, master documentarian Ondi Timoner turns an intended family tribute for a virtual memorial into a moving, bittersweet feature. In Last Flight Home, the Timoner family and immediate friends gather in Los Angeles to send off their father Eli Timoner. Only partially a biographical sketch, the bulk of the film is centered around the process of the send off. California’s End of Life Option Act offers terminally ill patients that are of sound mind the option to end their lives following a series of evaluations that occur during a 15-day period. The process requires at least two doctors agreeing with the assessment.
The family insists the help of the Faith and Hope hospice to honor Eli’s wishes after he returns home from being hospitalized. At 92 years old, Eli has been been partially crippled since a stroke in the 1980s brought on by...
The family insists the help of the Faith and Hope hospice to honor Eli’s wishes after he returns home from being hospitalized. At 92 years old, Eli has been been partially crippled since a stroke in the 1980s brought on by...
- 1/27/2022
- by John Fink
- The Film Stage
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