COLCOA Critics Awards 2017

 

COLCOA is proud to partner with LAFCA for the COLCOA Critics Awards. The 2017 LAFCA Jury will give a Critics Award a Special Prize and a First Feature Award, by choosing among 30 new feature films in competition. 

 

Winners will be announced on Wednesday May 3rd in the morning.

LAFCA is a professional organization of Los Angeles-based film critics working in the Los Angeles print and electronic media. Each year since its creation in 1975, LAFCA members honor outstanding cinematic achievements during their annual Achievement Awards ceremony in January. LAFCA also sponsors film events and donates funds to various Los Angeles film organizations. Since 2016, the president of the organization is Claudia Puig. 

2017 LAFCA CRITICS JURY 

 

 

Robert Abele

 

Robert Abele is a film and television critic/journalist whose work has appeared in The Los Angeles Times, LA Weekly, Variety, Premiere, DGA Quarterly, Emmy, The San Francisco Chronicle, The New York Post, The Dallas Morning News, Total Film and Playboy. A graduate of Southern Methodist University's film program and former theater critic, he is the co-author of the book, The Paramount Story, and has served on juries for the AFI Film Festival, the USA Film Festival and the PEN Center/USA West Literary Awards.

 

 

Jon Frosch

 

Jon Frosch is reviews editor and a film critic at the Hollywood Reporter. Before moving to Los Angeles for that job, he was film editor and critic at France 24 in Paris, where he started out as a general assignment reporter in 2009. Prior to that, he was an online editor and contributing writer at the International Herald Tribune (also in Paris) for four years. He has freelanced as a film critic and features writer for various publications, including The New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, The Atlantic, The Village Voice, The Stranger, Variety and Film Journal International. He holds a B.A. in English from Wesleyan University and an M.A. in French studies with a concentration in cinema from New York University.  

 

 

Mark Keiser

 

Mark Keizer is a senior film critic for Alt Film Guide. His previous outlets include Entertainment Today and L.A. Citybeat. He co-authored the book Ultimate DVD: The Essential Guide to Building Your DVD Collection, published by the Berkley Publishing Group. Currently, he’s co-host of the DVD DigiGods, a podcast available on iTunes and IGN.com. 

Keizer career also encompasses daytime talk, late night comedy, reality programs, game shows, variety shows, live news, and hidden camera. Most recently, Mark was Co-Executive Producer of Seasons 5 and 6 of Comedy Central’s The Man Show, hosted by Joe Rogan (Fear Factor) and Doug Stanhope. Mark’s work on The Man Show was the culmination of an overall deal with Stone-Stanley Entertainment, in which he oversaw development of the SpikeTV reality hit, Joe Schmo. Also for Stone-Stanley Entertainment, he served as Co-Executive Producer of the Animal Planet hidden camera comedy special Animal Pranksters. 

Keizer’s daytime duties include Supervising Producer of the syndicated talkfest The Roseanne Show. Other talk show producing credits include The Late, Late Show with Tom Snyder. 

 

 

Bob Koehler

 

Robert Koehler is a film critic for Variety, and contributes criticism to Cinema Scope and Cineaste film journals and the Christian Science Monitor. A former theater critic for the Los Angeles Times, he has also written reviews, articles and essays for a number of publications including Cahiers du Cinema and Die Tageszeitung. Koehler is a member of FIPRESCI and has served on juries at various festivals including Cannes, Vancouver, Buenos Aires, Slamdance, Guadalajara, Palm Springs, Los Angeles Latino, San Francisco Latino and Bermuda. His occasional blogs on cinema can be read at Filmjourney.org. As a member of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, he serves on the Experimental/Independent award committee, which annually recommends to LAFCA membership the best experimental or independent film that screened in Los Angeles during the past year. He also serves on LAFCA’s Disbursement committee, which plans disbursement of funds. As a programmer for LAFCA’s sponsored ongoing film series, “The Films That Got Away,” Koehler has programmed several films, from Peter Watkins’ “La Commune” to Lisandro Alonso’s “Los Muertos” and Jacques Rivette’s “Out 1,” in cooperation with the UCLA Film Archive, American Cinematheque, Filmforum and the Los Angeles Film Festival. He is currently working on a contribution to an anthology on contemporary cinema.

 

Luke E. Thompson

 

First published at the age of 10 when one of his poems was printed in a children's book in Ireland, Luke Y. Thompson had been an unofficial film critic for friends and family for many years before writing for the underground 'zines AteBall and his own KnifEdge, the latter of which caught the attention of the editors at the Los Angeles New Times in 1999, who were looking for a fresh perspective. Initially syndicated throughout all the New Times publications, his audience expanded with the merger of New Times and Village Voice, and he ultimately landed at the OC Weekly. LYT has a degree in film production from USC, and has won L.A. Press Club Awards for work done at the old New Times Los Angeles, an honorable mention award (2005) and second-place award (2006) for his online blog, and an honorable mention in 2007 for entertainment reviews/criticism at OC Weekly (the only film critic nominated in that category). Known to dye his hair odd colors as a cheap publicity stunt, and fond of sitting front-row-center.

 

Ella Taylor

 

Ella Taylor is a film critic and staff writer for npr.org. A former television critic and an academic who taught media sociology at the University of Washington in Seattle, she teaches film courses at USC and has written for the Atlantic Monthly, Mirabella Magazine, The New York Times, and the Boston Globe Magazine among other publications.

 

PAST JURIES 

2016

Ann Lee Ellingson

John Oppenheimer

Claudia Puig

Chcuk Wilson 

2015

Lael Loewenstein 

Michael Nordine

Jean Oppenheimer

Alynda Wheat

Chuck Wilson 

 

2014 

Andrew Barker

Tim Cogshell

Ann Lee Ellingson

Robert Koehler

Henry Sheehan

2013

Lael Loewenstein (PRESIDENT)

Justin Chang

Wade Major

Jean Oppenheimer

Chuck Wilson

 

2012

Christy Lemire (PRESIDENT)

Andrew Barker

Annlee Ellingson

Todd Gilchrist

Ella Taylor

 

2011

Peter Debruge (PRESIDENT)

David Ehrenstein

Mark Olsen

Justin Lowe

Henry Sheehan

 

2010

Jean Oppenheimer (PRESIDENT)

Tim Grierson

Sheri Linden

Wade Major

Brent Simon

 

2009

F.X. Feeney (PRESIDENT)

Peter Debruge

Andy Klein

Christy Lemire

Amy Nicholson

 

2008

Wade Major (PRESIDENT)

Scott Foundas

Mike Goodridge

Jean Oppenheimer

Claudia Puig