September 23, 2003
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Leslie Unger - (310) 247-3000
                       lunger@oscars.org

Beverly Hills, CA - Academy Award^® nominee "Spellbound" and "OT: Our Town" will be screened for the October 8 installment of the Contemporary Documentary Series, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Academy Foundation and the UCLA Film and Television Archive. The screening will begin at 7:30 p.m. in UCLA's James Bridges Theater and both films' makers are scheduled to be present.

"Spellbound" focuses on eight young people participating in what is often called the ultimate intellectual showdown - the National Spelling Bee. From the hardscrabble plains of Texas to the manicured lawns of Connecticut, the Ozark countryside and a troubled project in Washington, D.C., the film quilts together a patchwork of real and modern American stories. Anxious yet courageous, the young competitors featured wrestle with impossibly difficult words and enormous dreams. The film was produced by Jeffrey Blitz, who also directed, and Sean Welch.

"OT: Our Town" uses Dominguez High School, in one of Los Angeles County's toughest and most crime-ridden neighborhoods, as its setting.

Underfinanced and understaffed, the school has no theater department and has not mounted a play in over two decades. In the school cafeteria, two teachers and twenty-four students decide to mount a production of Thornton Wilder's "Our Town," a play with timeless and universal themes about life, love and death in an American community, and in doing so create a modern portrait of their own community. The film was produced and directed by Scott Hamilton Kennedy.

Admission to all screenings in the series is free. The James Bridges Theater is located in Westwood on the northeast corner of the UCLA campus, near the intersection of Sunset Boulevard and Hilgard Avenue. Parking is available for $7 in Lot 3, adjacent to the theater. For more information, call 310-247-3600 or 310-206-FILM.