Hamill movie wins Festival audience award
Breakthrough Audience Award Winner: HAMILL We have all seen the overcoming-adversity sports film. HAMILL, a true story based on the…
Breakthrough Audience Award Winner: HAMILL
We have all seen the overcoming-adversity sports film. HAMILL, a true story based on the life of UFC fighter Matt Hamill and directed by newcomer Oren Kaplan, is a not one we have seen before. Matt Hamill grew up in Loveland Ohio, deaf. Matt’s journey to winning a National Collegiate wrestling title is marked with the struggle of being different in a hearing world, the determination to be a champion and finally the acceptance of a deaf community that allows him to be himself.
Kaplan captures the experience of deafness so vividly that, in essence, this is a foreign language film, told in American Sign Language. Russell Harvard plays Matt with both his heart and frustration on his sleeve and Shoshannah Stern gives a vibrant performance as Matt’s deaf activist girlfriend.
The award is considered a major prize on the film festival circuit, and could help the movie secure a distribution deal.