The San Francisco Film Critics Circle have announced their 2010 award winners and — you’re not gonna believe it — The Social Network took home Best Picture.  And Best Director.  And Best Adapted Screenplay.  The talent behind such fine films as The King’s Speech, Black Swan, Blue Valentine, Winter’s Bone, Animal Kingdom, Toy Story 3, and The Tillman Story also won some awards, but not quite as many.  Hit the jump for the full list of winners.

The Producers Guild of America (aka the PGA) has announced which documentaries have been nominated for the Best Documentary Theatrical Motion Picture award.  The list is mainly made up of the usual suspects with early award season favorites Waiting for ‘Superman’. Inside Job, The Tillman Story, and Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer all receiving a nomination from the guild.  Lesser known documentaries Smash His Camera and Earth Made of Glass also received a nomination.   Missing from the list are some other highly acclaimed documentaries such as Exit Through the Gift Shop, Catfish, and Restrepo.  Nominations for the other PGA categories will be announced January 4, with the awards ceremony taking place on January 22.  You can hit the jump to read the full press release.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has released their shortlist of 15 documentaries that have advanced in the voting for Best Documentary nominations.  The list includes Charles Ferguson’s Inside Job, Davis Guggenheim’s Waiting for Superman, and, one of my favorite films of the year, Banksy’s Exit Through the Gift Shop.  Unfortunately, the documentary Catfish was shutout.  While some have speculated that it’s because of controversy regarding the documentary’s authenticity, that same controversy of “realism” also surrounds Exit Through the Gift Shop.  However, as long as Gift Shop continues to have a shot at the top prize, I’m happy (although Inside Job and Waiting for Superman are also quality films).

Hit the jump for the press release and a list of the final 15 contenders.  The 83rd Academy Awards nominations will be announced live on January 25, 2011.

“He wants me to tell him something pretty.”  This is the closing line of HBO’s Deadwood and it is one of my all-time favorite pieces of dialogue.  It perfectly sums up how we, both as individuals and as a people, want to live in a simple world where where good guys win and the bad guys lose and our cause is always just.  The death of U.S. Army Ranger Pat Tillman, the football star who gave up a multi-million dollar contract to join the army, was used by the military and the Bush Administration to tell the American people something pretty.  The Tillman Story is both a tragedy and a triumph.  It’s tragic that a man was betrayed by the country he gave his life to protect and it’s triumphant that his family, the people who it would seem would most want to hear a happy ending to Tillman’s life, refused to settle for something pretty.

Countless documentaries have grooved to the sounds of the Grateful Dead, but Amir Bar-Lev (The Tillman Story) has signed on to direct the first feature-length work of fiction centered around frontman Jerry Garcia.  According to Variety, Topper Lilien (Where the Money Is) adapted the screenplay from the Robert Greenfield book Dark Star: An Oral Biography of Jerry Garcia.

Garcia played an astounding 2,314 shows with the iconic San Francisco rock band from 1965 up until his passing in 1995.  The film will reportedly center on Garcia’s early life before joining the Dead.  Hit the jump for a synopsis of the source material.

Last week, we showed you the poster for the upcoming documentary The Tillman Story.  The film is about the cover-up involving the death of U.S. Army Ranger Pat Tillman, a man who gave up a multi-million dollar contract in the NFL to go fight in Afghanistan following 9/11.  I’ve already spoken about my thoughts on Tillman’s story, and I’m eager to see this film even though the trailer sells it as an action-mystery.  I understand the need to effectively market a documentary like this, but I feel like it cheapens his story by making it looks like a generic movie.

Hit the jump to check out the trailer.  The Tillman Story opens on August 20th.

The U.S. government wanted to tell us something pretty about the death of patriotic American Pat Tillman, a man who gave up his professional football career to join the Army Rangers following 9/11.  They turned his death into propaganda and said he died heroically when it truth he was killed by friendly fire.  But it’s the story of tragedy turned heroism as his family fought to uncover that truth.  It’s an inspiring tale because the lie of Tillman’s death mirrors the lie we were told about WMD in Iraq and the fact that his family refused to accept that lie and search for the truth, however unpleasant, tells us to challenge authority even if what we learn isn’t as pretty as we wanted.  The documentary The Tillman Story tells the true story this courage and heroism.

Hit the jump to see the poster for the film and click here for the official website.  The Tillman Story opens on August 20th.  For another in-depth look at the Tillman case, check out Jon Krakauer’s book Where Men Win Glory.

While some may have thought The Weinstein Company was down for the count, Harvey Weinstein has finally pulled the trigger at Sundance as his company purchased director Derek Cianfrance’s relationship drama Blue Valentine – which stars Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams – for just over $1 million. Also, according to Variety, TWC is close to landing the documentary The Tillman Story, which is about former NFL player Pat Tillman and the cover up by our government after he died.

While I haven’t seen The Tillman Story, the buzz in Park City is the film is really good.  But I did see Blue Valentine and it’s fantastic.  You know how everyone always says how good someone’s performance is?  Trust me when I say, Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams are amazing in this film, which is about the beginning and ending of a couple’s relationship.  Director Cianfrance cuts back and forth during the movie and he uses bright colors and film for the beginning of the relationship, and close-ups with the Red camera for the end.   It’s a great way to show the difference in time.  With how good the movie is, it’s no surprise it landed a distributor.  More from Sundance soon.