The awards keep coming at Austin Film Festival, as legendary screenwriter and director Christopher McQuarrie has been announced as the recipient of the 2025 Extraordinary Contribution to Filmmaking Award.
Prior winners include Ron Howard, Danny Boyle, Frank Darabont, and Jonathan Demme, and McQuarrie definitely belongs in that roster. Launched to giddy heights with the release in 1995 of The Usual Suspects (for which he won the Oscar for best original screenplay), in 2000 he began a creative partnership that has defined his career as Tom Cruise’s go-to scriptwriter. That collaboration includes the Jack Reacher films and the last four Mission: Impossible films, which McQuarrie also directed.
The festival, which has already announced Johnson’s Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery as its first film, also announced more panels for this year’s event, running Oct. 23-30.
In advance of what looks to be another blockbuster box office run, screenwriters Winnie Holzman and Dana Fox will be in conversation about Wicked and its upcoming sequel, Wicked: For Good, and how they turned the musical of the book into not one but two films.
AFF may have the word “film” in the title, but it’s also a home for TV writers, as shown by the heavy presence of sitcoms at this year’s festival. Big Mouth co-creators Mark Levin and Jennifer Flackett look back on the history of the hilarious animated show about adolescence and monsters as the series heads towards its final season. Abbott Elementary co-showrunner Patrick Schumacker discusses the Emmy-winning ABC mockumentary about life in a Philadelphia school. Continuing the sitcom theme, The Studio co-creator Alex Gregory will go Inside the Writers Room to look inside the creative process of a TV show that looks inside the creative process of TV shows. And blurring the lines between TV and film, Dear White People creator Justin Simien will be in conversation about the cross-media success of his biting look at race relations in America.
Of course, a major element of AFF’s success is that it’s a great chance for people in the film and TV industry to meet up before the end of the year and talk shop. This year is no exception, with Polly Platt award-winner Vachon and writer/director Celine Song exploring their working relationship on films like Past Lives and Materialists, and how collaboration is key in the writer-producer relationship. Similarly, in On Grounded Storytelling, Somebody Somewhere showrunners Hannah Bos and Paul Thureen talk about their long-running partnership, through shows like Mozart in the Jungle and films such as Driveways. Meanwhile, Kara Durrett and Jesse Burgum of Pinky Promise (Eleanor the Great, Bird, The Last Showgirl), and Dave Caplan of C2 Motion Picture Group (Longlegs, The Monkey) talk about the dirty business of money for their panel Inside the World of Indie Film Financing.
And for those hoping to get their big break, AFF regulars Craig Mazin (Chernobyl, The Last of Us) and John August (Big Fish) host the Three Page Challenge, where they give feedback on the first three pages of submitted scripts, and examine the art and science of the beginning of a movie.
Austin Film Festival takes place Oct. 23-30, and the Writers Conference runs Oct. 23–26. Passes and info at austinfilmfestival.com.
