If you look at Cassie Jaye’s official bios, you might be forgiven for thinking that the director of the upcoming Red Pill documentary had won an impressive “best documentary” prize at Cannes for her first feature-length film.
On her LinkedIn page, Jaye writes that “Daddy I Do,” her film on the abstinence-only movement, “won the Best Documentary Award at the 2010 Cannes Independent Film Festival.” She makes similar statements on YouTube and on her official site, CassieJaye.com.
Press coverage of the young filmmaker has made much of her Cannes award. In a feature on Jaye, the San Rafael Patch reported breathlessly that “Daddy I Do soon garnered immense acclaim, culminating with the Best Documentary Award at the Cannes International Film Festival.” Feminist website Bust declared that the film “has already won Best Documentary awards in several festivals, including the Cannes Film Festival.” A writer at Rumpus.net started off her interview with Jaye by congratulating her for winning “Best Documentary at Cannes.”
But if you go to the official site of the Cannes Film Festival, and look at its list of winners for 2010, you will find no mention of Daddy I Do.
Hell, you won’t find a Best Documentary winner for that year at all, because Cannes didn’t actually have a Best Documentary award.
So what’s going on? Is Jaye lying? Well, not technically.
She did win an award with the word “Cannes” in it. But it didn’t come from the official Cannes festival.
It came instead from a knockoff event, the Cannes INDEPENDENT Film Festival, that many in the film business consider an outright scam, using the Cannes name in order to profit from entry fees, much as the makers of the Spader-Man action figures above hoped to make money from confused or perhaps overly thrifty fans of the real Spiderman.
A site called CannesGuide warns filmmakers not to submit films to the faux festival, declaring that
the Cannes Independent Film Festival (CIFF) is, in our opinion, a scam. It is not connected to the Festival de Cannes, Marche du Film, or any other official festival organisation. It is a coat-tails event, run from the UK, which likely seeks to capitalise on the prestige associated with the city’s name and famous festival.
Although CIFF is a real event, we have questioned its legitimacy in the past and continue to believe that there is little or no value to filmmakers in submitting a film.
Since that was written, the “festival” seems to have vanished entirely from the world. Take a look at what its official web site looks like now. (Seriously, take a look.)
Jaye’s supporters will presumably point out that she’s never technically lied about her award or claimed that it came from the official Cannes festival. Certainly it’s not her fault that reporters make mistakes!
Except that it kind of is. Here’s a screenshot from the trailer for Daddy I Do.
Most people seeing this flash by on the screen, I suspect, will remember the giant CANNES and won’t even notice the word “independent” underneath it. Or, like the reporter for the San Rafael Patch, they’ll change the “independent” to “international” in their minds.
At the very least’s it’s a graphic seemingly designed to capitalize on the confusion between the Cannes Independent Film Festival and the real Festival de Cannes.
No, Jaye isn’t doing anything illegal here. But trumpeting an award from a phony festival as if it were a real award is not only dishonest; it’s kind of pathetic.
Since finding out Cassie Jaye has been lining her pockets with MRM money we’ve all had to take a waiting position regarding her film. Some suggested she has been led on by Elam & Co. and some even suggested she’s pulling a long con on them. We all fear both these situations, but there is no way to be sure if we’re being had or she is. Or they are. Any clues about the future at this point can only be found from her past. Or as Dr. Phil says: “The best predictor of future behaviour is relative past behaviour”.
I know, I can’t believe I quoted Dr. Phil either, but I broke my foot and was immobile for 5 weeks and the remote control was on the table. Might as well have been in China.
So, this gives you other relevance to this post besides “Cassie I’m coming to get you”.
No. You didn’t interrupt a circle jerk. You were an ass before, people haven’t forgotten it and so you’re not getting the benefit of the doubt. It’s nobody else’s fault but yours if you pissed people off.
BTW, I also remember that back in the Lou Reed thread you felt the need to share that you didn’t think it was a big deal that he had an abusive past, yet you think it’s immoral for David to post mild criticism of someone? Tell me why I should think you are arguing in good faith?
Why would David need to delay the publishing of the facts based on the outcome and interpretation of the film? Her touting the award is a bad thing regardless of the outcome. Calling it out now and having the film turn out to be skewed towards reality (not on MRA side) prevents the later call-outs of her qualifications. Calling it out now also deflates the gas-bags in the man-o-sphere who think they’ve really got a Cannes award winner on their hands. It’s a win-fucking-win.
So..
– Film maker decides to make a documentary about the MRM.
– MRM funds the film to make it happen.
– MRM lies about the credentials of the film maker, to make her look like more successful than she really is.
– Futrelle writes blog post accurately pointing out that one of her awards is a scam award.
MRM reaction: Y Mammoth so unfair? 🙁
So…would this article still be a thing if Cassie Jaye hadn’t pissed off David? Would he still be critical of her is she were being even and fair to the issue?
@NothingClever
This blog is about charting the actions of members of the manosphere, first and foremost. Since she has been embraced by members of the manosphere, that makes her credentials a credible topic for this blog. There are plenty of phonies out there who aren’t in/associated with the manosphere, and obviously David doesn’t have the time to go through all of them. Basically this is what his blog is for.
Independent film maker exaggerating her credentials – not much of a story.
Film maker funded by AVfM to make a pro-Elam documentary having her credentials exaggerated by the subjects of her film – more of a story.
If you did any research whatsoever, you’d realize that you can access old versions of that page, and that the page CLEARLY stated it’s separateness from the famous Cannes Film Festival. The reason it has “Cannes” in the name is because IT IS IN CANNES, FRANCE. This is the lamest post ever. She never misrepresented herself, and they never misrepresented themselves. The only person doing any misrepresenting is you.
http://web.archive.org/web/20100316164531/http://www.cannesfest.org/
Spader-Man!
Spader-Man!
Moderately active Spader-Man!
Can do just what a spider do
Eat bugs, turn them into poo!
Is he strong?
Listen bud, he’s got a moderately active bod!
Watches his fats and donates blood!
Flies a jet, just like that!
Also ate the neighbor’s cat!
Take a look up overhead
Here comes the Spader-Man!
It only takes away from her credibility for her to mention this award, much in the way it would take away from my credibility if I were to say I’m published by the National Library of Poetry.
http://wockyjivvy.com/poetry/shame/
(And yes, I’m unfortunately “published” by them, assuming they actually print anything you don’t pay for–I figured it out before I ever bought anything.)
Is it even a real award of any kind?
You pay a fee, they disappear or whatever but first they “award” you something?
That doesn’t sound like an “award” to me, that sounds like vanity publishing.
Incidentally, my new book, “A Bride Not Quite Far Enough” has been selected by (a) Random (abandoned) House.
Or to put it in terms the GaMRAgaters will recognize, is this award “pay-to-win?”
This also crucially alters the narrative of a feminist conspiracy! Sure, a Cannes winning director who couldn’t find funding might be suspicious- but a relatively unknown director? She didn’t get grants because grants are hard to get and are incredibly competitve, she couldn’t find investors because documentaries are a bad investment. As far as I can tell, before the MRA’s jumped on board the kickstarter no feminists anywhere were talking about this movie. Nobody knew about it, and nobody cared.
I got to say I’m with Felix on this one. What is the purpose of this article? Isn’t this site about tracking misogyny? Just because Cassie Jaye’s new film is about misogynists doesn’t automatically make her one, who cares if she fudged a bit on her CV?
I think everyone should reserve judgement on this woman until The Red Pill comes out.
I am still not clear on how a future documentary will change past actions.
We literally explained this to you, multiple times. We’re not “pretending we don’t know what’s happening”, we’re literally telling you you’re wrong. We’re not going to swallow this whole “I’m right, you’re all meanie-meanie pants who refuse to see how right I am!” bullshit. You’ve attempted to pull this before, and it’s still not acceptable.
We aren’t here to “reassure” you either.
I’m going to second dhag on this one: Fuck off, Felipe.
I think he’s referring to last time he got told off, Scented Fucking Hard Chairs went to check his twitter account to make sure he was here in good faith, as linked accounts are usually a good indicator of who’s who, and found that he was one of those male feminist types who like to still do sexist things but still insist they’re feminist somehow, even when called out by other feminists. In fact, SFHC called him out for something that seemed creepy (he was making odd comments on a girl’s picture that came off as creepy), and he turned around and tried to insist that the word “creepy” held no meaning because he didn’t know what it meant, apparently.
So now he thinks we’ve doxxed him for looking at shit he himself linked us to.
And now he’s salty because we’re not putting up with concern trolling.
I’m not either.
She’s omitting that her Cannes award isn’t even actually associated with the Cannes Film Festival, and she’s not correcting other people who are either, and that includes the MRM.
Pointing out that her award isn’t legit isn’t a bad thing. It’s stating facts, and the fact that people are trying to be like “Say this stuff after the Red Pill doc comes out!” makes no sense, because it’ll still be true after the doc comes out.
So will the fact that she’s broken her own moral rules and accepted money from the MRM to fund this movie, because “fuck feminists”.
This post makes me uneasy as well. Lots of creative people clutch at any sign at all that their work is being valued. She won’t be the first, or the last, to put her work in for a second or third rate award and be proud of it. Trying to make a career of something like documentary film making is hard frickin’ graft. I wouldn’t blame her at all for festooning her grant applications with everything from this ‘award’ to her second grade good behaviour report cards.
Second, she’s being love bombed by the MRAs at the moment. They’re showering her with love, affection and loadsa money. If she has any lingering doubts about them, they’re busy soothing them with cold hard cash. This isn’t a moment for her home team (she does, after all, describe herself as a feminist) to publicly pound her for something she might actually be proud of, scam or not.
I agree with Snorkmaiden. Let’s wait and see until the documentary comes out. I went and looked at her kickstarter explanation, and she’s playing her cards close to her chest. Her words are clearly deliberately ambiguous.
BOO!!!!
Happy Halloween Everyone!
So much butthurt in one article.
TIL
If I say I won “an Oscar”, and other people repeat I won an Oscar, and now everybody thinks I won an Oscar, but on closer inspection it turns out it’s really an “Independent Oscar Award” that my dad made for me, I am not being dishonest. And also, if I make a good documentary in the future the fake Oscar will become a real Oscar. Ta-dah.
This is not a “second or third rate award”. It’s an actual scam.
Spader Man
?w=400&h=236
http://i.imgur.com/1JvU5.jpg
But that doesn’t change the fact that it’s dishonest of her to continue to let the MRM and other people assume that she’s got an award from the legit Cannes festival, and not correcting them at all (at least that I’ve seen).
Don’t get me wrong, I agree with you: creative work is hard work and no one appreciates it as much as they should beyond people who work in that field and the occasional connoisseur. As a creative person myself, I can get behind that and sympathize the hell out of that. Many a wise person has said: Art is hard.
However, I don’t think it’s okay to dismiss dishonest behavior with “Well, it’s just hard in her field and she’s doing what she can to get by”.
I’m not saying she’s a terrible, awful person and everything she does is going to be garbage because she’s being slightly dishonest, I’m saying that she’s being slightly dishonest by letting people simplify the situation to make her look good, and that’s something worth noting at least.
She’s being honest in her resume and the like, and yes, I did say that maybe she should consider the reputation of the people behind that award and maybe not put it on there, but she’s still not correcting anyone by saying what Cannes said: “The Cannes Independent Film Festival is not affiliated with the Cannes Film Festival”, and I think that’s still somewhat dishonest.
Truth be told, it’s not that dishonest, but it’s still somewhat.