Peter Farrelly's 'I Play Rocky' Wins Virginia Film Festival Audience Award

Peter Farrelly's "I Play Rocky" has won the Virginia Film Festival's audience award for narrative feature, five weeks before Amazon MGM releases it in select theaters on November 6. The festival announced the winners on Sunday at the close of its 39th edition in Charlottesville.

The Stallone drama, which readies for a Thanksgiving-adjacent wide release on November 20, enters an awards conversation currently dominated by two other titles. It finished first runner-up for the Toronto International Film Festival People's Choice Award this year, behind Netflix's "La Bola Negra." IndieWire reports that the Oscar race appears to be a showdown between "La Bola Negra" and Universal's "The Odyssey," but cautions against underestimating "I Play Rocky's" appeal to crack the Best Picture 10.

Who made the winning film?

Anthony Ippolito gives a star-making performance as Sylvester Stallone, according to IndieWire. The film follows Stallone as he writes and stars in 1977's Oscar Best Picture winner, "Rocky," after producers Irwin Winkler and Robert Chartoff court him to snap up his first script. Stallone fights to play the lead himself, which he eventually does, as "I Play Rocky" recreates the original film's scrappy production. Tracy Letts steals the movie as a dryly observant United Artists studio head who is eventually disarmed by Sly's charms, IndieWire writes.

Last week, IndieWire sat for an intimate media screening of "I Play Rocky" that played all the way to the back of the room. Even an audience that small audibly cheered for the movie. The film is not universally loved by critics, the outlet notes.

How big was the festival?

The 39th Virginia Film Festival drew more than 26,600 attendees. It screened 134 features from Wednesday through Sunday and hosted more than 120 industry guests. Executive director Jody Kielbasa and artistic director Ilya Tovbis and their teams programmed the lineup.

The full list of audience award winners:

• Narrative Feature: "I Play Rocky"
• Documentary Feature: "Admission Possible"
• Narrative Short: "Getar Hero"
• Documentary Short: "Sarah Ann Kelley: Becoming Visible"

Matthew Syrett and Bowie Alexander's nonfiction "Admission Possible" won the documentary feature audience award. The acquisition title follows seven first-generation high-schoolers in New York City as they work to secure a future for their families and themselves.

Teddy Stern's narrative short "Getar Hero," about a cowboy living in Bombay, won that audience prize. The documentary short "Sarah Ann Kelley: Becoming Visible" centers on an 85-year-old Charlottesville native who broke racial and gender boundaries.

What else played in Charlottesville?

The festival's lineup included opener "The Debut," international Oscar hopefuls "Rose," "All of a Sudden," and "Minotaur," and Gotham-nominated indie "Mouse," all of which played well to local audiences.

IndieWire hosted a live "Screen Talk" podcast with "Paper Tiger" director James Gray ahead of his film's celebrated Virginia premiere; the episode debuts next week on podcast platforms. Jessica Lange and Nathan Lange were among the top-tier talent who gave live talks. David O. Russell and producer Todd Black showed first-look footage of Russell's NFL biopic "Madden," starring Nicolas Cage in heavy prosthetics.

What does the award change for the film?

For a movie without universal critical love, a festival audience prize in Charlottesville offers concrete evidence of crowd appeal. The November 6 select opening now carries a verified audience endorsement into a Best Picture field led by two stronger-financed rivals, with the November 20 wide release set to test whether that appeal stretches beyond festival halls.