If you are a doc enthusiast, you have probably heard about the upcoming Cinema Eye Awards. Organized by AJ Schnack and Thom Powers, the Awards will take place tomorrow at the IFC Center in NYC. I’ve maintained blog silence on the topic, though I have supported the Awards but submitting writing to their program and voting, but I ran into AJ at SXSW this past week where he asked me to blog about the Awards.

To be honest, I haven’t written on this because I have a couple of issues with it and rather than poking holes in the sails of my friends, I wanted to see how things would shake out. But, AJ wants these awards to be a community project and prefers for us to have our discussion in public, so to that end, there is an ongoing discussion over at The D-Word, should you wish to bend AJ, Thom & Co.’s ear. Below are my thoughts.

My main issue is the corporate sponsorship. I realize that any kind of awards need corporate support. The costs associated with ceremonies and administration would be impossible to manage. Other awards are often housed within a non-profit organization that will secure support from a variety of corporate sources to produce the event but the integrity of the awards remains with the producing organization (think Independent Spirits, Gothams). Here, you go to the Cinema Eye website, click on the category of films you want to browse and you are hyperlinked to Indiepix’s website where you can not only read about the film, but purchase it as well.