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Filmmaker Tareque Masud dead at 54

DHAKA, Bangladesh, Aug. 15 (UPI) -- Filmmaker Tareque Masud, 54, was killed, and his producer wife, Catherine Masud, seriously injured in a weekend bush crash in Bangladesh, officials said.

The Masuds, who collaborated on the award-winning 2002 film "The Clay Bird," were traveling with Bangladeshi artist Dhali al Mamun Saturday when their minibus collided with a bus in Ghior, about 40 miles west of Dhaka, the BBC reported.

Mishuk Munier, chief executive of Bangladesh's private ATN television news channel, also died at the scene and al Mamun was hurt in the crash, the British broadcaster said.

The nature of al Mamun and Catherine Masud's injuries was not immediately reported.

Tareque Masud's other film credits include the 1999 documentary "Words of Freedom" and the 2005 drama "Homeland."

Rodriguez, Higareda win Imagen Awards

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., Aug. 15 (UPI) -- Freddy Rodriguez and Martha Higareda were among entertainers honored at the Imagen Foundation Awards ceremony in Beverly Hills, Calif.

The black-tie gala at the Beverly Hilton Hotel Friday recognized positive portrayals of Latinos and Latino culture in entertainment.

Rodriguez took home the award for Best Actor/Television for "Chaos" and Higareda picked up the prize for Best Actress/Television for "Lies in Plain Sight."

The winner of Best Primetime Television Program or Movie-of-the-Week was "Law & Order: Los Angeles."

Carlos Gomez of "The Glades" and Eva La Rue of "CSI: Miami" won the honors for Best Supporting Actor and Actress/Television respectively.

"Dora the Explorer" earned the award for Best Children's Programming and "The Longoria Affair" garnered the trophy for Best Documentary/Television.

"Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel" was named Best Variety or Reality Show.

"Gun Hill Road" was declared Best Feature Film and its star, Esai Morales, presented with the award for Best Actor/Feature Film. Michelle Rodriguez won the award for Best Actress/Feature Film for "Tropico de Sangre.

26th Annual Imagen Awards Wrap-up « FILMLOOK Media and Post

I attended the 26th Annual Imagen Awards on August 12, 2011 along with 500 or so other attendees and everyone was dressed to the nines.    Origins of the Imagen (Image Awards) can be traced back to a 1983 meeting between Norman Lear and Helen Hernandez since there were no positive portrayals of Latinos in the entertainment industry at that time.  Then both Helen and Norman met with the leaders of the National Conference for Community and Justice , a respected non-sectarian human relations organization whose commitment is to fight prejudice so as to reduce racial tensions. Read more about the Conference here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Conference_for_Community_and_Justice .  It was from this meeting The Imagen Awards were conceived and every year since then the Imagen tradition recognizes Latinos who contribute to the industry from behind the scenes and those actors portraying positive roles.

The event was hosted by actress Maria Canals-Barrera, star of the Emmy Award-winning series,”The Wizards of Waverly Place” seen on Disney Channel.  Performers were Mark Ballas, on Dancing with the Stars for 8 seasons and just released his solo album, “HurtLoveBox”; more info can be found at his website,  http://www.markballas.com . DW3 also performed at the Imagens. DW3, one of the most enthusiastic new sounding bands blending Latin urban soul with some smooth jazz, can be found at dw3music.com .

Nominated in the category of Best Variety or Reality Show were two shows that hold a special meaning to myself and my companies, FILMLOOK Media and Post and C2 Entertainment. Mexican Made Easy is a show we have worked on for the past few seasons, color-correcting and editing episodes to air on The Food Network. Nominated in this category as well was Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel. Bryant Gumbel did a segment a few years ago about a border town called Brownsville in Texas. You wouldn’t know it from the looks of it, but Brownsville is home to some of the best chess players in the entire country. Bryant’s segment focused on how chess not only impacted the elementary students that were inspired by their teacher, but how the whole town was impacted by these kids. It was a wonderful surprise to see that Real Sports with Bryan Gumbel (chess kids) was announced the winner since a client of ours, Higher Ground, approached us to c0-produce a feature about these amazing kids.  We are currently in preproduction and hope to be in production in the first quarter of 2012.

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