MarlaLewinGFV

by Marla Lewin

Helen Mirren Photo taken by Stephan Rabold, Courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics

The 21st Annual Palm Springs International Film Festival (PSIFF) will present Academy Award winner Helen Mirren with the Career Achievement Award. Presented by Cartier, the Awards Gala will kick off the 2010 awards season on Tuesday, January 5 at the Palm Springs Convention Center and will be hosted by "Entertainment Tonight's" Mary Hart. The Festival runs January 5-18, 2010.

Mirren will join previously announced honorees Morgan Freeman, Mariah Carey and Anna Kendrick at the event. Morgan Freeman will be presented with the Career Achievement Award for Acting as well.

Mirren stars in the Sony Pictures Classic release The Last Station, as the wife of Tolstoy, It is a tale of two romances, one beginning and one near its end. Mirren launched her career in London at the National Youth Theatre, playing Cleopatra. Her film career began with Michael Powell's Age of Consent, but her breakthrough role came with John Mackenzie's The Long Good Friday, opposite Bob Hoskins. Mirren earned her first Academy Award nomination as Queen Charlotte in The Madness of King George, a role that won her another Best Actress Award from the Cannes Film Festival. She earned her second Oscar nomination for her role as the housekeeper in Robert Altman's Gosford Park. Her most celebrated role was as Elizabeth II in Stephen Frear's The Queen, for which she won the Academy Award for Best Actress along with a Golden Globe, BAFTA, SAG and numerous other awards from around the world. Other film credits include Excalibur, Calendar Girls, The Clearing, Shadowboxer, The Mosquito Coast and The Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover. Her upcoming projects include Brighton Rock, Love Ranch, The Debt and The Tempest.

Morgan Freeman latest role is  as Nelson Mandela in Invictus from director Clint Eastwood. Invictus tells the inspiring true story of how Nelson Mandela (Morgan Freeman) joined forces with the captain of South Africa's rugby team, Francois Pienaar (Matt Damon), to help unite their country. 

Morgan Freeman won an Academy Award® for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Clint Eastwood's Million Dollar Baby, for which he also won a Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Award® and received a Golden Globe nomination. Freeman has been honored with three additional Oscar® nominations -- the first for his chilling performance as a homicidal pimp in the 1987 drama, Street Smart, which also brought him L.A., New York and National Society of Film Critics Awards, and an Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Actor, as well as his first Golden Globe Award nomination. He earned his second Oscar® nomination and won Golden Globe and National Board of Review Awards for Best Actor for 1989's Driving Miss Daisy, recreating his award-winning off-Broadway role. He gained his third Oscar® nomination for his performance in Frank Darabont's 1994 drama, The Shawshank Redemption, which also brought Freeman Golden Globe and SAG Award nominations.

His more recent film work includes starring roles in Christopher Nolan's blockbusters The Dark Knight and Batman Begins; Rob Reiner's The Bucket List, opposite Jack Nicholson; Robert Benton's Feast of Love; Ben Affleck's Gone Baby Gone; Lasse Hallström's An Unfinished Life, with Robert Redford and Jennifer Lopez; the Jet Li actioner Unleashed, written by Luc Besson; and the comedy Bruce Almighty and its sequel, Evan Almighty. He also lent his distinctive voice to Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds and the Oscar-winning documentary March of the Penguins. Freeman's other film credits include Lucky Number Slevin, The Sum of All Fears, High Crimes, Along Came a Spider, Nurse Betty, Deep Impact Hard Rain, Steven Spielberg's Amistad, Kiss the Girls, Se7en, Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven, Glory, Lean on Me, Clean and Sober, Marie, Teachers, Harry & Son and Brubaker.

Mariah Carey will recieve the Breakthrough Performance Award for her performance in Lionsgate's Precious: Based on the Novel "Push" By Sapphire. Anna Kendrick will receive the Rising Star Award for her performance in Up in the Air.

There are at least three more award winners to be named in coming days.