FilmClick

Several excellent films from the San Francisco Independent Film Festival make their way across the bay to the Shattuck Cinema in Berkeley, CA for an extended run this weekend. FilmClick recommends these films from local filmmakers which are playing this weekend in Berkeley:

“The Full Picture”

Bay Area filmmaker Jon Bowden’s feature “The Full Picture” plays on Sat. Feb 21 at 9:30 PM. The film is about unresolved family history and the lengths that people will go to keep uncomfortable secrets even in their closest relationships.  The main character, Mark, lives in San Francisco with his long-time girlfriend, Erika.  The couple is headed toward marriage, at least that’s what Erika thinks, but Mark has been keeping some secrets about his family’s sordid past.  A visit from Mark’s mother leads to some uncomfortable revelations for all involved.  This is a well-written film; I particularly enjoyed the relationship between Mark and his brother, Hal, played by Joshua Hutchinson. Hutchinson and Lizzie Ross, who plays Erika, stand out in this film for me.

“Harrison Montgomery”

Daniel Davila’s “Harrison Montgomery” plays on Fri. Feb 20, at 7:15 PM. This film follows an aspiring artist, Ricardo, played by Octavio Gómez Berríos, who lives and creates his art in San Francisco’s rough Tenderloin neighborhood. Ricardo deals drugs to get by.  He ends up in a tangle; owing money to his boss and forced to move into a room at the grimy Hotel Boyd.  At his new place, Ricardo meets single mother Margo and another Hotel Boyd tenant, Harrison Montgomery, played soulfully by Martin Landau.   Montgomery is an eccentric and aging shut-in, who may have won the lottery years before. I won’t go too much more into the story, but it’s a surprisingly inspirational film filled with solid performances.  Of note to me was the gritty production design and the beautiful cinematography of the rarely featured Tenderloin.

by Christopher Potter, FilmClick.com

Go to: www.sfindie.com for show times, more information and tickets.

SF IndieFest celebrates DocFest this year with over 60 documentary films from around the world. The festival begins Oct.17- 31 at San Franciscoʼs Roxie Theatre and continues Oct.31- Nov. 6 at Berkeleyʼs Shattuck Cinema. Here’s a preview of this year’s opening night films.

Chelsea on the Rocks

Directed by Abel Ferrera, Chelsea on the Rocks focuses on the history and legend surrounding New York Cityʼs famed Chelsea Hotel. Built in 1883, the Chelsea Hotel has been a refuge for well-known artists, musicians, and writers such as Andy Warhol, Bob Dylan, and Tennessee Williams. In 2007, it was acquired by a boutique hotel management company and soon after the boho residence experienced a wave of evictions in favor of a more upscale crowd. Ferrera attempts to document the rich and fabled history of this American icon with interviews of famous past and present tenants, archival footage and re-enactments of events.

Kassim The Dream

Co-opening night film, Kassim The Dream, is the story of Uganda-born World Champion Boxer, Kassim ‘The Dream’ Ouma, who was kidnapped by the rebel army and trained to be a child soldier at the age of 6. He discovered boxing while in the army and after serving for twelve years, left for America. Upon arriving, Ouma began boxing and soared through the amateur boxing ranks to become a World Champion Boxer. Film director Kief Davidson, follows Ouma through his experiences inside and outside the ring and the drama of facing a horrifying childhood.

Bird’s Nest

Bird’s Nest chronicles the design efforts of Swiss architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron while working on the National Stadium in Bejing (know as the bird’s nest for its curved steel-net walls), home of many of the events for the 2008 Summer Olympics.  It also looks at Herzog and de Meuron’s design for a new city district in Jinhua, involving hotels, office and residential buildings. The film reveals how Chinese cultural tradition affects both projects, with the architects carefully researching esthetic and philosophical concepts of Chinese society and culture, attempting to define universal qualities of “beauty” and being careful to avoid imposing Western ideas, and above all to create buildings that will blend in culturally by being sensitive to Chinese cultural traditions and ways of living.

Toots

An authentic portrait called Toots chronicles Toots Shor’s dramatic rise from the mean streets of South Philly to the heart of both the glamour and underworld of mid-20th century New York City, where this Jewish, uneducated self-styled “bum” became the unlikely hero to America’s heroes during New York’s golden age. On any given night, the dining room of TOOTS SHOR’s could contain Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren, mob boss Frank Costello. Joe DiMaggio, Frank Sinatra, Frank Gifford, or Jackie Gleason. These giants of American culture and sports found in Toots a unique sense of comfort, somewhere between his trademark bear hug and relentless insults. In the end, Toots had lost it all, and Toots reveals as much about the city and era Shor embodied as it does about the man and his enduring legacy.

Hi, My Name is Ryan

Ryan Chadwick Avery is a milk and cookies connoisseur, a photobooth artist, a fake mustache aficionado and a punk rock performance artist that was dubbed the Clown Prince of the downtown Phoenix art scene. Some herald him a creative genius; others consider him a nuisance that poses a danger to himself and others. “Hi My Name is Ryan” gives a glimpse into this lad’s life and antics.

The People’s Advocate: The Life & Times of Charles R. Garry

One of the most influential criminal defense attorneys of the 20th century, Charles R. Garry (1909-1991) became a household name during the 1960s with his defense of a host of revolutionary political icons, including Huey Newton and Bobby Seale of the Black Panther Party. The People’s Advocate: The Life & Times of Charles R. Garry profiles this outspoken advocate for the underdog,  The documentary recounts Garry’s life through the voices of those who knew him best—family, fellow attorneys and former clients.

Standard Deviation

Standard Deviation is the story of the brilliant young physicist Billy Cottrell and the events leading to his incarceration as an Eco-terrorist.  A tall, athletic, and good-looking young man Billy was in the prime of his life in 2003. While doing research at the California Institute of Technology he was one of the most promising PhD candidates of theoretical physics in the world before the FBI arrested him for involvement in the fire bombings and vandalism of over 130 SUVs.

Chanbara Beauty - Midnight Circus

In true Midnight Circus fashion, Chanbara Beauty presents hot chicks with swords and zombies.  It’s all some people need in a movie.

For tickets, showtimes, trailers and more, check out:

http://www.sfindie.com/

What led you to make a film about the world of truck drivers? I think we were interested in what it is to like live inside of your car.  A lot of the open road is the loneliness that comes with it. Everything like that. When we really got into the truck with these people and actually traveled with them, we were there for the calls and we heard stories about their wives and their relationships and how it effected that.  And we became more attached to that side of it.  It definitely covers a lot of subjects all at once, I don’t know if there’s really one message that we’re trying to send out.   It’s a  commentary on the society that we’re living in currently.

Little America

Your film It’s Magic is what you call non-fiction fiction, tell me about that.
Jessie: We started writing in school we came up with this idea of non-fiction screenwriting.  Basically, we would just get together and tell each other stories and base our shorts off of that and that’s basically what we’re doing.  Brittany and I have a very fluid and organic way of communicating and we’re able to get a very individual vision.  We try to bring that into our films.  We share everything and are openly communicating.  We really love playing with that line of reality.  The difference between reality and entertainment.  How something happens, something happens to me and I tell it to Brittany and then she tells it back to me, and then we write about it, and we’re acting, and what happens to the actual story throughout all of those processes and all of those different ways of communicating.

Brittany:  We started as best friends first, so when we first started, we started with these exercises where she would first tell me something that happened to her and I would write about it.  Or, I would tell her something and she would write about it.  So that we would have that difference, but we were close enough to do that.  With “It’s Magic”, which is the latest thing we did, Jessie wrote it and I acted it as her, so that was kind of cool.

So, that was something that actually happened to you?
Jessie: Something like that, we take creative liberties very seriously.  I mean, we write what we know.  It’s pretty hard to fake it.  Anytime I’ve tried to not write what I know it sounds pretty shitty, so everything is pretty real.

What are your three favorite films?
Brittany: 8 1/2, Fellini films, the Weatherman, Batman, documentaries…Little America’s pretty good…

Little America

Have you placed your films online and do you think it’s a good outlet for young filmmakers to get exposure?
Brittany:  When we first started doing Little America, we were in college, so we had to make it seem like it was for a class, I was in a pop culture class and Jessie had this independent study, and for class whatever we did was to put it online.  I wasn’t really into it, I’m not really a computer person, so it was kind of a weird experience, but it was actually really cool because we got a lot of feedback, a lot of instant feedback right away, which was kind of a cool way of doing it.
Jessie:  I’m completely pro internet, I think it’s something great.  Especially with something like an art film, or Little America, it spans so many different themes, and cities, and it’s all about this big world, big country.  I mean these festivals are great, but the ajority of people are going to see it online.  I think it’s amazing.
Brittany:  That whole internet thing, I approve of it.

Do you hope to make money from your film?
Brittany:  I don’t really think we’re at the level where that matters.  Sure, we would love to make money off of our films, but right now, I mean we just made this movie for 200 bucks, but we both work full time to do it.
Jessie: We do it because we love it, and if we can put it online and people see it, then that’s pretty cool.

Jessie, you work in TV, what do you do?
Jessie: I work on the show Intervention, and I’m a PA minion.  I’m starting on a film next week, a feature working in the AD Department.  It’s a great opportunity.  I want to eventually write/direct and produce everything that we do so the more I can learn from the ground up the better.  I’m writing something right now, and I know I won’t pick it up until the movie wraps, which is February, but it’s what you have to do.

Did either of you go to film school?
Jessie: No.  There was absolutely no film department where we went.  We had to borrow and teach ourselves, it turned out better I think, because I learned how to be a lot more self sufficient, Just do it, instead of sitting in a classroom and talking about it.  I don’t think I would’ve had the idea to make Little America unless I was sitting in a sociology class learning about class and jobs and how identity is related to your work.  I don’t think that the idea of looking at truck drivers would’ve struck me; i wouldn’t have taken a class like that in film school.

What’s your motto?
Nec Metu

Any final words?
Brittany:  We the People sounds like a great festival, and we’re very excited to be part of it.  We’re excited to have people see the film besides our mothers.

“Little America” will be playing October 16 at We the People: A Documentary Film Festival at the Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock, 2225 Colorado Blvd., Los Angeles, CA.

For more info on We the People, visit:
http://www.tradeandrow.org/wethepeople/index.html

To see more of Jessie Kahnweiler & Brittany Johnston’s films go to:
http://www.jbkpictures.com/jbk/
or
http://ca.youtube.com/user/jbkpictures1

images courtesy of jbkpictures.com

Here’s a preview of the eclectic collection of short film programs at this year’s Mill Valley Film Festival’s (MVFF).

Lost Souls & Malcontent Beasties

Photo courtesy of plymptoons.com

In its tradition of showcasing adult-alluring animation, the 2008 MVFF promises a delectable array of shorts in its internationally diverse, eighty-five minute collection entitled “Lost Souls and Malcontent Beasties”. Highlights include an official selection of Annecy, the animation industry’s leading international competitive film festival, by Australian director Dennis Tuppicoff; Chainsaw (24 mins), combines 2D, 3D, and rotoscope to portray an interwoven story of love, celebrity, and the dangers of wielding a rotary saw. The 25-minute adventure spans six decades, using a chainsaw literally and figuratively as a metaphor for the dangerous character of romance. In The Tale of Little Puppetboy (13 mins), Johannes Nyhlom, a self-proclaimed “eccentric” Swedish animator shares three installments that portray his own relationship with his quirky clay-animated protagonist, Puppetboy, which recently screened at Cannes. Recipient of the special award at Annecy Jury,in My Happy Ending (5 mins), German director Milen Vitanov brings MVFF the heartwarming comedy of what happens when a dog chases, and actually succeeds in catching his own tail: they become best friends. Veteran 2D animator Bill Plympton’s Hot Dog (the six-minute sequel to academy-nominated Guard Dog) chronicles the chaos that ensue when its friendly canine hero works for the fire department.

My Date from Hell, photo courtesy of computerarts.co.uk

Two graduates of Germany’s Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg, Time Weinmann and Tom Bracht, use 3D animation to tell the story of an overweight devil who searches for the perfect companion when he becomes bored with running the underworld. In this fourteen-minute short, My Date from Hell, Beelzebub struggles with video dating, personal adds, and blind dates.

Saturday October 4, 6:00 PM, LOSL04R, Rafael

Tuesday, October 7, 9:15 PM, LOSL07R, Rafael

Bank of Life: A Collection of Swedish Shorts

Photo courtesy of MVFF

In this eighty-six minute collection of Swedish Short animations, narratives, and five music videos, the MVFF screens the work of these international artist who share the perspective that action, or failure to act, are the decisions that shape identity . In world premier Erik Rosenlun’s twelve minute silent animation Checkoo, an underperforming office drone risks everything in order to fit in, but find that it might not be enough, and looks to a wonder drug for assistance. The Games of Night tells the story of a young boy who fantasizes about how to get his alcoholic father to return from a bar while he waits for him to come home. Director Dan Levy Dagerman adapts the twenty-three minute film from the short story his grandfather, Stig Dagerman, wrote entitled “Nattens Lekar”.

Photo courtesy of bobfilm.se

In Magnus Holmgren’s Tile M for Murder, Dave, a disillusioned husband, attempts to escape the boredom and monotony of his marriage by attempting to kill his wife through the board game Scrabble. Mats Olof Olsson’s My Uncle Loved the Colour Yellow shares the story of family and mental illness as Martin celebrates his 12th birthday with his Uncle Helmer, who always gives him a yellow-colored birthday present. Karolina Johnsson’s The First Day depicts an elderly man’s revelation when he is sent to a nursing home. Håkan Wennström’s animates Thomas Tidholm’s narration of his own poem Outside Life. A series of five music videos from renowned video director Magnus Renfors that explore heartache, mystery and yearning, will act as interludes throughout the shorts.

Saturday, October 4, 3:30 pm, BRIN04R, Rafael

Thursday October 9, 9:45BRIN09R, Rafael

Décopage Digital: V(ision) Fest Shorts

Ranging from ostentatiously expressionistic to achingly poetic, V(ision) Fest’s experimental short films program will reach the hearts and minds of anyone who has sought inspiration in a dream. Both Mosaic Mecanique (Tiffany Doesken-Polos, US 6 mins) and Murmur (Peter Bryne, Carole Woodlock, and Michaela Eremiasova US 6 mins) venture through the porous membrane between reality and virtual imagery and sound. In There Is No There There (US 4 mins), Samuel Stout pays homage to the late Stan Brakhage, an experimental American film maker. Delhi Hankerchief (Steve Friendship, UK 8 mins) and Through Your Eyes (Baba Hillman, US 8 mins) are lyrical story-fragments that connect women with the cycles of nature. A Song For Everyday ( Welseley Wetherington, US 4 mins), ONeHeADWOrD PrOteCtiON (Igor and Invan Buharov, Canada 7 mins), and Pure (Jacob Bricca US 5 mins) are montage based films that offer social commentary and satire. The Secret Apocalyptic Love Diaries (Enid Baxter Blader, US 12 mins) , Ella and the Astronaut (Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck, US 8 mins), and Through Trackless Waters (Elizabeth Henry, US 13 mins) explore the difficulty of human relations, ranging from those more intimate to the intergalactic.

Saturday October 4, 1:00 PMDEC04T, 142 Throckmorton

Saturday, October 11, 6:30 PMDEC11T, 142 Throckmorton

Presented by the California Film Institute, The Mill Valley Film Festival celebrates the best independent and world cinema from October 2-12, 2008 at the CineArts at Sequoia, the Christopher B. Smith San Rafael Film Center and other venues throughout the Bay Area.  Tickets and more information are available at www.mvff.com.

by Lily Saltzberg, FilmClick.com
http://filmclick.com/lilsaltz

Secret City Film Festival
October 9 - 12, 2008
Oak Ridge, TN

The Secret City Film Festival, showing from Oct. 9-12, 2008, enriches the already interesting eastern Tennessee city of Oak Ridge, which was originally built in 1942 to create secretive military endeavors like the Manhattan Project.  The festival is presenting 60 films from around the world in this year’s 5th edition, including seventeen films from the great state of Tennessee and even a few from Oak Ridge.

The Boys of Summerville, a narrative feature film out of Harriman, Tennessee by director Brooks Benjamin tells the story of a small town native turned big city businessman who comes back to his hometown to sell his late father’s estate and gets caught in the small town’s love for softball.   It shows on Saturday, October 10 at 8 PM.  On the documentary side Being Lincoln - Men With Hats by Elvis Wilson of Nashville, Tennessee takes an upbeat look at the lives and motivations of a few of the over 160 men across the United States who are dedicated to bringing Abraham Lincoln to life.  What kind of man would spend $400 on a stovepipe hat, glue a pencil eraser on his face, and spend most of his time walking in someone else’s figuratively and literally enormous shoes?  Hit the festival on Thursday, October 9 at 7:15 PM to find out.  I hope that one hits my area sometime soon.

In addition to film screenings, the festival features educational workshops and panels, including a Lunch & Learn called “Shooting Red: A Case Study” on Friday, October 10 and the Southern Filmmakers Roundtable on October 11. Personally, I think that Red workshop will be fairly interesting considering the intricacies of shooting with the Red cameras.  I wish I could go.  By the way, filmmakers, listen to me; always go to the Lunch & Learn no matter how hung over you are.   First of all, the food will help.  Second, you’ll never get a better chance to talk to the other filmmakers without them being distracted about their film being shown or promoting their film or whatever.  For a short time, you all relax and geek out a bit.  Some of the best times I’ve had at festivals are at those lunchtime gatherings.

The festival, which had “humble beginnings” was started in 2003 by Keith McDaniel for the local film production community in East Tennessee, but has expanded to welcome filmmakers from around the country and the globe.  “The festival has just grown and grown – getting better and better each and every year,” says McDaniel. “More and more local folks are attending the festival and more and more filmmakers are traveling to participate. As a matter of fact, we have filmmakers attending this year from as far away as France.”

The festival begins this year on Thursday, Oct. 9 at 5:00 pm for Free Family Night. “We started family night last year as a way to say thanks to East Tennessee for their support. All the films on Thursday evening are family-friendly, admission is free and we even give away free popcorn,” McDaniel said.  The festival continues on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, culminating with the awards ceremony Sunday evening.  McDaniel said, “We present awards at the end of the festival to honor those films which our judges consider to be outstanding.”

“The festival is also a great opportunity for our East Tennessee filmmaking community to get together and celebrate their efforts. It also gives the public a chance to meet and mingle with these filmmakers and view their work,” McDaniel added. “We have a great time every year and this year looks to be the best festival we have ever presented.”

Full Festival Passes are available for purchase for $75 per person. However, they may be purchased online for only $60 through the month of September by visiting www.thesecretcitystore.com. Other ticket packages are also available, as well as festival schedule and film descriptions, by visiting  www.secretcityfilmfestival.com. For more information, or to volunteer to help with the festival, email keith@secretcityfilms.com.

If any of our users are interested in reviewing a film for our blog by personally hitting the Secret City Film Festival, let me know.  I’ll send you presents.

by Christopher Potter, FilmClick.com producer, http://www.filmclick.com/cspotter,  cpotter@filmclick.com

September 12, 2008

I had the opportunity this week to sit in on a briefing about this year’s 31st edition of the Mill Valley Film Festival (MVFF).  Luckily, I’m the one who gets to cover this event, since it’s right in FilmClick’s backyard, the San Francisco Bay Area.  For those of you who haven’t heard of the it, or for those who are contemplating a visit to the area during the festival (the weather is great here in October), the Mill Valley Film Festival is a non-competitive event presented by the California Film Institute with events in Mill Valley and San Rafael and a few other venues throughout the Bay Area.  It is generally regarded as a top showcase for independent and world cinema, and, for local film-lovers, it’s a don’t-miss event.  As usual, Mill Valley is showcasing a wide variety of films, events, niche presentations, concerts and more.  I’ll be detailing these events in the weeks leading up to the festival.

The first thing that caught my eye this year is a new endeavor they’re calling Active Cinema.  “I’ve lost count of how many times people have come up to me after a particularly inspiring screening wondering how they could put the film’s message into action in their daily lives,” says Zoe Elton, MVFF’s director of programming.  This reminded me of a few experiences at festivals, most recently opening night at LaborFest after the Ken Loach film, It’s a Free World.  People were talking after that film, just like people were talking after The 11th Hour.  The 11th Hour gave a website to join groups that would take action.  I wonder how that went…I’ll have to investigate.

MVFF’s idea is a program called “Active Cinema: A Creative Social Action Network”.  They hope to provide a catalyst that connects social, environmental and human rights films with the audiences that are inspired by them and the organizations that work on the issues addressed in the films.   The idea is about turning ideas into deeds through activity.  They’re sponsoring a tree planting in relation to two films showing at the festival, Children of the Amazon and Taking Root: The Vision of Wangari Maathai.

Taking Root: The Vision of Wangari Maathai

In total, there are thirteen films which will seek to inspire viewers to become doers, including Tim Disney’s American Violet, Makoto Sasa’s film Fire Under the Snow, and Archeology of Memory by Quique Cruz and Marilyn Mumford.   There’s also a panel discussion called the Active Cinema Roundtable on October 5, which will look at the funding and creation of socially conscious or issue driven films.  Check out Mill Valley’s website at www.mvff.com for more information.

This year’s edition of Cinemasports is also supporting the Active Cinema theme.  I’m thinking of fielding a FilmClick team, if anyone’s interested.

Presented by the California Film Institute, The Mill Valley Film Festival celebrates the best independent and world cinema from October 2-12, 2008 at the CineArts at Sequoia, the Christopher B. Smith San Rafael Film Center and other venues throughout the Bay Area.  Tickets and more information are available at www.mvff.com.

by Christopher Potter, FilmClick.com producer, http://www.filmclick.com/cspotter,  cpotter@filmclick.com

FilmClickers,

It’s time to announce the Comedy Finalists for the first FilmClick Online Film Festival. The FilmClick staff wants to thank you for lightening the mood around here for a few days. These seven funny film finalists will be competing for cash money; the top three spots in the comedy category during the July 29, 2008 - August 12, 2008 viewer voting period. We’ve made our selections–now it’s up to you.

Here are the seven finalists in an order determined by my stapler:

1. A Date with Wade

2. Everything or Nothing

3. Internet Party

4. Boxed Out

5. Love’s a Drag

6. Brainstorm

7. Eireannach Rithim - IRISH RUN

Honorable Mentions to:

Pirates of a Small Pond

Sleeves

The Coat

Prizes: Each category will award three cash prizes each for the top three finishes. First place will be awarded $1,000. Second place will receive $500. Third place will receive $250. In addition to cash prizes, everyone that makes it to the final round will receive a special note on their profile page, and will have their collective work highlighted on the homepage.

We’re on to the documentaries which, while artistically engaging, are generally much more serious. Finally, a good excuse for making the interns cry…

Anyway, we’ll be announcing all of the documentary finalists next Tuesday. Due to the volume and length of the documentary films, we haven’t all had a chance to see everything and make a preliminary vote quite yet. If we do have a consensus during the week, I’ll post on that film’s comments. Thanks again for all of the hilarious submissions and for being a part of our community!

Best,

Christopher Potter
Project Manager
FilmClick.com
http://www.filmclick.com/cspotter
cpotter@filmclick.com