By ron rollins

May 18, 2009 1:19 AM | Link to this

FILM FEST REPORT DAY 3 Well, the final day of the first FilmDayton Festival is done and all packed up, and it was a good one. The whole thing was good, in fact. Some highpoints from today (and there a lot): — “45365,” the doc from Bill and Turner Ross about smalltown life in Sidney, Ohio, was as big a hit here as it was at SXSW, where it recently won big kudos. The Sidney audience showed up and sold the show out, and loved the film. High point was Turner’s idea to give a beer to everybody who asked a question at the Q&A afterward, which really seemed to work…. Our own Karri O’Reilly ran up and down the aisles delivering the Bud, and seemed to enjoy herself. — The day was marked by strong workshops on film basics: lo-budget FX, how to make a living as an extra (hope we can see some of that in Dayton soon), how to keep your film job, and some general basics on moviemaking — thhat latter taught at c{space by Marisha Mukerjee, our hard-working festival coordinator. She had her crew going thru their paces with cameras on the downtown streets, making films on demand. It was cool to watch. — We started the day with “Dayton Codebreakers,” after which Aileen Leblanc led a good QA session in the lobby and then ran over to tear tickets for the next feature, “My Mummy.” — J. Todd Anderson is working out on the West Coast, and so couldn’t attend this weekend’s fest (he tried, bless him). But a bunch of his “My Mummy” cohorts were on hand to talk about the movie, along with the real by-gosh mummy and its case. Soooooo, how many OTHER film festivals have their own mummy? Really? I mean, I’m just sayin’. — After “45365,” we reprised the WSU Big Lens movies, and sold plenty of tickets doing it. Lots of demand for those films. Beforehand, it was “Best of Shorts,” Karri O’Reilly’s selection of top short films made here in the last decade or so, ranging from the touching dealing-with-cancer story “Night Swimming” by Brian Whitley, to the rambunctious and bawdy “Rubi Girls” by Rubi Girl, director and Neon GM Jonathan McNeal, who got big applause for … well, just for all the stuff he does. We couldn’t have had a festival without him. All in all, it’s been a great weekend. During the Sidney doc, we overheard one lady say, “Have they had a festival in Dayton all this time?” No ma’am. This was the first. You were part of it. You can tell your grandkids. From the couple from Richmond, Ind, who bought weekend passes to the young kids who took notes through every workshop to the film fans who caught up on stuff they couldn’t see anywhere else, it seemed as though we had a good darn time. The lobby was full of film folks, the sidewalks were packed wtih film folks, and it was all good. And yes, we’re doing it next year. Stay tuned. Thanks to our volunteers, our board, the Neon, and our sponsors: DP&L, the Dayton Daily News and ActiveDayton.com, Wright State University, SOCHE, WYSO, PicsMatch.com and ThinkTV.

By ron rollins

May 16, 2009 8:07 PM | Link to this

FILM FEST DAY 2 REPORT Brrrr… It’s getting a bit chilly, especially for May, out here on the lovely patio of the Neon Movies — but lemme tell ya, it’s warm inside the theater. As I type this, Ed Radtke’s fine film “The Speed of Life” is unspooling to kick off the prime-time portion of the second day of the first FilmDayton Festival. Your humble president (um, me) will confess that I wasn’t sure what size audience we’d get since the online sales for this one were a little slow, against our expectations; Ed is well known and is from the Dayton area, his film won several important awards at other festivals, and the movie has never screened in Dayton before tonight. We were pleasantly surprised, then, when about 120 people walked up to the box office and gave us a nicely full house. Thanks, all. Ed is in the house tonight, and he’ll be taking questions in about an hour. After his Q&A, folks will be trooping over to Gilly’s across the street to hear Lab Partners, Sohio and other local bands that feature into his soundtrack, hosted by WYSO’s own Rev Cool. Love that guy. WYSO, btw, has been a great media sponsor for this first festival. They’ve been promoting heavily to us all week, and had me on two different shows to talk about the festival — Jerry Kenney’s WYSO Weekend last Sunday, and Juliet Fromholt’s Kaliedoscope. I had a lot of fun with both of them. Anyway, Ed Radtke was involved in two of our panels today at ThinkTV — he was part of the “Industry Panel” that talked about the business of making indies films and the business of getting them financed and distributed. Along with him were filmmakers Karri O’Reilly, Bill and Turner Ross, BarbaraO and Jay Delaney, plus moderator Nicol Simmons and Mike Katchman, of Rivercoast Films, a new distribution company for independent films. Nicol Simmons’ WSU student film, the memorable “Dry Mount,” will be featured Sunday in the “Best of Shorts” program at 4PM, along with seven others. Radtke earlier gave a class on directing to an appreciative group at ThinkTV, and before his session Julia Reichert and Steve Bognar got the room stirred up and ready to shoot with a class on documentary-making. Attendees at both said they really appreciated the information and coaching. “Daughters of the Dust” opened our presentations today a little past noon. This is a gorgeous, moving film about an African-American family in the South in the early 1900s, and it stars BarbaraO, who presented it today as part of the African World Film Festival, one of FilmDayton’s key partnerships this week, and one we’re proud to have. I must say, parenthetically, that as I write this the crowds are walking up and down Fifth to get to the World A’Fair next door at the Convention Center… Parking has been a bit nutty for both days of the film fest, but you know what? We like having our first event happening on such a great, busy weekend for downtown. Urban Nights last night just got better and better, and tonight it’s cool to see folks wandering happily along the sidewalks and the city’s streets bustling with traffic. Yeah, we like being a part of that. Our second movie today was Jim Klein’s fascinating documentary from 13 years ago, “Taken For a Ride.” It’s about how General Motors apparently conspired to put the nations’ urban mass-transit system in its grave in the 1950s so that the nation would need more highways, and thus, more cars. It lays out its case pretty cleanly, and it’s utterly infuriating to watch. Jim said he’s always asked about whether he’d consider a sequel, but he says the topic took four years and wore him out. Besides, he’s a crack film editor and WSU prof who says very, very busy working on other Dayton filmmakers’ projects. He edited “The Speed of Life,” and just finished “True Nature,” the haunting thriller shot in Dayton by Patrick Steele, which should be ready for screening at the Neon this summer. Maybe you’ll see it at next year’s FilmDayton Festival? Wait and see…. Later tonight, its’ “Blue Car” (love that movie) and the insanely violent and ultra-nutty “Deadbeat at Dawn,” our ’80s exploitation gang flick shot right here in … yes, friends … Dayton. Jim van Bebber, the director, is supposed to be flying in tonight to see it on our big screen. Apparently, he’s a last-minute kind of guy. No big! Honestly, a lot of our festival has come falling into place at the last minute, the way these events often do…. And so far, so good anyway. We’re having a blast. Stop by for a full slate of films and workshops Sunday, including the second showing of the Wright State “Big Lens” student films. But here’s a flash: “45365” is officially SOLD OUT. See you at the Neon!

By ron rollins

May 16, 2009 1:47 AM | Link to this

Well, if I may say so, things went pretty well. We had a sold-out house for the Big Lens showing that opened the festival, and a nearly full theater for Jay Delaney’s “Not Your Typical Bigfoot Movie.” The “Pitch It!” movie-idea forum that started us off at 5:30 PM today drew a solid, interested crowd of about 60 people, and some dozen and a half “pitchers,” many of whom had really good ideas for movies. Our panel gave them good, solid, professional advice that had a real-world grounding. Two winners split $38! Meanwhile in that session, Dave Gasper of PicsMatch.com, one of our FilmDayton board members, gave checks totaling $10,000 to three young filmmakers who competed in the contest to come up with the perfect promo film for the Dave’s facial recognition software company…. Who the hell was that big rabbit? He was everywhere… Next year’s FilmDayton Festival mascot, maybe??? Just a thought. Our trusty volunteer cadre and the smart, on-it staff at the Neon made things snap and crackle through the evening. The lobby of the Neon was packed with film fans before both screenings, and there was a real energy in the air as Puzzle of Light played for the Urban Night crowds outside under gorgeous evening skies and then headed over to Mike Elsass’ Color of Energy Gallery in the Oregon Arts District for the after-party. Folks along Fifth Street could see Rod Hatfield’s great light-show projection from the gallery that announced FilmDayton had a hell of a party going on inside: Good music, good food, good art, good networking and good company all around. So, what about the movies? Good questions for Jay D. about his buddies the Bigfoot hunters; people really liked his film, a nice take on friendship and its ups and downs. The Big Lens movies from WSU students had folks talking, too — especially about “Toughman,” by Doug Paul and Rocky Smith. My guess is that we’ll sell out the Sunday evening show of Big Lens, too. So, we’ve got momentum, buzz, energy, good reviews and a solid product — films made in/about/by Dayton/Daytonians — to sell… I think we’re onto something. Thanks to everybody who helped, paid, showed up and hung out…. See you later this weekend! Cheers, Ron