The Women Texas Film Festival announced today that Studio Movie Grill (SMG) will be the presenting sponsor for this year’s edition of the critically acclaimed film festival. WTxFF also announced that film festival and film production veteran Vanessa Cook has come onboard as the festival’s Executive Director.
The Summer Movie Madness Marathon mimics fundraising walks, runs, and bike rides, with the participants asked to acquire pledges from friends, family, co-workers, etc. to donate funds based on whether or not they watch all four films that day. There will also be prizes for the film fans given away at each screening and for the most money raised for the organization, as well as special appearances to introduce each of the films.
In honor of the wonderfulness of Patty Jenkins’ WONDER WOMAN, this group of films has a loose connection of amazing women, including; the incredibly underrated director that Ida Lupino was (THE HITCH-HIKER), a “I’m having more fun than I should be allowed” performance by Glenn Close in THE GIRL WITH ALL THE GIFTS, a Marilyn Monroe double feature, one of Julie Andrews’ somewhat less-heralded favorites (for me at least) gems (THE AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY), as well as an extremely late-to-the-party screening of ROGUE ONE.
MEAN DREAMS not only isn’t trying to reinvent the wheel, it revels in the trappings of its poor, farm country setting, story tropes, and the familiar character archetypes it puts forward. The film banks on the romantic dynamic between the two leads (Sophie Nelisse, and Josh Wiggins), as well as the villain role embodied by Paxton..
The 12th Harlem International Film Festival’s red carpet on Saturday, May 6th, again gave a diverse group of filmmakers their due in front of the cameras. Sunday’s closing night presentation of Angela Robinson Witherspoon’s CURTSY, MISTER included a very special guest to see Witherspoon’s feature film directorial debut.
I take pride in my DVD library. And the news that Dallas’s Premiere Video was done fighting the good fight gave me the inspiration to dig into the shelves and watch some films that I hadn’t seen in awhile and actually watch some discs I hadn’t yet cracked open.
The Lighthouse International Film Festival (LIFF) has announced the complete lineup for its ninth annual event, which will take place June 8-11, 2017 on Long Beach Island, New Jersey. The festival will open with Sam Voutas’ acclaimed KING OF PEKING, a rousing Beijing-set love letter to cinema that brought cheering audiences to their feet at Tribeca 2017.
The 12th Harlem International Film festival’s Opening Night Afro Punk celebration, highlighted by the world premiere presentation of Daniel Peddle’s GARDEN OF THE PEACEFUL DRAGON featured more style on the red carpet than most. The impressive looks on the carpet showed that these filmmakers have figured out that the attention you get in front of the photographers and interviewers there can be useful to get attention for your film when it plays in the fest – and beyond.
This list is dominated by the films I saw at the Harlem International Film Festival. Since my duties at this fest included doing A LOT of film introductions and Q&As, I saw more films than usual at a fest I am doing the press & PR thing at. But that was a big win for me, as I saw films not necessarily in my wheelhouse that I really enjoyed, appreciated, and affected me quite a bit. Making discoveries at film festivals is what it is all about – and that is exactly what happened here.
Roberta Durrant’s KROTOA was named Best Narrative Feature, with Daniel Peddle’s GARDEN OF THE PEACEFUL DRAGON taking the award for Best Documentary Feature. Ilker Savaskurt’s GROOM’S BLOCK won Best World Film (Narrative) and Steven McGregor’s SERVANT OR SLAVE took the prize for Best World Documentary.
