John Wildman

FILM FESTIVAL NEWS: THE LAST MOVIE STAR, starring Burt Reynolds Opens The Oxford Film Festival goes big; political, and silly for its 15th Anniversary blow out edition

The 2018 Oxford Film Festival (February 7-11) has announced the full schedule of films for this year’s 15th Anniversary edition. On opening night, writer/director Adam Rifkin will present his latest effort, THE LAST MOVIE STAR, starring Burt Reynolds and Ariel Winter, while Carlos and Jason Sanchez’s intense drama, ALLURE, starring Evan Rachel Wood, will screen at the festival’s Centerpiece Selection and Robert Mullan’s 60s biopic MAD TO BE NORMAL, starring David Tennant Elisabeth Moss and Michael Gambon, serves as the closing night selection.

SHORTS AND TO THE POINT: Travis Bible’s time travel short, EXIT STRATEGY won $50,000 at the Louisiana Film Prize. And there are multiple good reasons for that.

Bible scores with EXIT STRATEGY by remembering two very key requirements that make that film or a film like GROUNDHOG DAY a classic and so many other films a nice try at best: He gives us characters to care about and one character in particular who grows during the course of his impossible journey.

FILMS GONE WILD: The Harvey Weinstein Revelations Need To Be the Tipping Point – It’s Up to Men Everywhere (Not Just in Film) to Finally Raise the Bar

And that’s the balance I think men need to strike, even when it (as it so often does) go against every instinct to “fix things” and “problem solve.” We need to be ready to stand up and speak out when a loved one, or a friend like Rose or my other film fest friend, or in fact, a complete stranger needs us to do so. But we also, need to never assume we’ve got all of this gamed out, that we’ve got it down, we know the score.

FILMS GONE WILD: If you are a guy debating the Tim League Alamo Drafthouse problem, try starting by listening to what the women are saying first — Films Gone Wild

I was wrong and I was wrong because it is so very easy to be wrong as a male in this arena. It is so incredibly easy to think of me first. It is beyond easy to not consider everything that vitally needs to be considered simply because I have a penis. It is a painful admission to make even as I seek to correct it and do better.

SHORTS AND TO THE POINT: Maja Aro ‘s HOODS hits the bullseye as the complete package in a cleverly conceived and created short film…that could be expanded into something more

It actually started as a very different script inspired by a video game. I wanted to write something with a badass female lead, then she evolved into this motorbike riding little red riding hood. I love the esthetic of dieselpunk, so the world was heavily influenced by that. It all kind of evolved from there. The world is big, and even though the short is just a little slice of an introduction to it, I didn’t want to feel half assed just because it was a short.

SHORTS AND TO THE POINT: Sarah Adams and Maggie Rieth Austin are a comedy duo to watch and laugh at as they take us for a bumpy ride in Lee Trull’s THE SERVICE ELEVATOR

But this particular version of that stuck in the elevator scenario gets an additional boost because it was written, developed, and stars two women who might as we’ll bring back vaudeville, they’ve got their “act” together so honed – Sarah Adams and Maggie Rieth Austin.