The Place of No Words is the real deal, sincere human connection of the highest filmic order. By using nerd culture to produce a more moving and touching work than probably anything in its realm that has come before it, it transcends genre and falls squarely into greatness.
This year’s 20th Anniversary Indie Memphis film festival featured a street closure for the first time in their storied history, adding a big festival tent to expand the fest’s presence and footprint on the city. After the Opening Night red carpet featuring THOM PAIN and Rainn Wilson, and Thursday’s photo call with Mark Webber – two of indie films’s best examples of the actor’s actor, the red carpet under the tent on Friday night encouraged the attending filmmakers, as well as the notoriously photo and press-shy Memphis filmmaking regulars to allow themselves to be corralled for their moment in the fake-sun, while others still managed to dodge it (we’re looking right at you, Morgan Jon Fox).
This list is dominated by films I saw at Indie Memphis and films I used to pass the time on the plane. There’s old school Mark Webber, side-by-side with his latest film, and not-so-coincidentally, an Adam Bhala Lough twosome, as well.
Karl Jacob’s COLD NOVEMBER won the jury award (and a $1000 cash prize) for Best Narrative Feature, Landen Van Soest and Jeremy Levine’s FOR AKHEEM took home the jury award (and $1000 courtesy of Classic American Hardwoods) for Best Documentary Feature, and Laura Jean Hocking and Melissa Sweazy’s GOOD GRIEF received the nod (and a $1000 cash prize) as Best Hometowner Feature.
The Indie Memphis Film Festival presented by Duncan-Williams, Inc., (November 1-6) has announced its full slate of films for the 20th edition of the annual festival this year. Oliver Butler and Will Eno’s THOM PAIN opens the festival, while Lynn Sachs’s TIP OF MY TONGUE is the Closing Night selection. In between those two films and among the competition films, are a special salute to Abel Ferrara, a MLK50 series honoring the slain Civil Rights leader, a special sneak peak at Craig Brewer’s new television series, a special sidebar of shorts featuring the work of filmmakers from Saudi Arabia, a music-filled block party, and a full slate of screenings featuring many of the most critically revered and popular films from this year’s film festival circuit.
Last year, in a meeting with a major PR firm in L.A., I was told that unless the fest’s dates lined up perfectly with the actual release of the film that there was no way they would recommend that client going to the fest. It was just a pain-in-the-ass for the publicist. And that was a friend of mine. Cutthroat, baby.
