NewEnglandFilm.com

As in past years, the 2008 Berkshire International Film
Festival boasts a broad line-up of docs, narratives, features and shorts.   The
festival also honors special guest Kevin Bacon with the annual Achievement in
Film Award on Friday May 16^th. 
The festival, which runs from May 15-18 at theaters in
Great Barrington, MA, also features several films with regional ties.  According
to Kelley Vickery, festival founder and director, both the underwriters and
producers of a documentary about the international relief nonprofit, Doctors
Without Borders, have strong connections to the Berkshire area.  Living in
Emergency: Stories of Doctors Without Borders will have its world premiere
at 7 pm on May 17th.  It screens again on May 18^th at 11:15 am. 
Douglas Trumbull, who lives in the Berkshires, will be
present with a screening of Blade Runner.  Trumbull was the special
effects supervisor for the 1982 Ridley Scott film, as well as classics such as
2001: A Space Odyssey, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and Star Trek: 
The Motion Picture.  Vickery calls him an industry icon. “He created some of
the effects still used today,” she said. 
Three short films made in the region, Breaking Pattern,
Return to Labradoria,
and Love and Class in Connecticut, will also screen this year. 
NewEnglandFilm.com had the chance to view these shorts in advance of the
festival and provide the following reactions: 

Return to Labradoria. 

[Click to enlarge]

Ryan Kampe’s beautifully filmed Breaking Pattern
opens with lush, vivid colors.  It is summer in New England.  There is a mother
with a baby.  All seems right with the world.  But before long it is obvious
that the beautiful colors belie the bleakness of the characters’ lives.  In the
short span of 15 minutes, Breaking Pattern gives us suspense, violence,
social commentary, and a love story, or two.  Shot on location in Western
Massachusetts with an all-local cast, the complex situations in Breaking
Pattern give insight into life in small New England towns. 
Thomas Posson and Diego Ongaro’s
Return To Labradoria is bizarre and enchanting.  (Diego Ongaro is
a resident of Sandisfield, MA.)  The impossibly cheerful and completely
unsuccessful wood salesman, Jacques, pines for his childhood dog, John John. 
His love for John John interferes with his ability to interact normally in his
day-to-day life.  A plot twist involves a space ship and a trip to Planet
Labradoria…  Return to Labradoria is a film for anyone who has ever loved
a pet.  I kept my dog by my side for the rest of the day.  It might make you
want to run out and get a dog, or a goldfish, or a python, so you too can have
the type of love Jacques shares with John John.  

Love and Class in Connecticut. 
[Click to enlarge]

Susan Cinoman and Douglas
Tenaglia’s Love and Class in Connecticut is a highly charged
drama.  The acting, directing, and dialogue are so riveting that the viewer may
not even notice: the whole movie takes place in one room.  An old story of
family conflict told in a refreshingly contemporary way, this film shows us that
families are complicated and someone else’s may even be more complicated than
yours.  The entire crew is from Connecticut.  
Each of these shorts, so different from each other, shares
an essential quality — the ability to involve the viewer completely in the
lives of those in the film.  Unlike a feature film, which can tell the whole
story, these shorts show a vignette of a life, enough of the story to keep the
viewer hooked but not enough to stop the viewer from wondering, “What happens
next?” Each packs a punch that will stay with this viewer long after the credits
role.  
The Berkshire
International Film Festival runs May 15-18.