This Month
A trio of festivals opens the month: The 21st
Connecticut Gay & Lesbian Film Festival
will be held May 30-June 7;
Newport International Film Festival
runs June 3-8; catch the
Boston International Film Festival
June 6-14.
Does the phrase “permanent vacation” mean
more to you than an Aerosmith album? Organizers of Boston Open Screen
hope so; bring your vids, or just your
attitude to the Coolidge on June 10th. Learn more about all of this
here.
The LEF Foundation presents the second of
its three part series, Facing
Realities: Boston Documentary on June 12th at 6:30 pm. Ross
McElwee will be present with Backyard
and Nina Davenport will be
present with Operation Filmmaker at the Boston ICA.
On June 14th Victor Franko premieres his first feature film,
Solitaire, starring Marilyn Chambers, at the Columbus Theatre in
Providence. Doors open at 6 pm.
WGBH Lab invites submissions for
Filmmakers-in-Residence until June 15th. Participants receive a
stipend, working space, administrative support, editing equipment, editorial
guidance, and access to WGBH staff to advance their projects.
Details.
The Center for Independent Documentary and the
Kopkind Center are sponsoring a weeklong retreat for ten filmmakers along
with mentors at Treefrog Farm in Guilford VT, from August 3-10. The
deadline is June 15th.
The last two
Beyond Broadcast conferences took place at Harvard and MIT,
respectively. This year it will be held at American University on June 17th,
where participants will “explore different definitions of "public media," learn
about participatory mapping and visualization tools, and examine how those tools
can help us all understand the shifting terrain for mission-driven media.” If
you are going, please let
NewEnglandFilm.com know your thoughts.
Or maybe you’ll be at
Silver Docs? It's June 16-23.
Provincetown Film Festival is this month,
June 18-22. The always attractive line-up includes an acting award for Gael
Garcia Bernal, the Faith Hubley Memorial Award for Jane Lynch, and the Filmmaker
on the Edge Award for Quentin Tarantino. Yes, that means they’ll be there,
maybe even watching the North American premiere of Madonna’s Filth and Wisdom.
Visit
www.ptownfilmfest.org.
The Cambridge-based Social Equity Venture Fund (S.E.VEN)
is seeking short films (2-5 minutes) that tell the story of an entrepreneur’s
solution to poverty. Winning Cinéma
Prospérité films will “show what odds they've overcome, the impact they've
had on the world and how they've still managed/are managing to achieve their
goals.” Submit through September 15th.
In addition to
Robb Moss and Peter Galison’s Secrecy, the
Nantucket Film Festival
(June 19-22) will show The Wackness (directed by Nantucket summer
resident Jonathan Levine) and Transsiberian (directed by former MA
resident Brad Anderson and written by Nantucket native, Will Conroy).
Coming Soon
Bonnie Silva
of Newbury, Massachusetts has spent two years documenting stories of rescued
dogs, cats, rabbits, and the people willing to go the extra mile to save them.
Fifteen Legs should be screening in New England soon.
Held Over
Josh and Benny Safdie. (Photo by Henri-Maxime
Ducoulombier.)
[Click to enlarge]
The Safdie brothers – Josh and Benny – have received the
stamp of international cinematic approval from the Directors’ Fortnight at
Cannes. (FYI on
Directors’ Fortnight: it was created by the SRF (French Directors Society)
in 1969; the SRF programs a selection of films from around the world during the
Cannes Film Festival.) Josh Safdie had his debut feature, The
Pleasure of Being Robbed, screened and Benny Safdie had a short,
The Acquaintances of a Lonely John, screened. The bros are BU alums.
Lawrence, MA filmmaker Lorre Fritchy has been busy
with her feature Millies. She visited Lawrence High School for a Q and
A; “talked film” at a YWCA fundraiser, and started on principal photography, “on
the streets and rooftops” of her hometown. She also wrote a story for
NewEnglandFilm.com
this month.
A New England Emmy victory goes to... the Rhode
Island International Film Festival for its PSA campaign, No Excuses.
LEF Foundation announced its 2008 Moving Image Fund
recipients which included filmmakers
Laura Colella,
Steve
Subotnik,
David Sutherland and
Steven Ascher & Jeanne Jordan to name a few. In total, 26 projects
were awarded $280,000 in funds. See the
complete list.
We always like to
know what former Bostonian Byron Hurt is up to. He recently posted a
video tribute to Sean Bell,
one of the victims of the recent police shooting controversy in Queens, in honor
of Bell’s birthday (May 18, 1983).
Screenings, festivals, meetings and other events at at www.NewEnglandFilm.com/events/
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