POST WOODSTOCK BLUES

I arrived back into New York City late last night from the Woodstock Film Festival and found myself missing the winds of the Catskills and colorful leaves, despite having slept in layers of clothes and blankets at night. Woodstock was the first film festival that I’ve been to with my short Honored and found the overall experience enjoyable. The permanent staff and volunteers were incredibly helpful and friendly and really did their best to make the filmmakers comfortable and get the most from the festival experience. The environment that Co-Founders/Festival Directors Meira Blaustein and Laurent Rejto have created up there is fantastic and seems to continue to please both industry and filmmakers alike.

I was able to catch a lot of films while there. One that I really wanted to see was the Hungarian film Iska’s Journey written and directed by Csaba Bollók but word was the print got lost by UPS. Ack! This however allowed for an additional screening of Julian Schnabel’s The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Le Scaphandre et le Papillon) which continues to amaze audiences. The word “sublime” continually came up in conversations with people about that film.

Here’s a rundown of highlights of films I saw at Woodstock Film Festival (in addition to what was posted on the 12th):

DOCUMENTARIES

James Crump’s Black White and Gray:A Portrait of Sam Wagstaff and Robert Mapplethorpe is a doc that I think people who love the arts, but have a basic knowledge of things should check out. Many people know well of Mapplethorpe, but little of Wagstaff who was deeply influential in bringing controversial art into play. And without Wagstaff, it is quite possible we wouldn’t know Mapplethorpe’s work and perhaps many contemporary art photographers. What I particularly liked about this film was how it was able to delve into the personal relationship between Wagstaff and Mapplethorpe thanks to the interview with Patti Smith. Through this we get a glimpse into their world through a dear friend and fellow artist’s perspective. The film opens in New York this Friday at Cinema Village.

Doris Dörrie’s How To Cook Your Life (Wie Man Sein Leben Kocht) follows the charismatic Zen Master Edward Espe Brown as he explains the guiding principles of Zen Buddhism as they apply to the preparation of food and life itself. The film is a wonderful examination on how far people, and Americans in particular, have come from our connection with food. It also was a wonderful look into Zen and human nature. No matter how Zen we try to be, we’re still human. And there are some scenes where we see Brown frustrated with his students and with the food – particularly in the way things are packaged these days. The scene where he tries to open a packet of cheese is hilarious. We’ve all been there, trying with our hands to open a package and have to take evasive action with a knife of some kind. The film itself a meditation; the simple pacing, beautiful shots of food, and the anecdotes of Brown and Zen philosophy weave a constructive thread. The Woodstock screening was the North American premiere of How To Cook Your Life.

Robert Stone’s Oswald’s Ghost had it’s World Premiere at Woodstock. The film pulls us into the world of conspiracy as Stone deconstructs the mythologies and controversy surrounding the assasination of JFK and how our beliefs in what may have happened have shaped history. The film presents the predominant theories of what happened that day in Dallas and at the introduction of the screening, Mr. Stone relayed that he made this film bearing in mind the post 9-11 world we live in today, a world also rampant with conspiracy theories. 70% of Americans today believe there was a conspiracy behind JFK’s assasination. Watching Oswald’s Ghost I went into it wondering if Oswald was set up. But by the end, I believed that maybe he did do it and did it alone. But I’m still unsure, as many of us continue to be. The portion that struck me the most was the footage and information on Oswald’s opportunist mother; a woman who used the infamacy of her son’s fate to her own advantage. This film will certainly lend itself to a lot of discussion, particularly among people who were alive at the time of the assasination. It was an event that changed so much in America and we certainly continue to feel the after effects.

FEATURES

Alex Holdridge was highlighted in “25 New Faces of Independent Film” and I had the opportunity to see In Search of a Midnight Kiss at Woodstock. The film centers on Wilson (Scoot McNairy) who’s break up with his ex-girlfriend still lingers as New Year’s Eve approaches and his best friend convinces him to place an ad on Craigslist for a date so he won’t spend the night alone. Enter the strongwilled Vivian (Sara Simmonds)who has an agenda of her own, and we follow the pair from their meeting and into the New Year morning. This sort of tale has the chance of becoming self-indulgent, and there were a couple moments the story teetered in that direction, but overall the film is tightly held together, and rings true for those who’ve struggled through break-ups and new beginnings in life and love. The movie opens in theatres in February 2008.

Sol Tryon’s The Living Wake is a dark comedy set in a storybook universe that follows the final day of of self-proclaimed artist and genius K. Roth Binew, played brilliantly by Mike O’Connell in a role that he created originally as part of a one-man show. Binew has one day left to live and enlists his best and only friend Mills (Jesse Eisenberg) to take him around town on his bicycle rickshaw as he tries to sort through life’s unanswered mysteries and hands out invitations to friends, enemies and acquaintances for his living wake which is to take place that evening. The film was shot Mr. Tryon’s home state of Maine during the autumn. The beautiful setting and absurdist trials of Binew blend together perfectly and as I watched the film I could see the actors delight in performing it. The Living Wake ultimately won the Audience Award at Woodstock (complete list of Awards can be viewed HERE) and is currently playing at the Austin Film Festival and next will be at AFI in Los Angeles.

SHORT FILMS

I spent most of Saturday watching short films. I was naturally curious to see the other shorts programmed and who I was up against competition-wise. The first set of shorts I saw were from graduate students at NYU and Columbia University and dealt with issues of pre-adolesencents and teenagers. Aquarium by Rob Meyer was the first film up and ended up taking the Diane Seligman Award for Best Student Short. The film was a quirky tale about an aquarium obsessed boy who also drowned his aging dog. The casting of the kids in this film was really great from the main boy, his geeky friends, the wacky teacher/aquarist, and the girl-next-door the boy has a crush on. In this program I also really enjoyed Myna Joseph’s Man which touches on the competitiveness and confusion between sisters and sexuality. The performances were raw and real, and Ms. Joseph handled the subject matter with great honesty. Suzi Yoonessi’s short Dear Lemon Lima also screened in this program, and was taken from her feature script of the same title written with Nicki Paluga that also participated in No Borders at the the IFP Market in 2006. Also screened was Carina Tautu’s short Still Center; a whimsical glimpse into the life of a young Romanian woman who discovers she’s pregnant with triplets. I had a hard time connecting with this short. It may have been the title cards throughout which were there to dictate the mood or change – for me, it’s like the unwarranted voice-over. I just can’t get into it and felt like the film would have worked better without.

The next program I saw was a mixture of films from the US and overseas that dealt with love and the passage of time, both free form and nonsensical and some pure sci-fi. A lot of these films have had runs through other festival circuits including favorites Phillip Van’s (“25 New Faces of Independent Film”) High Maintenance and Julien Lecat and Sylvain Pioutaz’s Waiting For Yesterday (Demain La Veille). Both of which I really enjoyed, and I also got a kick out of Doug Lenox’s Quincy and Althea where we encounter a married couple eager for divorce in the wake of post-Katrina New Orleans.

Next up was my screening. The complete program included a roster of actors the likes of Fisher Stevens (Matthew Ross’s Red Angel based on Eric Bogosian’s play); Ray Wise and Lin Shaye (Padraig Reynolds’s Election); Johnny Galecki and Tom Irwin (Zachary Sluser’s Who You Know)and local musician Raw Believer (Rick Rodgers’s Hunt Me). Mine stars Elisabeth Moss. The themes were pretty volatile, with characters all being pushed to the edge. Doing the Q+A was hard for me. I don’t like to stand up in front of a room of people, but I managed to get through it despite the fact my face felt like it was burning and I kept shifting from having my arms folded to having my hands in my back jean pockets. In the end, I got some really great feedback from people, so it made sweating it out worth it.

The last shorts program I saw had the theme of “crazies or eccentrics”. The first film up Caroline by Committee by Mary Haas depicted a young woman and her insecurities personified: a team made up of the likes of the “Bulimic Buddy,” “Disapproving Mother,” and “Fashionista Fag” to name a few. This film was a lot of fun to watch. Gregg Brown’s Shrinks showed a young man’s (played by Gregg Brown) interviews with five shrinks, each one tackling a specific neurosis and the delivery more and more eccentric. I really loved how each doctor’s office perfectly matching the shrink. I felt mixed about Andre Lyon’s Nuts where a father’s neurosis and son’s allergy to nuts come to a tragic clash. Kurt Kuenne’s Validation was sweet and entertaining, with a great performance from the lead who’s character just wants people to smile.

The winning short was Andrew Zuckerman’s High Falls starring Maggie Gyllenhaal and Peter Sarsgaard. Unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to view this program (which also included “25 New Faces in Independent Film” Fellipe Gamarano Barbosa’s Salt Kiss (Beijo de Sal)), but it was really hard to see everything I wanted to see as there were many films, plus the entire festival program was divided among locations in Woodstock, Rhinebeck, Rosendale and Hunter. Award-wise, I was disappointed that unlike the documentary and animation categories, there was not an Honorable Mention for the narratives. Of course I don’t know that Honored would have made the cut, but who knows, the title of my short and “honorable” share letters, and a girl can dream!!

PARTIES

Oh yes, parties. All the official parties were held mainly at local restaurants and had plenty of food and loads of wine from the wine sponsor. I’d have to say the best one was held at the Byrdcliffe Barn which was a few minutes walk from where I was staying. It was the after-party for the screening of Oliver Noble’s short Night of the Living Jews which had it’s premiere at Woodstock, playing before Ti West’s Trigger Man Friday night. The film was shot locally and features several zombie cameos including actress Melissa Leo, director Larry Fessenden, and Woodstock Festival Co-Founder/Director Laurent Rejto. I parked my car in front of the Villetta, where I was staying at the Byrdcliffe Artist’s Colony, and thought, sure, we can walk down in the pitch darkness without a flashlight to a barn somewhere in the woods, but quickly realized the complete meaning of pitch black. Fortunately a car picked us up and we made our way to the party that had burgers and kegs of beer, a deejay, some dude dancing on stage in sunglasses, and it was in a barn! Oh, how I miss Woodstock…