Festivals
Quick Feet, Soft Hands
Reason #21 to be sad about not living on the East Coast any longer: Our fabulous Self-Reliant Filmmaker Paul Harrill’s new short, Quick Feet, Soft Hands, will be showing at the Maryland Film Festival after its Nashville premiere. It stars indie up-and-coming-Queen Greta Gerwig as “a young woman whose hopes of moving up are tied to Jim, a minor league baseball player. As Jim falls deeper into a batting slump, the couple must cope with the day-to-day realities of being young and poor. And they must confront the prospect that they may never make it to the big leagues.”
Best of luck to Paul and team, and if you are in the area or headed to the fest, check it out yo.
Quick Feet, Soft Hands - Trailer from Paul Harrill on Vimeo.
Cine Las Americas: Septiembres
Carles Bosch, Oscar nominated director of Balseros, takes the stage after the Austin premiere of Septiembres. To audience members who wonder where else the film might be seen, Bosch responds, there is no US distributor and he is not optimistic.
Link Round-Up
I’ve been getting a lot of emails about cool stuff that is going on this month, and it’s tough to post about everything. Here is a quick round-up of some good stuff that has crossed my inbox:
This is actually not new news, but looks like Arts Engine is gearing up to do something with DocuClub, the works-in-progress screening program founded by Susan Kaplan. It was a great program and it’s wonderful to see that it will continue with the awesome Arts Engine folks.
The Independent Film Festival of Boston has announced their line-up, which looks like some of the best festival fare of this year, so far. If you are in Boston, you’ll want to catch these great films while they are in your backyard. Great website with trailers and such! The fest runs from April 23 - 29. Check out The Greening of Southie for me and let me know what you think.
Speaking of The Greening of South, directed by Ian Cheney, one of my faves from last year, King Corn, which features Cheney and Curt Ellis, will be airing on Independent Lens on April 15. Be sure to DVR or tune in if you haven’t seen it (or buy the DVD, of course).
And lastly, if you are a Chris Marker fan, my former employer Icarus Films is working in partnership with The Wexner Center to sell DVDs of his work. If you are a fan, you know that much of his body of work has not been available in the US so here’s your chance to stock up on Marker films.
Dear Filmmaker,
Would you please speak up?! Eugene Hernandez posted a discussion starter on his blog about The Festival That Shall Not Be Named Here and their absurd new policy that accredited festival press may not post film reviews in advance of the premiere screening. Journalists and film writers like myself have a sense of our own importance, for better or worse, but what really matters is filmmakers. It’s the internet for God’s sake–you can post anonymously, but let your thoughts be heard.
If I see 5 filmmaker comments on Eug’s blog that say this is a great, welcome policy, then maybe we shift our understanding of what is helpful and what isn’t. If you say it’s not helpful, then maybe (and I give that a big maybe), the fest will shift its policy. I’m so utterly sick of this particular festival bullying everyone who tries to participate and no one speaking up. Hey, they supposedly made changes to respond to criticism for this year, so at least give it a shot. Read Eugene’s post and share a comment, PUULEEZ!
SXSW 08: In a Dream
I’m not sure I’ve ever had a day at a festival like I had yesterday. Truly amazing. I watched Margaret Brown’s excellent work, then In a Dream by Jeremiah Zagar, a beautiful new film that took home the Emerging Visions Audience Award here at SXSW.
I'm really looking forward to this one and was excited to see the trailer posted, but it looks like the ...
Thanks for the feedback Mark, I'll keep that in mind :) 
Wow, that does look great!
More video, Agnes! I love when you post cool stuff like this! 
Right on! I thought the exact same thing when I read the times article. I think its also ...