Virginia is for
film makers
A weekend of films directed by
Virginians
CINEviews
is proud to announce this year's special guest is Paul Fitzgerald--actor, screenwriter and
director. Paul's directorial debut feature,
Forgiven, which Paul also wrote
and starred in, premiered at the 2006 Sundance Film
Festival where it was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize
and has gone on to play in festivals around the country and
world—including The Deauville American Film Festival. Paul’s most recent acting work includes the
role of Richard Henry Lee in the Emmy nominated John
Adams mini-series for HBO.
Guest Paul Fitzgerald
will screen his film, Forgiven and lead a
workshop with emmy-winning art director, David Crank. Other films will be shown throughout the
weekend.
Festival
Schedule (click on film title for more information &
trailer)
Friday, Nov 14 6pm, Opening Night Gala with special guest Paul Fitzgerald
call 847-7277 for ticket information
9pm, Forgiven
(drama) Written and directed by Paul Fitzgerald
(Lynchburg)
Saturday, Nov. 15
10:30 am, Ashpet (drama, appropriate for all
ages), directed by Tom
Davenport (Warrenton)
1:30pm, WORKSHOP, $10 for students/$20 for other The challenges of creating period of Film, from both sides of the camera
with emmy-winning art director DAVID CRANK (Richmond) and PAUL FITZGERALD
(Lynchburg)
3pm, John Adams, Part 2,
Independence, (Rated PG-13. free & open to the public)
7:30pm,
Swing Vote (comedy short) Directed by Rebecca Pelletier
(Lynchburg) and Emily Morse
8pm, Snowflake Crusade(science fiction) Directed by Megan Holley
(Richmond)
Rated R - $5 for one short film & one feature
7:30pm,
Lustig (drama short) Directed by John Francis Black, II,
(Richmond) 8pm, Dismal, (suspense thriller) Directed
by Ray Brown (Hampton Roads)
Rated R - $5 for one short film & one feature
Sunday, November 16 2pm Virginia Folklife Documentary Series ($5 for 3 films) When My Work is Over (38 min) Directed by Tom Davenport
(Delaplane) It Aint City Music (15 min) Directed by Tom Davenport
(Delaplane) Talking Feet (87 min) Directed by Mike Seeger
(Lexington)
Forgiven
(drama)
Written and directed by Paul Fitzgerald,
Rated R
On the eve of his campaign for the
Senate, small-town D.A. Peter Miles (played by Fitzgerald himself)
receives word that the governor has exonerated a death-row inmate,
Ronald Bradler, whom Miles prosecuted some five years earlier. When a
public vetting of Miles's record, amid a media frenzy, discloses
evidence of impropriety in the prosecutor's conduct, Bradley seeks out
Miles for answers. As much about the exigencies of power as the
consequences of society's racial and class divide, this is personal
drama elevated to the level of Greek tragedy, wherein lives both real
and symbolic are on display.
Forgiven Friday, Nov 14, 9pm
$5 (seating is limited
)
SATURDAY MORNING CLASSIC
ASHPET Directed by Tom Davenport
Rated PG Set in the rural
South in the early years of World War II, Ashpet is a
humorously touching version of Cinderella, the world's most popular
folktale.
45 minutes.
Ashpet Saturday, Nov 15, 10:30am
$1 for children/$5 adults (seating is limited)
WORKSHOP
The challenges of creating period of Film, from both sides of the camera
with emmy-winning art director DAVID CRANK and PAUL FITZGERALD
Saturday, November 10 at 1:30
Students with ID $10
Other $20
seating is limited
Please call for info: 847-7277
Lustig (drama, 16 min) Directed by John Francis Black, II
Set in
the years after the end of WWII, tells the story of a man's solitary
journey for redemption. Carrying haunting memories from time spent in a
concentration camp, the man seeks out the family of a friend he knew
there. He brings a secret to their doorstep that only the strength and
courage of the deceased allows him to reveal. In admitting his own
cowardice, he creates the heroic legacy of a man. A man a young son will
always remember.
One Nation Under Guard (doc. 10 min) Directed by Lucas Krost US prisons have become big business,
housing 25% of all the people in the world behind bars, the largest
prison population on the planet. In a frenzy of criminal justice, we
have turned our backs on the founding principles of this nation to
produce state and federal prisons at an alarming rate in the 1990s,
opening 1 every 15 days in depressed rural towns and communities. Under
this prison-industrial complex, we are locking up 1 in 3 young black men
in this nation. US prisons are holding the strangest of reunions:
grandfathers, fathers and sons behind bars. There is no paying of their
debt to society, no clean slate
It Ain't City Music (doc. 15 min.) Directed by Tom Davenport 1972 film of the National Country Music
Contest in Warrenton, Virginia. "Any country song you hear nowadays, the
guy's either in jail or just got divorced," notes a man who continues,
"but it's their lives and they write songs about it."
Swing Vote (comedy, 23 min) Directed by Rebecca Pelletier & Emily
Morse Disillusioned and desperate following the results of the 2004
presidential election, best friends Casey and Billie stumble upon a plan
to swing the 2008 election. Through seduction and sexual manipulation,
the underground organization that these women create sets out to not
only sway the male Republican vote, but to create lifetime Democratic
converts. Casey and Billie's experiment soon takes on a life of its own
as their army of women are thrown into a whirlwind of encounters with
the "other side."
Snowflake Crusade Saturday, Nov 15, 8pm
$5, Rated R
Snowflake Crusade (science fiction, 95 min) Directed by Megan Holley
In the year 2045, cloning has become a fashionable procreative
alternative for the rich, the famous, and the vain. Clive (Scot
McKenzie) is the clone of a deceased but revered Nobel Prize–winning
food geneticist who solved world hunger. Youthful rebellion and the
struggle to deal with the issues of his own identity have taken Clive
down a very different path, alienating all those around him. In and out
of state-run correctional institutions, where he was subjected to
electric convulsive shock therapy, Clive survived by mentally escaping
to his own fantasies of a summer camp for misfit clone
Dismal (suspense thriller, 90 min)
Directed by Ray Brown Bill and
Matt need a break. Leaving their families behind for a long weekend, the
pair head out for some trout fishing in the 100,000+ acres of Virginia’s
Great Dismal Swamp. Bill supplies the best gear and Matt brings
unrivaled knowledge of the wilderness. But tension arises between them –
and the trip is no peaceful escape.
It gets worse. A day into the trip, most of their gear – including their
canoe – mysteriously disappears . The pair start the long walk back to
civilization – but the swamp has other plans.
Sunday, Nov 16, 2:00pm
$5 for 3 films (seating is limited)
When My Work is Over (38 min) Directed by Tom Davenport
Louise Anderson
(1921-1994), the gifted African American storyteller who
played Dark Sally in Tom Davenport's children's classic
Ashpet: An American Cinderella, tells her
family stories and folk tales, and recites poetry in
this film taped in Jacksonville, North Carolina, in the
last years of her life. She presents a powerful portrait
of courage, dignity, and lively humor in the face of
serious illness. Her sisters Evelyn Anderson and Dorothy
McLeod join Louise in recalling their experiences
growing up in the South, working in restaurants and as
domestics in white households, and struggling for civil
rights in the early 1960s. Together they present a warm
and engaging picture of an unsung generation of Southern
black women.
It Ain't City Music (doc. 15 min.) Directed by Tom Davenport 1972 film of the National Country Music
Contest in Warrenton, Virginia. "Any country song you hear nowadays, the
guy's either in jail or just got divorced," notes a man who continues,
"but it's their lives and they write songs about it."
Talking Feet
is the first documentary to feature flatfoot, buck,
hoedown, and rural tap dancing, the styles of solo
Southern dancing which are a companion to traditional
old-time music and on which modern clog dancing is
based. Featuring
24 traditional dancers videotaped on location in
West Virginia, Kentucky, Virginia, and North Carolina.
Talking Feet is a
film about a forgotten side of American dance culture:
solo mountain dancing. Mike Seeger and Ruth Pershing
take us to the southeastern mountains of the U. S., the
source of this genre, and to a range of individuals
(old, young, black, white, female and male) who grew up
with the idea of talking with their feet. The film
captures the deep sense of tradition and the value of
freedom of expression these dancers share. Talking
Feet is an exploration of a dance form rich in
American do-it-yourself pride
Damaged Goods (drama, 100min) Directed by Todd Densmore For three friends in Portland, Maine growing up is a hard
thing to do. Rob Kevin and Cameron fill their vapid existence with
drugs, alcohol, and women until one day when a dark secret is exposed.
Unknown to Cameron, Rob and Kevin each hold a secret addiction, far
worse than anything expected. They get off on cutting themselves, or
"bloodletting". It's their ultimate high, until Rob meets Cailin
(Michelle Northcott) who gives him the hope for a better life.
