NCIndieSeen

Tribeca Film has acquired U.S. rights to Bert Marcus Productions’ How to Make Money Selling Drugs, which had its world premiere on Friday night at the Toronto International Film Festival. The provocative documentary offers an in-depth look at the high-stakes world of drug dealing and drug enforcement by blending authentic reportage with pop culture references. Directed by Matthew Cooke, the film reunites producers Bert Marcus of Bert Marcus Productions and Adrian Grenier (HBO’s Entourage), the team that created the breakout hit Teenage Paparazzo.



Tribeca Film plans a 2013 theatrical release day and date with on-demand platforms, where it will be available in more than 40 million homes through a variety of video-on-demand offerings, as well as iTunes, Amazon Watch Instantly, VUDU and Xbox.


How To Make Money Selling Drugs offers a captivating glimpse into the lives of those on both sides of the “war on drugs,” delivering a diverse and unique perspective on the controversial subject through interviews with 50 Cent, The Wire producer David Simon, Arianna Huffington, Woody Harrelson, Eminem and Susan Sarandon, as well as infamous drug kingpin “Freeway” Rick Ross. Presenting a shockingly candid examination of how a street dealer can rise to cartel lord with relative ease, the documentary reveals how public policy and government drug enforcement have struggled to creatively adapt to and effectively disincentive Americans from dealing drugs. Bert Marcus Productions was granted unprecedented access from top‐ranking government officials, from the U.S. Drug Czar to the Drug Enforcement Agency, all providing unique and honest viewpoints on this pervasive global topic.


“This is a work that resonates with truth, anger and insight by an extremely talented filmmaker,” said Geoff Gilmore, Chief Creative Officer of Tribeca Enterprises. “From politics to the police and drug dealers to drug users, the scope of Matthew Cooke’s examination of these illicit networks is extraordinary.”



"We are thrilled to be collaborating with Tribeca Film," said Bert Marcus, Chief Executive Officer of Bert Marcus Productions.  "Given the history of Tribeca Film as an industry pioneer with an esteemed track record of connecting audiences to unique, thought-provoking work, we cannot think of a better home for our documentary that seeks to enlighten and entertain audiences about the complexities of the 'war on drugs.'  We look forward to a productive and creative partnership and believe there is no better fit in terms of culture and vision for our movie to reach the public."


“Seeing this film find a home with Tribeca after all this time is definitely a dream come true. And the timing couldn't be better,” said Matthew Cooke. “Today America consumes a majority of the marijuana and 40% of the world's cocaine while simultaneously incarcerating more of its citizens than any country in the history of the world. We hope to encourage a national conversation on one of the worst public policy failures of the last 50 years. And do so in a way that's engaging, entertaining and inspiring.”



The deal was negotiated for Tribeca Film by Nick Savva, Director of Acquisitions, and by ICM Partners and Lawrence Kopeikin on behalf of the filmmakers.

The Documentary Summit is a two day non-fiction conference. With seminars from expert speakers and structured networking, it offers a unique opportunity to connect, share, learn and collaborate. Join the movement now. Speakers include Eric Johnson from Trailblazer Studios on a composer panel, filmmaker Cynthia Hill (February One), DP/filmmaker Rex Miller, Rachel Raney of The Southern Documentary Fund, filmmaker/editor Elizabeth Haviland James, a funding panel and much more.

For more information and to purchase tickets, visit www.documentarysummit.com. NC Indie Seen blog members, affiliates and friends use the promotional code INDIESEEN to get the discount price of $139 (normally $179).

Find collaborators. Get insight. Leave inspired.

The Documentary Summit is presented by The Documentary Film Makers Handbook, Trailblazer Studios, The Southern Documentary Fund and The Empowerment Project.

Takeover! follows Full Service—a hungry and determined independent band from Austin, Texas—as they embark on an experiment called the “Takeover Tour”; a sixteen-city tour of amphitheatre parking lots. Uninvited and unknown, they follow national acts 311 and Snoop Dogg, playing unsanctioned shows for tailgaters outside the venues. What starts as a strategic plan to boost their fan-base quickly turns into a test of the very character and heart of the band itself. As they battle police, venue security, equipment failures, and each other, they learn just how far they are willing to go to live the dream.


Sunday May 6, 2012
“TAKEOVER!” movie screening (90 minutes) and acoustic performance by Full Service (Austin, TX)
7pm / All Ages / The Evening Muse (www.theeveningmuse.com)

Official Trailer: http://youtu.be/tlJFJfy8D2I

Movie Website: www.takeoverthemovie.com

A Film by Kurt and Ian Marcus

IT’S ABOUT YOU is a new musical documentary that offers a rare and intimate look at the life and music of Rock and Roll Hall of Famer John Mellencamp. The film premiered at this year’s SXSW festival and follows Mellencamp on his summer 2009 concert tour and during the recording of his most recent album, 2010’s universally acclaimed No Better Than This, the sessions for which took place at American musical and historical landmarks, including Sun Studios in Memphis and the First African Baptist Church in Savannah, GA. We see Mellencamp recording – with a single mike and mono tape recorder more than half a century old – in the same hotel room where legendary bluesman Robert Johnson created some of his most memorable work. Along the way, Mellencamp reveals a side not often seen by the public, in a film that becomes a soulful, highly personal meditation on small-town America.









Kurt Markus’ photography has appeared in such leading publications as Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, GQ and The New York Times Magazine, and he has shot cutting-edge ad campaigns for BMW, Armani, Nike and other companies. His unique vision has been brought to bear on IT’S ABOUT YOU, which was shot on Super 8 and whose vintage Americana look is the cinematic equivalent of a well-worn pair of jeans.



RT: 80 Minutes
Rated: NR

Cucalorus gives filmmakers the opportunity to present their "works-in-progress". What this means is a film that in its rough cut stage is presented to an audience to review. The audience gives their opinion about where they feel the story is going and if there is any room for improvement. It's a great way to present a critical analysis to filmmakers and get direct feedback from the audience.

The documentary "Bringing It Home" is about industrial hemp and the illegalization of allowing it to grow in farms in the U.S.  The film focuses on the many benefits that hemp offers such as energy-efficient homes, healthy ingredients such as omega 3, and its lack of synthetic chemicals which may benefit people with disabilities and illnesses who are sensitive to these chemicals.

The film is still in its beginning stages, but the story is very relevant and is an important story to tell.  There is a large misconception about Hemp since it is the sister plant to the Marijuana plant.  However, a film like this can certainly shed some light on how beneficial this plant is to society.

For more information check out http://www.bringingithomemovie.com/

On the eve of the 100th Anniversary of the theft of the Mona Lisa, Joe Medeiros has completed his new documentary The Missing Piece: The Truth about the Man Who Stole the Mona Lisa, the culmination of Medeiros’ 35- year quest to find the truth about the theft and the man who stole her. After a successful career in comedy writing (21 years writing for Jay Leno, 17 years as headwriter for “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno), Medeiros returns to answer the questions that have always haunted him: Who really stole the Mona Lisa, why, and how?


To date, much of the information presented in books, films and television programs about Vincenzo Peruggia and his theft of the Mona Lisa is wrong – from the spelling of Peruggia’s surname to his true motivation for stealing La Gioconda. Even Italian television productions about Peruggia and his theft have been so inaccurate in their portrayal of the man and his life’s story that they have caused great embarrassment for the Peruggia family whom Medeiros has featured in his film. After years of research, and debunking the myths along the way, Medeiros has found the exact details and complete information that tell the true story.

Vincent Delieuvin, Curator of Italian Paintings of the 16th century at the Musée du Louvre, summarized the need for The Missing Piece best, “The theft of the Mona Lisa is an essential part of her history and the correct and true story of her absence has never been told, but this extraordinary and little known story needs to be told to indemnify her legacy. Peruggia created this unimaginable part of her history; therefore his story needs to be told too.”

A trivia junkie by nature, Medeiros became obsessed with the little known piece of history that the Mona Lisa had been stolen from its home in the Louvre on August 21, 1911. In 2008, his nagging curiosity about why Peruggia really stole the painting finally was satisfied when he decided to make a documentary film about the theft and the man who stole her.

The Missing Piece tells the story behind the theft. Acting alone, an Italian immigrant housepainter named Vincenzo Peruggia swiftly removed the painting from the Louvre and held her in his room in Paris for over two years. Peruggia was never apprehended until he returned the Mona Lisa to Florence through an Italian art dealer, claiming he stole the painting to return her to her rightful owners – the Italian people.

Medeiros search takes him to Vincenzo Peruggia’s 84 year-old daughter, Celestina, whom he hopes will tell him the secret of her father’s reason for the crime. What he encounters instead is a daughter who knows little about her father’s life. When the team finally arrives in Dumenza, Italy and is accepted into the home of the endearing Celestina they are presented with a new challenge: while Celestina believes her father stole the Mona Lisa for patriotic reasons. She knows little else. Her father, Vincenzo, died when she was only a toddler. The family's memory of him has been shrouded in shame because of the theft, and they rarely mention him. She tells Joe that before she dies, she wants to know the truth about her father’s motive for stealing the painting.

The search leads Joe and his research team through thousands of documents in the French and Italian national archives. They interview Louvre and Uffizi officials and gain unprecedented access to the museums and to leading art and art crimes experts all over the world. Wading through this mountain of information, Joe can only assemble a profile of Peruggia as a man whom a world-renowned court psychiatrist called "mentally deficient", one who was treated shabbily and called "macaroni" by his Parisian co-workers, and who came to believe that all Italian art in the Louvre was stolen by Napoleon. Joe takes Peruggia’s grandson Silvio to Paris to retrace his grandfather’s life in the City of Lights, but they are unable to discover Peruggia's true motives there. Joe, along with Celestina's daughter Graziella, leaves for Florence in search of the truth. There, where Peruggia brought the painting in December 1913, in the state archives they find Peruggia’s letters to his family revealing his true intentions. It is now up to Joe to return to Dumenza and deliver ailing Celestina The Missing Piece, the truth about her father and his unthinkable theft of the Mona Lisa.

THE WHALE, a new documentary about a lonely young killer whale who causes upheaval in a small town and amazement around the world when he tries to make friends with humans, will be released theatrically by Paladin, it was announced by company president, Mark Urman.


THE WHALE (http://www.thewhalemovie.com/) was directed by noted journalist Michael Parfit and veteran producer-cinematographer Suzanne Chisholm, who encountered the young orca whale, nicknamed Luna, at the height of his celebrity and spent several years chronicling his adventures both in print and on film.


Ryan Reynolds, who hails from the very region in Western Canada where the story unfolds, narrates the film and served as executive producer, along with Scarlett Johansson and Eric Desatnik. THE WHALE will play its first commercial engagements in late summer and expand in the fall.

Set on the rugged western coast of Vancouver Island, THE WHALE describes what happens when Luna, a baby orca, gets separated from his family and unexpectedly starts making contact with people along a scenic fjord called Nootka Sound . Because orcas are highly social creatures who spend their lives traveling with their pods, Luna attempts to find a surrogate family among the area residents, much to their delight. But as word spreads about Luna, people become torn between their love for the lonely young whale and fears that human contact might harm him.

Luna’s saga is seen through the eyes of the colorful characters who live and work along the Sound and who fall in love with the whale -- including a cook on an old freighter, a fisheries officer conflicted by what he thinks Luna needs and what he is told to do, a grandmother who is arrested for petting Luna, and a Native American elder whose tribe believes Luna is the reincarnation of a chief.

The film also describes how Parfit and Chisholm themselves, who first went to Nootka Sound on assignment for Smithsonian, grow so concerned about Luna’s fate that they get involved in trying to help him, crossing the traditional line between journalist and subject and becoming characters in the very story they are telling. Their efforts to find ways to safely give Luna the attention he seems so determined to get are a major part of the film's climax.

“THE WHALE is a wondrous experience,” said Urman. “It speaks volumes about our complex and ever-changing relationship with nature. Michael and Suzanne have told this story so effectively that, while it has all the power of truth, it also has all the emotion and beauty of a perfect fable.”

“We’re thrilled to be releasing THE WHALE with Paladin,” said producer Chisholm. “The team’s experience and success is extraordinary, and we could not have found a better place for this movie." Parfit adds: “Working with people like Ryan Reynolds on the narration, and Mark Urman and his team on distribution has been a great example of how collaborative film is. The fact that all of them love Luna as much as we do is wonderful.”

Parfit, an award-winning writer, director, and cinematographer, has authored four books, scripted two Imax films and has written many major articles for National Geographic and Smithsonian magazines. A heavily illustrated feature, written by Parfit, about the couple’s adventures with Luna and how they brought the story to the big screen, appears in Smithsonian's double summer issue, currently on stands. The article is also on the Smithsonian website, here: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/Luna-A-Whale-to-Watch.html#


Please visit THE WHALE on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/thewhalemovie



THE WHALE deal caps a particularly busy season for Paladin, following the highly successful release of Tom Shadyac’s “I Am,” which has grossed over $1.5 million, making it the highest grossing non-studio, non-3D documentary release of the year. The company launches the award-winning “Love Etc.” on July 1st and recently announced the fall release of Tiffany Shlain’s Sundance favorite, “Connected.” Also opening this summer for the company is Marcus Dean Fuller’s “One Fall,” and coming in autumn is Margaret Whitton’s romantic comedy, “A Bird of the Air.”

For more information about the festival check out this link or email pinksheepfilm@gmail.com



Pink Sheep Film Festival will be held on June 10th at Jengo’s Playhouse. The films begin at 7 pm and will screen the shorter films first, break for intermission, and then screen the longer feature films. There will also be an after party at 10 pm. Anyone and everyone is invited to attend, even if you can only attend the party. Advance tickets are on sale for $7 here at Edge of Urge (18 Market St. downtown) and $10 at the door.


List of all films:

Short block:

Bedfellows
Punch Me
Back to Life
Pay No Attention to the man in a Bear Suit
Cappuccino
The Love Permit

Features:

Put This on The Map
Whistlin’ Dixie


WHISTLIN’ DIXIE (Directed by Meredith Heil)


Whistlin’ Dixie invites the viewer to travel along as filmmaker Meredith Heil explores America’s Southern heartland in search of queer sound. The film journeys through the region’s independent, queer lo-fi scene, tracking down the LGBTQ musicians, fans and activists that are actively using DIY music to build safe spaces and strike down prejudices, therein altering the political and social climate of the new South for generations to come



Whistlin' Dixie: Queer Sounds, New South Trailer from Meredith Heil on Vimeo.


PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE MAN IN A BEAR SUIT (Directed by Michael Blair)


An insecure and uncertain writer tries to draw a line between himself and his body, represented by a man in a bear suit. With the help of the bear, a medical student and his mostly imaginary crush, he re-evaluates his ideas about himself and finds even more reasons to be insecure and uncertain.




TRAILER #1 - Pay No Attention to the Man in the... by uncgfilm


BEDFELLOWS (Directed by by Pierre Stefanos)

Bedfellows follows the adventure of 20-something Bobby as he returns to the gay bar where he got his heart broken for the first time. Upon meeting and spending the night with an attractive stranger named Jonathan, Bobby dreams about what a lifetime relationship with him could be like. The dream takes us on a thirty-year journey of ups-and-downs in life and love. But what will happen when Bobby wakes up to reality in the morning?





PUNCH ME (Directed by Robert X. Golphin)

With a romance on the rocks and a father on his sick bed, a young man must accept his true identity before he loses the two people he loves most.







THE LOVE PERMIT (Directed by Christopher Ludgate)

Naive Mr. Young is strapped to the hot seat in a very controlled political environment that imposes some outrageous sanctions on people’s lives. During an encounter with an administrator while applying for a love & sex permit, he finds himself increasingly on guard, becoming tangled in red tape and incriminating words.






CAPPUCCINO (Directed by Tamer Ruggli)

While trying to find his way between his classmate and sexual fantasy Damien and his very generous but protective mother Gina, his life is about to change.

The new documentary about Ozzy Osbourne called God Bless Ozzy Osbourne debuted Saturday April 24th at the Borough of Manhattan Community College on Easter Sunday.  The red carpet brought the film's director Mike Weiss and producer Mike Piscitelli and the Osbourne family clan.

Kelly, Sharon, Ozzy and Jack Osbourne photo by Julia Weeks

Photo by Julia Weeks

Photo by Julia Weeks

SOUL SURFER is the true story of competitive teen surfer Bethany Hamilton, who lost her arm in a shark attack and courageously overcame all odds to become a champion again, inspiring millions worldwide through her sheer determination and unwavering faith. Coming to theaters nationwide on April 15, 2011, this exciting feature film stars Dennis Quaid, Helen Hunt, AnnaSophia Robb, and Carrie Underwood in her film debut. The cast also includes Lorraine Nicholson, Kevin Sorbo and Jeremy Sumpter.



The first film to be released under the new deal between FilmDistrict and Sony Pictures, SOUL SURFER will go out as a wide release via TriStar Pictures with a broad-based and integrated marketing campaign managed by FilmDistrict.


The film was independently financed by Enticing Entertainment and Island Film Group, and is a production of Mandalay Vision, Brookwell McNamara Entertainment and Life’s A Beach Entertainment. North American and substantial International rights were acquired prior to the commencement of production by the Affirm Films division of Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions.


The film was directed by Sean McNamara from a screenplay by McNamara, Michael Berk, Douglas Schwartz, and Deborah Bonann Schwartz, with additional writing by Ron Bass, Jen Smolka and Kara Holden, and is based on Bethany Hamilton’s memoir “Soul Surfer: A True Story of Faith, Family and Fighting to Get Back on the Board.”


"My family and I are honored to be the subject of such an amazing film,” says Bethany Hamilton. “My hope is that the story continues to inspire people around the world to overcome the challenges that face them."

The film was produced by David Zelon, Douglas Schwartz, David Brookwell, Sean McNamara and Roy "Dutch" Hofstetter and executive produced by David Tice and Dominic Ianno, and shot on location in Hawaii.


“The world needs a hero right now,” says primary financier and executive producer David Tice. “When I met Bethany and her family, I felt compelled to share her extraordinary life on the big screen.”


“Steve Bersch and I immediately responded to the honesty of Bethany’s story and its universal message of courage and perseverance,” says Peter Schlessel, CEO of FilmDistrict, who initiated and approved the production with Bersch while at Sony, and then forged the partnership between Sony and the newly formed FilmDistrict for release of the film.


“SOUL SURFER embodies an absolutely amazing story, wonderfully told by the filmmakers, and we’re thrilled to play a part in bringing this story to audiences this spring,” says Bersch, President, Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions.


“This movie, with its winning story and cast, is a real audience pleaser,” said Bob Berney, President, Theatrical Distribution, FilmDistrict. “It’s the perfect family film for the spring break season.”

Below is a clip on the actual documentary which will soon be released as a future film

Where were you on 11/4/08?  I remember that day like it was yesterday, I was living in Manhattan at the time and went to an election party with some friends.  It wasn't until I got off of the subway train en route to another party that I heard Barack Obama was elected the 44th President of the United States of America.  The city was filled with a surge of of energy and the streets were loud with the sounds of rejoicing New York City residents.

The participatory documentary film 11/4/08 shows those very images.  It depicts the day, afternoon, and evening of election night on that historical day.  The film is shot in several major metropolitan cities and edited simultaneously from cities all across the world including, New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, St. Louis, New Orleans, Dubai, Geneva, Berlin, and even New Delhi.  It's pretty phenomenal to see the perspectives of voters from each American city and to see their view on Senator Obama's possible win as the next President.  It's also interesting to see the thoughts and opinions of foreign citizens of other countries give their two cents on what to expect if Barack Obama becomes the next President.

11/4/08 allows viewers to see how hard volunteers worked to streamline the election process that day, show young people give their thoughts on John McCain and Barack Obama's differences, even perspectives from people who are not eligible to vote as to what could be expected of this election.  Block parties, celebrations, speeches, and all sorts of joyous moments are shown once the campaign results are announced.

The film was shot on many different formats from several different filmmakers that allowed this film to be curated by Jeff Deutchman.  Jeff thought of the idea two weeks before the election.  He sent mass emails and Facebook blasts to friends about this experimental film which became a moment in history.

The participatory documentary is still accepting submissions of film caught on 11/4/08.  You can check out the film's website HERE. 

11/4/08 will be released in selected theaters nationwide 10/20/10

"features big ideas and occasional gunfire... Holstein comes across so vividly and genuinely... feels like an argument for a certain kind of cinematic purity."


- Peter Gutierrez, TribecaFilm.com


"Excellent!"


- Chicago Reader

The third film in Daniel Kraus' WORK Series, a set of independent documentaries designed to create an on-going record of the American worker.

"Endlessly intriguing...three films chronicling ordinary Americans at their rather extraordinary jobs. Their tiles are self-explanatory and deceptively simple — Sheriff, Musician and Kraus’s latest, Professor. The films, meanwhile, are anything but."


- Movieline



A college education has become part of the American dream. But what are we learning and who is teaching us?

For nearly four decades, Rabbi Jay Holstein has been one of the University of Iowa’s most popular professors. With a foul mouth, a raunchy sense of humor, and a piercing brilliance, Holstein uses massive 500-student lectures to turn inside-out the most fundamental assumptions on topics as divergent as sex, suicide, and the Holocaust. His courses, including “Quest for Human Destiny,” have become the stuff of campus legend, and between firing a Glock and running 10 miles per day, the 69-year-old Holstein spends his office hours wrestling with students over animal experimentation, alcohol use, and homosexuality.

Following the internationally acclaimed cinéma vérité of Sheriff and Musician, Professor tackles intellectual labor and in doing so grapples with some of life’s greatest and most elemental enigmas.



Check out a preview of the film here:

Greek Americans are as woven into Charlotte’s fabric as the oak trees that line its streets. In a special presentation, The Fifth Annual Charlotte Film Festival is proud to present “Hometown Stories: The Greek Americans of Charlotte.”

This inspiring documentary explores the numerous contributions Greeks have made in Charlotte over the last 100 years. The Emmy Award winning story highlights their deep roots winding back to the turn of the 20th century when Charlotte was barely on the map. The Greeks – known now for festivals, food and civic contributions – survived poverty, foreign occupations, and war. Working together they managed to bring a wealth of culture and community to their new home: America.

The film is one of many produced at WTVI, Charlotte’s award-winning public television station that has provided education and entertainment for 45 years. This year, the station also is co-sponsoring “A Long and Winding Road,” another film with Carolina roots.

“A Long and Winding Road” encapsulates the story of the Blue Ridge Parkway, the National Park Service’s most visited treasure. Surprisingly, the 469-mile parkway was not initially welcomed by the settlers of the North Carolina and Virginia mountains. And this controversial documentary reveals the stunning secret deal that shaped the route of the Parkway and changed lives and American society in unexpected ways.

Decades after thousands of Guatemalans disappeared into the abyss of civil war, thousands of families learn how they died in “La Isla – Archives of a Tragedy” being presented at The Fifth Annual Charlotte Film Festival.


A building explosion in Guatemala City two years ago shed light on the archives of the secret police. This allowed an investigation into the hidden history of this Latin American country from the military coup of in the film, to screen during the festival Sept. 20-27th, young Guatamaleans sift through troubling documents that describe people dying from shock torture and how, during police interrogations, officers sliced wounds into the soles of suspects who were then forced to walk over salt. The archives also include horrific photos of mutilated bodies.



The U.S.-supported dictatorship had set up an extensive program of elimination against the opposition, complete with death squads. Surviving relatives of untraceable "revolutionaries" and "communists" study documents in the film that reveal the fate of their loved ones. Thousands were dumped anonymously into a cemetery.


The film highlights how saddened relatives finally get answers to so many unanswered questions. It also creates a venue for dialogue about the disturbing facts that have come to light. Director Uli Stelzner is an author, director and producer in Berlin and Central America. Over the years he’s been a mailman, garbage man, semi-pro football player and teacher. He’s a member of the German Association of documentary filmmakers (Agdok) and co-founder and member of the Guatemalan Association of Audiovisual Workers (AGA).

The Charlotte Film Festival provides a cultural hub for established and emerging film-artists to showcase their works to the region’s top producers, peers, investors and viewers. Within the past four years, the Charlotte Film Festival has continued to grow attracting filmmakers from around that nation as well as gaining international attention. They continue to attract festival goers and enthusiasts from Charlotte, North Carolina and nearby states.

Premiering tonight at Toronto International Film Festival is Laura Israel's WINDFALL.


When an multi-national corporation offers to revitalize a rural farm town's failing economy with a new industry, residents believe they have found the solution to their economic problems. But the townspeople grow increasingly alarmed as they discover that the company's plans for their town are far from anything they could have ever predicted. Hauntingly filmed, WINDFALL delivers the message that sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel can be an oncoming train.

When world-renowned architects Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown discovered that their iconic beach house was scheduled for demolition last year, they launched an epic operation to preserve the home by transporting it across land and sea. The mission to save this model of modern architecture was captured in the documentary short film, Saving Lieb House, to be screened at the Charlotte Film Festival on Sept. 25.



The film, directed by James Venturi (Robert and Denise’s son) and John Halpern, begins at the Jersey Shore and follows the home as it travels to its new location in Long Island. The 25-minute documentary shows crews lifting the foundation, cutting the power and transporting the house down city highways and country roads to a barge in the Hudson River, where it passes beneath the Brooklyn, Manhattan and Williamsburg bridges.

Art, architecture and film enthusiasts can experience Saving Lieb House along with two other documentary shorts, The Art of Courage and Desert in Coffeehouse, at the Charlotte Film Festival Saturday, Sept. 25 at 4:30 p.m. at EpiCentre Theaters.


Saving Lieb House is one of more than 60 films that will be showcased at this year’s Film Festival. The Fifth Annual Charlotte Film Festival will be held Sept. 20-26 at two locations – EpiCentre Theaters and Regal Park Terrace, both in Charlotte.

A pervasive pattern is sweeping across the elder generation of the LGBT community in what experts in the documentary film GenSilent call an epidemic of discrimination. Aging members of the LGBT community are forced to return to the closet as they enter their “golden years”, replacing dignity with invisibility.

The Charlotte Film Festival, in partnership with The Gay Charlotte Film Festival present GenSilent, a documentary by award-winning director and filmmaker, Stu Maddux (Bob and Jack's 52-Year Adventure Trip to Hell and Back), that explores the day-to-day lives of six LGBT seniors in Boston, Massachusetts over the course of a year.

Unlike any previous LGBT film about aging, GenSilent startlingly discovers how oppression in the years before Stonewall now leaves many elders not just afraid but dangerously isolated. Many LGBT seniors who enter into long-term healthcare are being forced back into the closet for fear of legal and social discrimination.

A recently publicized case in Sonoma County, California brought to light the issue faced by gay elders. Harold Scull and Clay Greene, partners for more than 20 years, were literally pulled apart by the Sonoma County government after Scull fell down the stairs leaving his partner to care for him. Even though both men had drafted wills, power of attorney and health care directives, Sonoma County officials and health care staff refused to recognize their partnership as anything more than roommates and prevented Greene from seeing his partner. After auctioning off the couple’s belongings, terminating their lease and placing both men in separate nursing homes, the government prevented Harold and Clay from ever seeing each other again. Harold Scull died alone and without dignity.

GenSilent explores the wide range in quality of paid caregivers --from those who are specifically trained to make LGBT seniors feel safe, to the other end of the spectrum, where LGBT elders face discrimination, neglect or abuse. In addition to the challenges that these men and women face, GenSilent also evokes hope as each subject crosses paths with a small but growing group of impassioned professionals trying to wake up the long-term and healthcare industries to their plight.


GenSilent screens on Sunday, September 26 at the Regal Park Terrace 6. Tickets are $8 and can be purchased online at http://www.charlottefilmfestival.org/2010/ gen-silent or at the Regal Park Terrace box office.




Bob and Jack's 52-Year Adventure- clip from Stu Maddux on Vimeo.

Andie MacDowell will be at a North Carolina ballfield to show a seven-minute short film she helped make this summer about a day in the life of the park.



The Asheville Citizen-Times reported that “Before the First Pitch” will be shown Sunday night on the scoreboard at McCormick Field in Asheville. The film shows behind-the-scenes work before the single-A Rockies affiliate Asheville Tourists take the field.


A native of Gaffney, S.C., MacDowell lives in Asheville. She and filmmaker Rod Murphy plan to make another documentary together about the Miss Gay Latina transgender beauty pageant in Asheville.


The star of “Four Weddings and a Funeral” and “Groundhog Day” says she has been working on a Fox TV series called “Lone Star” and plans to start work in the fall on a remake of the 1980s hit “Footloose.”

Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo goes behind prison walls to follow convict cowgirls on their journey to the 2007 Oklahoma State Penitentiary Rodeo. In 2006, female inmates were allowed to participate for the first time.

In a state with the highest female incarceration rate in the country, these women share common experiences such as broken homes, drug abuse and alienation from their children. From 1940 – 2008, the Oklahoma State Penitentiary held an annual ‘Prison Rodeo’. Part Wild West show and part coliseum-esque spectacle, it was one of the last of its kind – a relic of the American penal system. Prisoners compete on wild-broncs and bucking bulls, risking life-long injuries. For inmates like Danny Liles, a 14-year veteran of the rodeo, the chance to battle livestock offers a brief respite from prison life. Within this strange arena the prisoners become the heroes while the public and guards applaud.