Top Ten Films of Crossroads Film Festival

Top 10 Films of Crossroads Film Festival

By Melanie Addington

Bearing in mind that I did not see every film (although I did try and hit up most of them) from the selection that I viewed, these are my top ten favorites of this fest.

10. Glimpse is an experimental animation by Dustin Grella. He created 4,500 still images and shot them over a 9-month period. It is a wonderful look at the work of William de Kooning.

9. Of All the Things. Ok, to be fair..I saw this at On Location:Memphis Film Festival, not at Crossroads. But it is still fresh in my mind as one of my new favorites as director Jody Lambert weaves an interesting tale of his father who just happens to be one of the great songwriters that has the opportunity to perform in front of a live audience in the Philippines. The film takes a humorous and yet touching look at Dennis Lambert as he and his son make the journey across the world.

8. Before and After Kissing Maria is a great short in that has somewhat of a circular story arc bringing you back to the very beginning of the film at the end in order to give us the final moment. The little boy that wants to kiss Maria is joyful to watch and this short does just what I like shorts to do, give me a reason to care about characters in a very short time and give me a beginning, middle and definitive end. The Spanish filmmaker Ramon Alos did a very sweet job with this one.

7. Control is the brief story of Ian Curtis, the lead singer of Joy Division that committed suicide at 23. No surprises that he is a rock star that had marital problems, bouts of depression, but part of what makes the film great is the interesting way that they delve into the story as well as looking at how his epilepsy effects his performances and life. The other part is that Martin Ruhe, the cinematographer, makes the film look gorgeous. Look for his work in the 2009 Julie Delpy film, The Countess. Samantha Morton plays Debbie, Ian’s wife. Goodness, she just can’t do wrong, can she? Her performance is, as always, stunningly good. But newcomer Sam Riley as Ian does as good a job if not better than Gary Oldman as Sid Vicious in Sid and Nancy. Cool fact: Producer Orian Williams was born and raised in Jackson.

6. My Country is the first film by Odette Best and is a lovely way to show the tension between aborigines and whites living in Australia. To be honest, I judged the aborigine man as the filmmakers intends to do but was swept away into the storyline and slowly realized my own reaction as his story was revealed. The back flashes may be a bit heavy-handed but if the film’s goal is to make a political statement, it has done so.

5. Doxology, by Michael Langan, is truly one of my favorite experimental films. The stop-motion animation and strange little hymn to God (sorta) of the main character are delivered in a fast-paced entertaining way and I just could watch it over and over again.

4. City of Cranes is one of those films that the topic is such a novel idea that I often forget to pay attention to film quality. It is set in a four-part series examining different aspects of London workers that soar above the city streets on a daily basis. I’ve always wondered what is inside the heads of people who work on those cranes and the film answered the question with some lovely imagery.

3. Pretty Ugly People is a delightful comedy. You can read my review here.

2. Ballast, directed by Lance Hammer and starring all Mississippi cast including Oxonian Johnny McPhail, reveals so much of the delta and the strength of the people there. A review will be up soon.

1. Lars and the Real Girl was written by Nancy Oliver. Now, if you aren’t familiar with the name, you may recognize the hit HBO series she wrote, Six Feet Under. If you ever saw the show, you understand that her writing is, let’s say, quirky. She does it at her best in Lars and the Real Girl. Really an excellent film that is very plot driven and with a stellar performance by Ryan Gosling. Yes, it is a little sentimental but it has heart and I dig it. This one will be out for rent soon and I highly recommend it.

At the end of the road..Final Crossroads Fest Day

By Melanie Addington

The final day of the festival arrived after quite a late night. Sunday began with a filmmakers’ brunch at 10 a.m., but yours truly slept through it in order to recover from the fantastic after-party on Saturday hosted by Drew Davis of The Code. The Code guys have a very cool workshop/art space in downtown Jackson where the party went late into the night. Filmmakers and musicians mingled after quite the long day of screenings. There was even a merry-go-round. It was deliciously fun.

Short films including the award winner Spider began at 1 p.m. as well as award winning documentary, Beyond the Call. At 3 p.m. I set in on the Black and White: Films on Race and Culture short block which included April Grayson’s award winning film, Another Word For Family. Also playing was Freedom’s Call, an interesting documentary on two of the black journalists that covered the Civil Rights events including the integration of Little Rock, Ole Miss and the murder of Medgar Evers. Susan Glisson of the William Winter Institute at the University of Mississippi was interviewed, as well as James Meredith.

At 7 p.m. I ended the fest with the very eloquent and touching film, Lars and the Real Girl. Starring Ryan Gosling (The Notebook) as Lars, the story revolves around a town coming together to support the delusion of Lars and his new love as he struggles to come to grips with lifelong trauma and current family issues. Gosling makes you believe so deeply in what he feels on screen that you are carried away with him in his fantasy. Lars and The Real Girl has been out on a limited release since October 2007 but should be available to rent coming up soon. The film was bittersweet and having to leave afterwards after making so many great new friends made it doubly so.

Stay tuned for a look at the top films of the Crossroads film festival!

The Crossroads “not quite live” Wrap Up – Day 3

By Melanie Addington

Sorry, Scenesters, for such a late post about day three and four, but tornadoes and wireless internet access apparently do not mix well! Day four is right behind this!

Day three, Saturday at the Crossroads Film Festival was filled with mostly clear skies. The morning began with panels from 9 -11 a.m. at the Mississippi Museum of Art with filmmakers discussing legal issues with music in film, new media, etc. Also running at the same time were several workshops for children and teens on filmmaking.

At 1 p.m. everyone had headed over to the United Artist to begin the day’s films. I started the day at the Dream Sequence: Shorts Block I to see the southern premiere of Michael Tedford’s Maro as well as the world premiere of February Stars (not the Foo Fighters video but a short tense film about Death). One of the films, Hijo, did not arrive in time for it to be screened, according to Greg Smith, VP of Crossroads, so the guys from The Code stepped in one more time and played another of their series, New Orleans edition, which fit well into the dreamlike sequence of shorts.

To continue my shorts fix, I headed next to the Everyone has an Ending short block where my friend Alex Harder was showing his 3-minute short We Hear Sirens which can also be seen this weekend at the Delta International Film Festival at Delta State University. One of the strong points of this festival is the way that they thematically program their shorts, which provides a nicely-toned structure. I haven’t really seen that very often and it is quite nice.

Afterwards I went to a screening of the Ballast, the delta story that won big at Sundance. The film will have a limited theatrical release beginning Aug. 29. This is definitely something to see, not only because it was filmed with local cast and crew in Mississippi but because it is an amazing film. A review of the film and interview with star Johnny McPhail will be in the Oxford Eagle on Thursday. I will also post the blog version on my blog at www.oxfordfilmfreak.wordpress.com

Playing at the same time was Of All The Things by Jody Lambert. I had previously seen this in Memphis the week before and you can check out what I said here. This is a fun documentary and I can’t stop thinking about it every time I turn on the radio and realize I am listening to one of Dennis Lambert’s hits.

As the Ballast screening went late, I missed out on seeing the Bob Dylan story I’m Not There but the film is going to have a much more extended release soon. I was upset about this as it was Heath Ledger’s last role and I have been wanting to see it for months.

Last but not least on Day 3 was the Awards Ceremony which was set to begin at 9:30 but instead began a little after 11 p.m. However, the live music from the amazing performer Amanda Ray soothed many of us. You haven’t seen someone put their heart and soul into a performance until you have seen Ray perform.

Afterwards, Herman Snell, the President of Crossroads Film Festival, announced the winners. There was not a big to do about the announcements, just a handing of the award to any winners that were there.

2008 Crossroads Film Festival Winners:

Music Video	Fashionable	Cameron McCasland
Experimental	Doxology	Michael Langan
Animated Film	The Hunger Artist	Tom Gibbons
Student	Last Day of December	Bogdan George Apetri
Narrative Short	Spider	Nash Edgerton
Documentary Short	Hero, Wings are Not Necessary to Fly	Angel Loza
Documentary Feature	Beyond the Call	Adrian Belic
Narrative Feature	Disappearances	Jay Craven
Director’s Choice	Of All the Things	Jody Lambert
RUMA Award	Another Word for Family	April Grayson
Youth	What’s Up	Curtis Everitt

April Grayson, the winner of the Ruma Award for most promising Mississippi filmmaker currently resides in Oxford. The film had previously played at the Oxford Film Festival in February. The audience award has not yet been announced but expect a blog as soon as we hear about it!

Day 4 is up next! Then stay tuned for a mini-review of the films I saw!

Crossroads Day 2, The Weather Channel Edition

(Orian Williams (left), producer of Control at the Q&A./Melanie Addington)

Crossroads Film Festival Day 2

By Melanie Addington

Note: Sorry for the delay but thanks to stormy weather, I had no internet until now.

Day 2 of Crossroads film festival started with a clap of thunder and lightning as a strong thunderstorm rolled through the middle of the state. A tornado touched down outside Clinton and a good portion of Jackson lost power. When I headed to the festival reception at Schimmel’s, it was still unclear whether we would even have power by 7 p.m. in time to see Anton Corbjin’s film, Control. But by 5:30 or so the skies had calmed to a reasonable drizzle and power was restored.

At Schimmels, nicely catered food and wine were out for filmmakers and V.I.P’s to relax away from the stormy day. A d.j. played in the upstairs of the very swanky restaurant and bar. It was a nice intimate setting and helped to set the tone for the rest of the evening. I met up with the Citizen director, James Darling, and quite a bit of the crew from Teary Sockets. Director Jackson Anderson was quite nervous at the lack of electricity and was hoping that the showing would go off without a hitch. Around 6:30 p.m. I headed to the theater, avoiding tree branches laid out on roads on my way.

The short film scheduled for tonight did not play but luckily the guys from The Code stepped in and showed a part of their series which included (Oxford’s own) Dent May’s video Oh Paris which premiered at the Oxford Film Festival in February.

Control followed to the half filled stadium theater (I was pleasantly surprised that so many showed with the weather being so bad!). Telling the tragic story of Ian Curtis, the lead singer of Joy Division that committed suicide at 23, Control is a beautifully shot black and white film that has been taking film festivals by storm. The film won three awards at the 2007 Cannes as well as numerous other awards.

A review of the film will be available at Oxford Film Freak tomorrow.

Playing at the same time across the hall was the documentary What Would Jesus Buy about the commercialization of Christmas. The Q&A with the focus of the film, Reverend Billy, ran over and the Teary Sockets film scheduled for 9 p.m. began at 10 p.m. to a much smaller audience.

After the movies, Wiley and the Checkmates performed at Hal and Mal’s afterparty. The bar was not overly attended but the few film fest people there had a fun time. I had the opportunity to catch up with Jody Lambert, the Of All The Things director who just showed the film at On Location: Memphis last week and plays at Crossroads tomorrow. Also at the party was producer Orian Williams of Control who I commented on how much I enjoyed seeing a black and white film because the cinematography was just lovely. The party was still going strong when I took off at midnight.

Today is a big day as it is the first of the all day programming and panels begin around 9 a.m. ending with the awards ceremony at 9:30 p.m. Stay tuned tonight for the big winners and updates on day 3 of Crossroads Film festival.

Crossroads Film Fest Starts off with a packed house for world premiere!

(Crossroads Film Festival runs Thursday thru Sunday/Melanie Addington)

Crossroads Kicks off with a Great Start!

By Melanie Addington

Crossroads Film Festival began tonight with a packed house at the world premiere of Pretty Ugly People written and directed by Ole Miss alum Tate Taylor. After the small crowds at last week’s On Location: Memphis International Film Festival it was exciting to be at a fest that had a great buzz about it. In fact, from the moment you walk into the United Artists theater, you can see just how excited the volunteers are. They are infectious with their hospitality and friendliness.

(Herman Snell, festival director, Joy Parikh,  Greg Smith (VP of Crossroads) and Walter Biggins (Festival Committee – Workshop Coordinator)at the fest opening night/Melanie Addington)

As I waited for the movie to begin, the theater seats kept filling and when the lights went down, I’d say the theater was about 95 percent full. A short film, Citizen, started us off and was a nice little political piece set in the near distant future. James Darling, the film’s director, simply told the crowd that he hoped they enjoy the film.

After a brief Q&A with Darling, we began the world premiere of Pretty Ugly People. The crowd seemed to be filled with friends, family and longtime supporters which I worried would skew the audience reaction. But not to worry. The film was hysterical.

Pretty Ugly People is a comedy with heart. Starring Missy Pyle as Lucy, the film is about a woman who having suffered from being the “heavy” friend in college, reunites with her old buddies for a long weekend. After glamorizing her friends for years, she is in for a surprise when she discovers that they all have their less than joyful moments. Melissa McCarthy (Gilmore Girls, Pumpkin, etc) is the caring friend that rounds up the less supportive crew who are too busy in their own lives to want to have to take time out for Lucy.

The premise of the film rests on this idea that Lucy, having never asked any of them for anything before, needs them “before her time is up.” An ambiguous phone call with McCarthy’s character, Becky, leads her to assume that Lucy is dying and they must go no matter what. I won’t give away whether she is or not, but let’s just say, the crew is not so happy when they arrive and Lucy has plans for them to go on a four-day hike through the wilderness.

The plot is fairly simple and the reunion type film has been done many times before (The Big Chill, etc), yet the film remains fresh with some great comedy from the ensemble cast. Still, the film has a good message and doesn’t just make fun of the heavy girl, but actually shows that we all have our hang ups, whether it is our looks, or sexual identity, our race, our position in society. Due to some pretty strong direction from Taylor, the film never gets heavy handed even though it takes on some pretty tough subjects.

As much as I loved the film, I had some trouble with the beginning and end. The middle of the film, when they are in the wilderness, is just perfect. Some great acting that is shot in a beautiful location in the hills of Montana is all you need. But the original premise of their friendship was stretched a bit thin as rather than open with flash back scenes of their college time, the director made an interesting decision to begin with animation. Not to say I didn’t like the animation, as it was done very well, with some great edits into the real characters (I compare it to the John Cusack Better Off Dead animation scenes but with more flair).

But, since the characters are bitchy and not real happy to support her in the beginning, it doesn’t help that they remain bitchy and not real happy to support her throughout. Why is she surprised by this? Why are these people her friends? Oh because, we all have those college friends, don’t we? The ones that you promise to remain in touch forever but as your lives go down separate paths, it gets harder and harder to remember to reach out. In fact, one of the lines in the film hits the nail on the head about the most obnoxious character, “We all have our George’s, don’t we?”

And we do. You can connect with this movie, because we all have those friends throughout life that we can be ourselves around even when we are our less than perfect selves. Those are the friends that, maybe it takes a while to get reacquainted, but once you do it is like you are right back in the moment that bonded you in the first place. And yet the beginning does work in the context of the film to help you understand that her idealized version of her college friends and who they are today maybe are not so different, it is she that is waking up.

And then the end happens. A complete curveball that maybe was a little too over the top but definitely a strong plot point in order to create a change in these characters. The ending is not the worst I have seen, but I did find it slightly out of place for the rhythm of the story.

After the film, the audience burst out in applause before Tate Taylor and Brunson Green, producer and also an Ole Miss graduate did a Q&A.

(Brunson Green and Tate Taylor at the Q&A for the world premiere of Pretty Ugly People/Melanie Addington)

They discussed that their film had a budget of $3 million and that to get it from script to screen they had to go door-to-door looking for handouts for about six months. “You really gotta love doing this,” said Taylor. They finished the film on Sunday and told the audience that they were the first people to ever see it. An audience member asked Taylor where the premise of the film came from and he replied, “Octavia. (who hilariously plays Mary in the film) She is a friend of mine and had recently had gastric bypass surgery in real life and I was being insensitive and asked her why she would do that to her body. She responded because, when I’m finally thin, I’ll be happy like you guys.” Taylor said this made a huge impact on him and he realized that everyone has their something, the something that keeps them from thinking they can be happy.

The film has been submitted to a few festivals and will begin playing the circuit soon. We’ll keep a lookout for you and let you know when you will have a chance to see it! And if you see it for no other reason, then see it for the hysterical cameo by Allison Janney (West Wing). She steals the movie in both of her short scenes. Fantastic!

Check back tomorrow for day two of the Crossroads Film Festival coverage!