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PRODUCTION STAFF

Stephen Imwalle
Director

Chad Phillips
Faculty Advisor

John Lee Jellicorse
Executive Producer

Ann Bryan
Jaimie Parker
A. J. Lee
Public Relations

Kevin Norris
Joe Izzo
Program Layout

Zora Medor
Scriptwriting Showcase Director

Miles Young
Chief of Operations

Amber Smith
Hospitality Committee Chair

Stephen Cook
Chad Davis
Zach Driscoll
Stephanie Gaston
Joe Izzo
Ben Kaufher
Jeff Lackey
A. J. Lee
Austin Lynch
Jon Mayes
Kevin Norris
Greg Robbins
Amber Smith
Tiffany VanKeuren
Andy Wells
Katherine Worrell
Miles Young
Staff

Michael Frierson
Eric Patrick
Additional Programming

This site is maintained by
John Lee Jellicorse
and was last modified on
10 February 2004

18 to 21 February 2004

WINNERS ANNOUNCED!!!

Welcome from Stephen Imwalle, Festival Director
Keynote Address: Jakob Trollbäck
Judges Lectures:
Tom Blomquist	Stuart Robertson		Leanne Campbell
Best of the Ottawa Animation Festival 2003
Ashby Dialogue Artist: David Gatten
Focus on NC Film Commissions
High School Films in Competition
Blue’s Clues with “Joe”			Meet Joe at the 2004 Carolina Film and Video Festival
Staged Reading of Winning Screenplay: The Minstrel Boy by Ed Devany
Featured Documentary: Anthony Fragola's Feast of the Dead
Winners’ Night			Winners
Filmmakers’ Forums:
Thursday	Friday		Saturday
Competitive Screenings:
Wednesday 18th	Thursday 19th		Friday 20th
Daily Schedules:
Wednesday 18th	Thursday 19th	Friday 20th	Saturday 21st
Ever wonder what types of folk have works in film festivals and what happens to them later? Read Jaimie Parker's new article, "More Than Fifteen Minutes of Fame" and trace some of the most popular CFVF winners.

Welcome from Stephen Imwalle, Festival Director

Greetings !

     Welcome to the 2004 Carolina Film and Video Festival. Each year the CFVF highlights some of the best up and coming independent and student film and video work. I think you'll find that this year will prove no different. With over two hundred submissions to the festival this year, the CFVF staff had their work cut out for them. Thanks to everyone who was involved in the process, especially Kevin Norris, Amber Smith, Miles Young, and Joe Izzo.

     Building on the success of last year's festival, our weekday events will be held at the Elliott University Center. Saturday's Winners' Night will once again be held at the historic Carolina Theatre in downtown Greensboro. We are, however, pleased to announce a few changes to the festival this year. The Festival competition will now include a cash prize for "Excellence in Directing" as well as a new award sponsored by CineFilm Labs for the "Best Student Narrative Film." The screenwriting competition will include a cash prize of $1,000 this year in addition to the staged reading of the script. Thursday evening will feature a double bill of the best from the "Ottawa International Student Animation Festival" followed by the second night of our competitive screenings. Thanks to Dr. Michael Frierson and Eric Patrick for organizing this event.

     Special thanks to the filmmakers, our guest speakers, and jurors for taking the time to help contribute to the success of this year's CFVF. Each guest and juror will be sharing their knowledge and experience with film and video in our afternoon panels. Don't miss out on an excellent opportunity to participate in a group discussion with some industry professionals. In addition, the filmmaker forums are a chance for the audience and filmmakers to interact on a one to one basis, transcending the cinema screen. I hope to see you there.

Enjoy the show,

Stephen Imwalle

CFVF Director

Day One: Wednesday 18 February

7: 00 p.m.
Keynote Address EUC Auditorium

   The keynote speaker is Jakob Trollbäck, founder of Trollbäck and Company, one of the most sought-after design houses in New York. His designs have been used in film titles and commercials, and have attracted high-profile clients such as HBO, TNT, AMC, Sundance Channel, Volvo and Sony. The Swedish-born artist has offices in Manhattan and California. For a sample of his work, visit his web site.

Competitive Screenings Session One
EUC Auditorium

8:00 p.m.
The Bug Man
Mike Miley, Narrative, 22 minutes
American Film Institute – Los Angeles, CA

The slice-of-life story of an exterminator and his relationship with his clients.

8:25 p.m.
Bautismo
Casey Koehler, Experimental, 6 minutes
University of Colorado – Boulder, CO

A young woman caught in a nightmare tries to flee from its vicious undertow.

8:31 p.m.
Perils In Nude Modeling
Scott Rice, Narrative, 10 minutes
University of Texas-Austin – Austin, TX

On the verge of expulsion, a hapless art student must decide between life-long ambition and love when an audacious nude model makes a dangerous demand in the middle of class.

8:41 p.m.
Day of Independence
Chris Tashima, Narrative, 27 minutes
Independent – Los Angeles, CA

Set in a U.S. internment camp for Japanese Americans during World War II, this story chronicles the journey of a young man’s struggle to find strength through courage, sacrifice, and baseball.

9:08 p.m.
Fence Dogs
Chris Holmes, Narrative, 10 minutes
University of North Carolina at Greensboro – Greensboro, NC

One man’s quest to salvage his last remaining link to a lost brother . . . his dog Oreo.

9:18 p.m.
Time Streams
Stephanie Maxwell and Allan Schindler, Experimental, 6 minutes
Independent – Fairport, NY

Time Streams is a collaborative work between an animator and composer that signifies intersecting ribbons of time.

9:23 p.m. - Intermission

9:35 p.m.
Argent Liquide (Cash Flow)
US Premiere
Shaun Andrews, Experimental, 12 minutes
Independent – Fribourg, Switzerland

Where does your money go?

9:46 p.m.
Electric Vertebrae
David Chontos, Experimental, 13 minutes
Rochester Institute of Technology – Carmel, NY

A mixed-media journey through the mind of a neo-nineteenth century asylum patient.

9:58 p.m.
Comedy: The Other Black Gold
Alicia Dattner, Narrative, 5 minutes
Independent – San Francisco, CA

A mock-public service announcement pleading for the preservation of comedy.

10:05 p.m.
Lustron – The House America’s Been Waiting For
Bill Kubota, Documentary, 57 minutes
Independent – Madison Heights, MI

After World War II, a housing shortage creates a demand for new, low cost homes that can be built quickly and efficiently. A visionary builder battles corrupt government officials to save his dream homes.

Day Two: Thursday 19 February

11:00 a.m.
Filmmakers Forum I Alexander Room EUC

     Meet creative personnel from the films being screened in the Festival and get their insights into contemporary film and video production and distribution. Featured will be Chris Holmes, Producer and Director of Fence Dogs.

2:00 p.m.
Juror Lecture: Tom Blomquist Alexander Room, EUC

     

Tom Blomquist

Tom Blomquist is an award-winning writer, producer and director, whose diverse credits include the drama series Christy; Walker, Texas Ranger; Twice In a Lifetime; Star Trek: Next Generation; Fame L. A.; Farscape; Quantum Leap; Hunter; Werewolf; Swamp Thing; Hardcastle & McCormick, A-Team and Riptide for networks ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, USA, PAX, Sci-Fi, and syndication. Blomquist most recently served as Executive Producer and Writer of the critically acclaimed mini-series sequel to Christy; as well as Director of the theatrical comedy featurette Prison Life, which was cited by the Houston Chronicle as one of the ten best shorts of 2001. A former executive on The Hallmark Hall of Fame, Blomquist has also served on the screenwriting faculties of The American Film Institute, University of Southern California and UCLA. In 2003 he was a judge and industry panelist at the Nashville Film Festival.

4:00 p.m.
Juror Lecture: Stuart Robertson Alexander Room, EUC

Stuart Robertson

     Stuart Robertson is an independent visual effects supervisor who works in Los Angeles. A member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and a board member of the Visual Effects Society, his feature credits include Woody Allen’s Zelig, Roland Emmerich’s revolutionary war epic The Patriot, Stephen King’s Rose Red, and such films as The Ghost and The Darkness, Predator, Back to the Future 2, Last Action Hero and The Abyss. In 1998, Stuart received an Academy Award for outstanding visual effects on the feature film What Dreams May Come.

7:00 p.m.
The Best of the Ottawa Student Animation Festival 2003
plus two
EUC Auditorium

Full Schedule of Animations To Be Screened

     Held every other year, the Ottawa Student Animation Festival is widely regarded as one of the most important venues for new animation in the world. The Festival showcases animation from the best schools across the planet. Since some of the pieces shown in this screening are not suitable for children, parental guidance is advised; and children will be admitted only when accompanied by a parent or guardian. In addition, Perpetual Motion by Kimberly Minor, the most recent Student Academy Award winner in animation, and Unearthed by Christina Spangler, a film from the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design's animation program, will also be screened as part of this special tribute to the art of the animator.

8:30 p.m.
Intermission

Competitive Screenings Session Two
EUC Auditorium

8:45 p.m.
The Champagne Society
Jonny Gillette, Narrative, 20 minutes
North Carolina School of the Arts – Winston-Salem, NC

When Walter Thursby, leader of the Champagne Society, meets Emelia Tuppinston, leader of the Anarchist Reading Club for Young Ladies, love, treason, and a daring rescue mission follow.

9:05 p.m.
Interference
Lauren Hollingsworth, Narrative, 11 minutes
University of Southern California – Culver City, CA

A female P.I. is hired to follow an adulteress. When she discovers that the woman is being abused by her lover, she tries to intervene with disastrous results.

9:16 p.m.
Upelo
Marty Hardin, Experimental, 11 minutes
Independent – Wilmington, NC

Upelo is the Germanic root word for evil. This film is a chilling commentary on violence, war, and how people choose to ignore the consequences of both.

9:27 p.m.
Take It and Like It
Bret Sigler and Kate Davidson, Documentary, 26 minutes
University of California at Berkeley – San Francisco, CA

Where in the world will the United States government store half a century’s worth of radioactive waste? Not in my backyard.

9:51 p.m.
Silence
Mateen Kemet, Narrative, 23 minutes
Chapman University – Hollywood, CA

The life and times of a Bronx teenager living in an abusive family.

10:14 p.m.
Carter’s Wish
Kevin Shahinian, Narrative, 13 minutes
University of Southern California – Fountain Valley, CA

Carter Bigelow had one simple wish. But after a catastrophic mistake made by an absent minded Genie, everyone else’s wishes are coming true . . . except Carter’s.

10:27 p.m.
Matsutake
Todd Dayton, Documentary, 23 minutes
University of California at Berkeley - New York, NY

The globetrotting tale of an edible, wild mushroom, international trade, and the folks who make this fungus their life and livelihood.

10:50 p.m.
The Drive North
Tess Ernst, Experimental, 13 minutes
Hampshire College – Chicago, IL

Two friends bicker their way up the East Coast into a discomforting transition into adulthood.

Day Three: Friday 20 February

Noon
Filmmakers Forum II Alexander Room EUC

     Meet creative personnel from the films being screened in the Festival and get their insights into contemporary film and video production and distribution.

1:00 p.m.

Juror Lecture: Leanne Campbell Alexander Room EUC

Leanne M. Campbell

     Leanne M. Campbell is Studio Head of Blue Ridge Motion Picture Studios. She has twenty-five years of experience in Commercial and Residential Real Estate. She opened her first business at age 20 and purchased her first property at 21. She has also completed the Boston Marathon. She, along with Merwin Gross opened Blue Ridge Motion Pictures in September of 2001. Leanne states that"all the things I've done until now, have prepared me for this career." She surrounds herself with people of high integrity and experience, and never compromises her values and integrity. Her vision is one of service and hospitality, providing a full-service production facility, all in one place. She divides her time between Asheville, North Carolina and Exeter, New Hampshire, where she still over sees an on going Real Estate Management Company. She loves a challenge and the Boston Red Sox . . . which alone is a challenge in itself!!!!! Leanne and Blue Ridge Studios were recently featured in a USA Today story about the shooting of Cold Mountain.

2:00
Ashby Dialogues Guest Artist: David Gatten Alexander Room EUC

     In this session, Festival goers will have the opportunity to review in depth the work of a UNCG alumnus, David Gatten (Media Studies BA 1995). David received his MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1998. He currently lives in Ithaca, NY, and teaches filmmaking in the Department of Cinema and Photography at Ithaca College. Over the last three years his films have explored the intersection of the printed word and the moving image, while investigating the shifting vocabularies of experience and representation within intimate spaces and historical documents. Through traditional research methods and nontraditional film processes, the films trace the contours of both private lives and public histories, combining elements of philosophy, biography, and poetry with experiments in cinematic forms and narrative structures. Currently David is at work on a series of seven films about the division of landscapes, objects, ideas, and people; about letters, libraries, ghosts, and lovers among the Byrd family of Virginia during the early eighteenth century.

David Gatten (left), with fellow featured filmmaker Bruce McClure at the Images Festival of Independent Film and Video, Toronto, April 2003.

     Last year Gatten was one of 113 artists included in the 2002 Whitney Biennial. Two of his most recent films premiered in New York City at Lincoln Center in the 1999 and 2001 editions of the New York Film Festival. Gatten’s work has been exhibited at museums and cinémathèques including the Pacific Film Archive, Art Institute of Chicago, Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Art Gallery of Ontario, Cinémathèque Française, Helsinki Film Co-Op, Millennium Film Workshop, Anthology Film Archives, and Chicago Filmmakers. His films have been screened at festivals around the world including Rotterdam, New York, Ann Arbor, Toronto, Onion City, Ottawa, Athens, Bangkok, Impakt, Media City, Cinematexas, THAW, Chicago Underground, Black Maria, and others. Gatten's work is included in the permanent collections of the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and the Art Institute of Chicago, as well as in private collections in the United States, Canada, and Japan.

     Gatten's latest film, Secret History of the Dividing Line, premiered in December of 2002 at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York City. The film received its international premiere in January of 2003 at the Rotterdam International Film Festival in the Netherlands. It was the recipient of awards at both the Onion City Film Festival in Chicago and the Black Maria Film and Video Festival.

Image from Gatten's Secret History of the Dividing Line

     The Enjoyment of Reading (Lost & Found) (2001) is an investigation into the division of knowledge into discreet categories and the impulse to understand the world by creating an intellectual identity through the accumulation and cataloguing of natural and metaphysical phenomena. The film premiered at the New York Film Festival in October of 2001. It screened at the Media City Festival in Windsor, Ontario, and at the "Early Cinema and the Avant Garde Film” festival and symposium in Vienna, Austria. As well, the film was included in the Ann Arbor Film Festival, THAW 02, Cinematexas, and the Images Festival of Independent Film and Video in Toronto. In a recent issue of Film Comment magazine Nicole Armour writes

Gatten's approach to biography is unique . [ . . .] The film's devotion to reading as a solitary and deeply personal pursuit is a romantic one, and its implication that the art we surround ourselves with will live on as evidence of our existence is both consoling and inspiring.

     Moxon's Mechanick Exercises, or, The Doctrine of Handy-Works Applied to the Art of Printing (1999) was selected for inclusion in the 2002 Whitney Biennial. This handmade film, with its images generated almost entirely from cellophane tape, proceeds from the landmark moment in the middle of the fifteenth century when Gutenberg inaugurated the use of movable type in the West with his forty-two-line Bible. Using a cameraless tape and ink transfer process, words themselves were lifted from a number of historical texts, the ink-words were fixed directly onto a clear film base, and some 24,000 individual frames of text were contact printed onto 16 mm film stock. A constant restaging of appearance as disappearance, the image oscillates: small pockets of meaning emerge for an instant and then vanish into the flow of material that constitutes a passage through time and space . . . notion of the Baroque house in which souls are in ascension from a lower floor comprising “pleats of matter“ to an upper floor which contains the “folds of the soul,” . . . the text-as-image in the film is itself constantly in transformation translation, and ascension as it pushes upward, disappearing at the ceiling of the frame. Moxon’s Mechanick Exercises also screened at Lincoln Center as part of the New York Film Festival before winning the 1st prize Juror's Choice Award at the Black Maria Film and Video Festival, 2nd Prize at the Athens International Film and Video Festival, 2nd Prize at the Images Festival, and Honorable Mention at the Ann Arbor Film Festival.

     Hardwood Process (1996) was awarded the Grand Prize at both the Ann Arbor Film Festival and the Onion City Film Festival in 1997. A hand-made, diary film generated from alternative processing techniques, chemical treatments, and optical and contact printing, it is a history of scarred surfaces, an inquiry, and an imagining: for the marks we see and the marks we make, for the languages we can read and for those we are trying to learn. Written in the scratches on the floors, the scars on the hands, and the chemical etchings into the film emulsion, these languages of experience are unstable ones--vocabularies constantly shifting with the passage of time. The film is contact printed by hand on an old Bell and Howell model C printer resulting in individual, unique release prints.

     What the Water Said, Nos. 1-3 (1997-1998) received the Special Jury Prize at the Bangkok International Art Film Festival. It was included in "The American Century" exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art and received awards at the Black Maria Film and Video Festival and the Images Festival in Toronto. This film is the result of a series of cameraless collaborations between the filmmaker, the Atlantic Ocean, and a crab cage. For three days in January and three days in October of 1997, and again, for a day, in August of 1998, lengths of unexposed, undeveloped film were soaked in a crab cage on a South Carolina beach. Both the sound and image in What The Water Said are the result of the ensuing oceanic inscriptions written directly into the emulsion of the film as it was buffeted by the salt water, sand, rocks, shells, and the sides of the crab cage.

Ultimately, of course, the particular nature of the results is less significant than the imagination behind Gatten's experiment. Whatever effects Gatten's flinging the crab-trap into the sea would have created, his gesture in making the film reveals not only a faith in the possibility of collaborating with the environment in a more direct way, but confidence in the ongoing capacity of the mechanical age to continue to bring body and spirit together. Obviously, throwing the crab cage into the sea is a kind of prayer, a spiritually driven gesture that means to effect a material result, a petition to Nature in the hope of response. And the result is a set of inscriptions on the filmstrip that the projector transforms into light. As viewers sit in the darkened space of the theater, they are face to face with the inevitable cinematic paradox: once again, a machine (indeed, for all practica purposes, a vestige of nineteenth century technology) confronts us with the ineffable . [ . . . ] Gatten continues to find new creative possibilities within the continuing premonitions of film's demise. (Scott MacDonald, The Garden in the Machine)

     The Ashby Dialogues are named for Dr. Warren Ashby, creative and beloved teacher and administrator during nearly four decades of service at UNC Greensboro. Among his many contributions to the University were those of serving as the first head of the Philosophy Department and first Director of UNCG’s distinctive Residential College. The Ashby Dialogues continue Dr. Ashby’s mission for the University: "freedom in the search and service of truth."

4:00 p.m.
Film Commission Update Alexander Room EUC

     Director of the Piedmont Triad Film Commission, Rebecca Clark, will lead a panel discussion including Bill Arnold, Director of the State Film Commission, and other North Carolina commission directors on the issue of state economic incentives for film production.

High School Competition EUC Auditorium

     The Alberta Ahler Award is given each year to the best film or video submitted by a currently enrolled high school student. It is named after a distinguished communication and theatre teacher at Knoxville, Tennessee, Central High School, in honor of all high school teachers.

7:00 p.m.
Beauty as the Beast
Jonathan Diaz, Narrative, 7 minutes
Centennial High School – Alpharetta, GA

7:07 p.m.
MP Free?
Patrick Edwards, Katie Fulbright, Jake Hartsfield, Gardner Pierson, and Darrell Stover (Advisor), Documentary, 8 minutes
Independent – Cary, NC

7:15 p.m.
Friendland
Nick Corirossi, Narrative, 12 minutes
South Miami Senior High School – Miami, FL

Competitive Screenings Session Three
EUC Auditorium

8:00 p.m.
As Virgins Fall
Steven Ward, Narrative, 28 minutes
Independent – Hollywood, CA

August 8, 1969. The hottest night of the summer. A privileged teenage girl is about to learn that no one is safe.

8:30 p.m.
Dandelion
Hal Forsstrom, Animation, 11 minutes
Rhode Island School of Design – Peabody, MA

A soldier escapes the wasteland of war only to discover the horrors of the battlefield following him to the farthest ends of the world.

8:40 p.m.
Tackle Box
Matthew Mebane, Narrative, 11 minutes
Independent – Los Angeles, CA

Even after death, love lingers, bringing a group of outcasts to redemption.

8:50 p.m.
Tech Fall
Brad Preslar, Narrative, 12 minutes
University of Miami – Charlotte, NC

Bill is a high school wrestler whose father’s coaching borders on abuse. After he loses a match, Bill is forced to confront his father’s abuse on the wrestling mat.

9:02 p.m.
The Bad Guy’s Bad Plan
Jerry Pasnikowski, Animation, 4 minutes
Pratt Institute – Liverpool, NY

Joe Coodryette loves jumping through windows, giving rise to his many adventures.

9:06 p.m.
Dad’s Dead
Chris Shepherd, Animation, 7 minutes
Independent – London, England

A young man tries to piece together fragmented moments from the past, memories being triggered by admiration for his best friend that turn to revulsion.

9:13 p.m. - Intermission

9:23 p.m.
Katrina
Stephen Butchko, Narrative, 18 minutes
Independent – Los Angeles, CA

Katrina’s fascination with her downstairs neighbors turns to obsession and violence.

9:41 p.m.
Food Chain
Hyunjoung Kim, Animation, 2 minutes
Pratt Institute – Elmhurst, NY

There’s always someone bigger.

9:43 p.m.
Sui Generis
Alexandre Nothis, Experimental, 8 minutes
University of Southern California – Los Angeles, CA

Sui Generis explores the themes of birth and evolution.

9:51 p.m.
February One
Rebecca Cerese, Documentary, 61 minutes
Independent – Durham, NC

Based on first hand accounts and archival footage, February One documents one volatile winter in Greensboro that not only challenged public accommodation customs and laws in North Carolina, but also served as a blueprint for the wave of non-violent civil rights protests that followed.

Day Four: Saturday 21 February

10:00 a.m.
Blue's Clues (featuring Joe) Carolina Theatre

    The Carolina Film and Video Festival is proud to present a special screening of the Nickelodeon children's television show Blue’s Clues. Blue’s Clues is a play-along, think-along, half-hour animated series starring a live action host named Joe who invites viewers into his computer-animated storybook to help him and his dog, Blue, solve the day’s riddles. Nine million children worldwide watch the program weekly. It is the recipient of a Peabody award and has been nominated for Emmy awards yearly since 1998.

     Two special guests to the festival, Dave Palmer, the animation director of the show, and Donovan Patton, the actor who plays the character of Joe, will introduce the program at the Carolina Theatre. Palmer is the Supervising Director of Animation and Animation Producer for Blue's Clues.  He has worked on Blue's Clues since the pilot in 1996, for which he developed the show's animation process and designed the character Blue. Dave is also a freelance illustrator, animator, director, and animation teacher, and is the creator of the animated short Dave the Brave Meets a Big, Orange Monster, which is currently airing on both Nickelodeon and CBS. Palmer's work on Blue's Clues has been written about in Kit Laybourne's The Animation Book: A Complete Guide to Animated Filmmaking.

Donovan Patton

     Patton is an actor in New York City who graduated from the Interlochen Arts Academy in Michigan. Though Donovan is mostly known for his role as the character Joe on Blue’s Clues, he has acted Off Broadway in the Vineyard Theater’s production of True History, Real Adventures and Lincoln Center Institute’s Romeo and Juliet and Barstool Words. He also appears in Ryan Rossell's film Black Wine. Blue’s Clues was created by Traci Paige Johnson, Todd Kessler and Angela C. Santomero. Santomero serves as Executive Producer and Head Writer, and Johnson is Executive Producer and Director of Design. Jennifer Twomey Perello also is Executive Producer.

     The audience will get to experience two favorite Blue’s Clues episodes on the Carolina Theatre’s big screen, interact with Joe, and learn from Palmer how Blue and his friends come to life.

1:00 p.m.
Filmmakers Forum III Carolina Theatre

     Meet creative personnel from the films being screened in the Festival and get their insights into contemporary film and video production and distribution including Rebecca Cerese from February One who will discuss her independent documentary that chronicles the sit-in movement that originated in Greensboro.

2:00 p.m.
Screenplay Winner Carolina Theatre

Staged reading of The Minstrel Boy by Ed Devany
Directed by Zora Medor

     The Minstrel Boy presents a striking perspective of the Catholic Irish community in Boston, Massachusetts, during the mid-1970's bussing riots. In 1974, the city of Boston, usually a staid and rather placid metropolis, exploded into irrational anger when bussing was implemented by Mayor Kevin White. Children of both races, black and white, were bussed into schools of different neighborhoods, races, and cultures. Shamefully, adults of both races stoned and cursed these young victims of forced integration. The Minstrel Boy vividly depicts various actions and reactions of Boston's one-and-a-half-century-old Irish Catholic community during the bussing crisis.

     The Minstrel Boy is a true ensemble film script--an actor's and director's dream. Complete with original lyrics set to popular old Irish tunes, an authentic Irish pub-singer-player in the character of Tommy O'Riordan, a former burlesque dancing queen, and an irrepressible Irish Catholic mother, this script crackles with humor and joie-de-vivre from start to finish. It portrays society and family life in microcosm, uniquely flavored with Irish songs, family life, noisy and nosy neighbors, Irish pubbers, rioters (some of whom are the neighbors), and strong-speaking priests. Those with genteel ears, take heed! The language is typically Northeast and Bostonian--tumbling with vivid metaphors and thick with God-raging epithets. Become involved with the crisis of truth in the Irish community as played out in an Irish family of such ingrained Catholicism that four of the children have chosen the vocation of the church. See how Tommy O'Riordan turns the tables on prejudiced fellow Irish, who seek to trap him in their net of bigotry. Empathize with the life-changing decision that Timmy and his father make when 12-year old Timmy is offered a tempting opportunity to remain in the safe haven of his parochial private school and escape the controversial bussing ordinance. The hornets' nest stirred by the bussing ordinance brings about a family crisis that spawns lifelong love and understanding.

Ed Devany

     Ed Devany has had a lifelong career in theatre/television/films, as writer, producer, director at stations in Virginia, Connecticut, New York, and Texas. His plays have been published in Margaret Mayorga's Best Short Plays twice and produced Off Broadway and in regional theatre. His screenplays have been finalists at the O'Neill Conference twice, Sundance Institute, and WGAe competitions. Seven of his television scripts have been produced on national public television. He has won prizes in poetry competitions in North Carolina, New York, and Virginia, and recently had a short story published in Racing Home, a collection of prize-winning North Carolina writers. He has written opera libretti, books and lyrics to five musicals, and music and lyrics to over fifty songs. Retired from DGA and WGAw, he continues writing while enjoying a family of four grown children and six grandchildren. On the same day of the reading in Greensboro his son Charley will see a short play of his performed in Philadelphia. Devany has provided the following background commentary on the screenplay:

     The Minstrel Boy was completed at the MacDowell Colony after a two-week stay in Boston, visiting all the sites utilized in the story. Prior to that, a year was spent in research in Austin, Texas, through series of interviews with a Catholic Priest who had served in Boston at the time of the riots. Intended for Jack Lemmon, who had taken an interest in the author and his work, a press release from a friend announcing Lemmon's casting in Mass Appeal set the work back a few days. However, on submitting the script to Lemmon later, his response was, "Sorry, I don't like to cover the same ground twice." Later letters explaining that the role of the Priest was not intended for Lemmon, but rather, Tommy, were to no avail. Still later submitted to an American script series at PBS, the work was rejected for "only showing one
side of the story" (which came from reading a recently published study of the riots cutting back and forth between a white family and a black one). The reader of The Minstrel Boy missed the point of the script, in which the riots are only a background behind a father-son story. Discouraged, I put the script aside until recently submitting it to Greensboro. It is refreshing and restorative to find it works for other people. I have always believed in it, enjoyed every minute of creating it, and pray for the chance to edit, rewrite and develop it further.

     Zora Medor has been 'playing' in theater since childhood--as director, playwright, actress, and generic jill-of-all-trades. In 1987, she took a detour into the world of filmmaking, but has found the media highway where both roads merge. A UNC Greensboro MFA graduate in film/video and drama production, she continues to combine theater and film/video production, always working on several projects simultaneously. She enjoys the fresh perspectives offered by teaching students of all ages, and loves directing neophytes as well as professional actors. She has received awards, fellowships and grants from the NC United Arts Council, Vermont Council for the Arts, Trinity College Theater Productions, etc. to write and produce plays and movies. She directed the first Screenwriting Showcase for CFVF in 2002 and served as a judge for the 2003 Showcase.

Featured Documentary: Feast of the Dead
Carolina Theatre

     As its featured documentary for 2004, the Carolina Film and Video Festival is proud to present Anthony Fragola's personal documentary, Feast of the Dead.

Anthony Fragola

     Anthony Fragola's short stories have appeared in literary magazines such as The Greensboro Review, The Cornhill (England), Dewan Sastra (Malaysia), Story Magazine, and the Southern California Anthology. Several of the stories from Fragola's collection of short stories, Feast of the Dead, have been aired on the BBC World Service short story series. His films and videos have been shown in numerous film festivals and conferences, including the Melbourne International Film Festival, the Society for Visual Anthropology, and at universities such as Barnard, Guilford, Florida State, and the University of Virginia. In La Sicilia, Elio D'Amico, wrote of Feast of the Dead, the story collection: "In these stories emerges the life of someone who lived those roots of tradition from afar, undergoing the mysterious fascination with them [. . .]. It is the comparison not only of two generations, but above all of two mentalities that in their diversity, always unite."

     As a boy growing up in New York, Fragola was fascinated by the stories his grandmother wove about her native Italy--the destructive power of Mt. Etna, the harsh conditions, and above all, the rituals of the "Feast of the Dead," also called All Souls Day.

     A week-long festival celebrated at the beginning of November, the Feast of the Dead honors the spirits of one's ancestors. The Sicilians pay their respects to the departed by decorating and polishing graves, holding mass, and visiting cemeteries. Parents put out cookies called "bones of the dead" for the spirits, who are said to leave presents for the living. Nearly two decades after his grandmother's death, Fragola made the journey to her hometown of Linguaglossa in southern Italy. Linguaglossa, translated as "large tongue," is nestled on the slopes of volcanic Mount Etna. Led by his guide and relative Antonino Vecchio, Fragola visited the small village during the Feast of the Dead and documented his experiences on film.

     From the foot of majestic Mount Etna to the shrinking ruins of an Italian-American neighborhood in Syracuse, New York, Feast of the Dead takes the viewer on the journey of a man reconnecting with the ancient traditions of his Sicilian family and confronting the realities of what remains. Scenes included preparation for the festival, a visit to his ancestral home, a processional through the streets, and interviews with family, a priest, and a sculptor.

7:00 p.m.
Winner’s night Screenings Carolina Theatre

Winners' night screenings are in the historic Carolina Theatre.

     View the winners of the 2004 Carolina Film and Video Festival, honor the filmmakers as they receive their awards, and then visit with the filmmaker and Festival staff at a closing reception in the Carolina Theatre’s beautiful Renaissance Room.

 

 

 

CFVF 2004 Awards

Excellence in Directing Award: CFVF proudly introduces a new prize of $1,000 awarded to the best direction of a film or video. The winner: Scott Rice for Perils in Nude Modeling

Kodak Award: CFVF offers a prize of $1,000 worth of film stock to the best independent narrative film or video. The winner: Tackle Box (Matthew Mebane)

CineFilm Lab Award: CFVF awards a prize of $500 worth of film processing to the best student narrative film or video. The winner: Perils in Nude Modeling (Scott Rice)

The Screenwriter's Showcase: CFVF offers an award of $200 and a staged reading of the best screenplay submitted to the Festival. The winner: Ed Devany (The Minstrel Boy)

Independent Filmmaker Awards: special cash prizes for innovative approaches to documentary, animation, and experimentation made by independent artists in film and video. The Independent Experimental/ Animation Prize of $400 for outstanding achievement in an animated or experimental, film or video. The winner: [Argent Liquide (Cash Flow)] (Shaun Andrews) The Independent Documentary Prize of $400 for outstanding achievement in documentary film or video. The winner: February One (Rebecca Cerese)

College Filmmaker Awards: special cash prizes for innovative approaches to documentary, animation, and experimentation in first or subsequent works made by artists enrolled in college or university classes. The College Experimental/Animation Prize of $400 for outstanding achievement in an animated or experimental film or video. The winner: Bautismo (Casey Koehler) The College Documentary Prize of $400 for outstanding achievement in documentary film or video. The winner: Take It and Like It (Bret Sigler and Kate Davidson)

Alberta Ahler Filmmaker Prize: special cash prize of $400 for the best film made by a high school student. The winner: Friendland (Nick Corirossi)

Honorable Mention Beauty as the Beast (Directing--Comedy) Day of Independence (Hair and Costume) Dad's Dead (Editing) The Champagne Society (Screen story) Drive North (Directing--Drama) Silence (Music and Performances) Tech Fall (Cinematography)

Presentation of the 2004 North Carolina Distinguished Filmmaker Award

     One of North Carolina's "most distinguished media awards" (Reel Carolina, August/September 2003: 4) will be awarded for 2004 to Frank Capra, Jr. The North Carolina Distinguished Filmmaker is nominated by heads of academic programs and by CEOs of film related institutions and companies and chosen by the UNC Greensboro Broadcasting and Cinema Advisory Committee, chaired by Lee Kinard. The award is presented each year to a person who has a exceptional individual achievement or a career profile of excellence in filmmaking in North Carolina or featuring North Carolina subjects and/or locales.

     Frank Capra, Jr., is President of EUE/Screen Gems Studios-North Carolina, the largest motion picture studio east of Hollywood. Having fallen in love with Wilmington, NC, in 1983, while on a location shoot, he has adopted North Carolina and its film industry as his own. He is the unceasing advocate of North Carolina film financing and production and a major reason why the Tar Heel state ranks third behind only California and New York in terms of dollars spent on film production.

10:00
Closing Reception Carolina Theatre