Part 2 of 4 in my series of reports from the June Film Festival Frenzy (TM). Q. Whatever happened to part 1? A. No one promised these would be in order.
My voyage to Newport began almost two weeks ago, with a red eye flight to New York, a LIRR train into Penn Station (remarkably fast and cheap, remind me, why have I been taking a cab all these years?) followed by the scenic 3 hour train ride to Rhode Island. Once there, I was rushed into town to get my filmmaker pass, rushed out to the random Courtyard by Marriott I was stationed in (I never did know the name of the town, other than that it was not Newport and it was near a Chili's and a Home Depot, which pretty much places it almost anywhere in America) and finally back to Newport, where I immediately joined a panel on music and film.
And we're off.
What followed was one of the highlights of the long festival tour we've enjoyed with the film, one of those great festival experiences where you see a bunch of good friends, you become better friends with people that you'd met at previous fests and, of course, you meet new people, some of whom you love immediately and some of whom, well, love themselves more intensely than you ever could.
Some of those I love (from left): juror/filmmaker Sarie Horowitz, DEVIL CAME ON HORSEBACK co-director Annie Sundberg, yours truly, BLINDSIGHT director Lucy Walker, A&E IndieFilms' Ryan Harrington, Newport director of programming David Nugent and juror/filmmaker Sascha Paladino.
I was particularly glad to hang out with filmmakers Michael Tully (SILVER JEW) and Craig Zobel (GREAT WORLD OF SOUND), whom I'd spent a little bit of time with in Sarasota, but really got to enjoy in Newport. Also, psyched that I got to see Tully's film. SILVER JEW, which premiered at SXSW, is deceptively simple. Tully follows indie rock legend David Berman, leader of the Drag City band Silver Jews, as he embarks on a tour. But therein lie the details that make Silver Jew so different from any number of other "bands on tour" docs. First, Tully only follows Berman for a few days - but these days happen to be spent in Israel, which reveals itself to be a profoundly life-changing experience for Berman, who had ony recently converted to Judaism after a stint in rehab. Second, this is Berman's first tour, his first-ever live shows, and we watch as an artist connects for the first time with an audience.
It is in this duality that the film excels. The audience witnesses the film's subject coming face to face with himself, who he is and how he influences others as an artist, and what he believes about himself and his world as a person of faith. In a few days, Tully captures a man coming alive with his own identity.
Tully, Lucy Walker and TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE editor Sloane Klevin on the cliff walk.
I didn't get a chance to see GREAT WORLD OF SOUND in Newport. Nor did I get to see it in CineVegas. Strangely enough, my film about music (nonfiction) and Craig's film about music (fiction) were programmed against each other at each festival. But hopes are high that I will see it next week at LAFF. I also didn't get a chance to see Jeff Nichols' SHOTGUN STORIES, which many of my fellow filmmakers were raving about (it won the student jury prize, as well as the New American Cinema award at the recently concluded SIFF).
I did get a chance to go to numerous parties and events at Newport, of which I had been only partially prepared. They turned out to be a happily endless series of ongoing house parties at mansions (or chateaus, take your pick) sprinkled throughout town. On his blog, Michael Tully described this experience masterfully:
I stood on a porch on a mansion on a cliff above the water Friday evening, eating lobster and shrimp and sushi. While these festival experiences are great, for a sensitive person such as myself it is really, really, really hard to have these extreme ups and downs. I was in more mansions in two days than I've been in my entire life combined. And now I'm back in my room, realizing that I have forty-two dollars in my account and no food in my kitchen. I'm not complaining, just pointing out the strangeness of this lifestyle. It is e-x-t-r-e-m-e.
One thing that Tully forgot to mention was what happened after he, Lucy Walker and TAXI TO THE DARKSIDE editor Sloane Klevin experienced at the end of our long stroll/run/climb over Newport's famed Cliff Walk. We came to a street miles from where we had began and I knew that my screening was less than an hour away. None of us could get cell reception so that we could call the festival and request a lift. So we walked to the end of a long residential street where what to our wondering eyes should appear but a trolley car, idling by, waiting to pick up a load of tourists from one of the many Newport mansion tours. We asked for directions and he invited us aboard, asking us to move to the back and keep our conversations to a minimum, and not mention to his paying customers - a flock of ladies from Philly - that we were getting in on the end of their tour. So we meandered back to town, hearing a bunch of great stories, told in classic Catskills entertainer fashion (Did you hear the one about Claiborne Pell?).
What follows now is some of that experience in photo form featuring the previously named Horowitz, Sundberg, Walker, Harrington, Nugent, Paladino, Tully and Klevin, as well as juror/filmmaker Katie Brown, DEVIL CAME ON HORSEBACK co-director Ricki Stern, juror/filmmaker Kristi Jacobsen and Newport's Sam Griffin, among others.
Before I even arrived in Newport, I was excited by David Nugent's amazing line-up of films, many of the best nonfiction films that have debuted at fests over the past nine months (really? I could have given birth - well, not me perhaps - since Toronto?) and I was honored to be included amongst them.
The festival itself, which had been praised to me by others in advance, outpaced my expectations. The staff was incredibly gracious (even if transportation was sometimes a little difficult to procure, particularly from my motel somewhere near Massachusetts) and the audiences warm and responsive. And obviously the parties were pretty tremendous.
But, and maybe it was because the festival was celebrating its 10th year, staff changes were looming and old faces returning, there was a familial aspect to Newport that I hadn't expected and perhaps haven't seen at other festivals. The same quality I mentioned at the top of this post - seeing old friends, making new ones - was reflected in the staff, the locals, the regulars. It was a wonderful weekend.
Thanks to David, Sam and everyone for their remarkable hospitality.
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