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"Screen South very kindly agreed to give
me a grant to facilitate my attendance of the NYIIFVF and its
sister event the Los Angeles International Independent Film and
Video Festival this coming September. I believe that these are
the two main cities of American film making and thus attending
these festivals could have the potential to be very beneficial
to myself and the film.
I
was also very eager to attend these festivals as they had the
most expensive entry fees that I had ever paid. $525:50 combined
fee but I felt that would guarantee (if selected) a screening
in the two most important film cities in the states.
The
NY festival ran from April 2nd through to the 12th. Screenings
started at mid-day every day on two screens and ran until mid-night
each night at Village East Cinemas, Screens 1, 6, 7 at 181 2nd
Avenue @ 12th Street, Manhattan, NY USA. The festival itself was
sponsored by ITN Distribution and Independent Film Quarterly Magazine
and ran jointly with the New York Music Festival. The events kicked
off with a party on April 2nd at Madison Square Gardens.
I
invited many of the fellow film-makers that I had met from previous
film festivals to the launch party. Diane Longo from the Directors
View Film Festival in Connecticut went to the party and kindly
handed out many flyers detailing the date, venue and time of Summer
Rain’s screening in NY. She also used the Director’s
View press & contacts data-base and also sent out over 200
e-mail press releases to the New York Tri-state area press and
production companies.
In
advance of flying to NY, I contacted many of the New York based
film makers that I had met. I invited Robert De Niro as I was
his Character Research Assistant on FRANKENSTEIN. I also invited
controversial documentarian Michael Moore, James Schamus the writer-producer
of CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON and Rick Sands, head of production
at Miramax.
The
festival was also sponsored by Manhattan East Suites Hotels –
a chain throughout New York who offered a 10% discount film-maker
rate. However, I found that by booking my hotel through www.expedia.com
I was still able to stay at a festival hotel with a 25% discount
at an even greater saving than offered by the festival. I stayed
at the Dumont Plaza for the week.
The
advantage of staying at the official festival hotel was that it
very close to both the cinema’s and central Manhattan. It
was only five minutes to the Empire State Building, ten minutes
to Broadway and twenty minutes walk from Greenwich Village and
the cinema.
 |
As
the grant took care of the hotel room I was able to invite
one of my leading actors, Charlie Watts, who played Michael
in the film. Since filming Summer Rain Charlie went onto
spend a year as Christopher Wren in THE MOUSETRAP on the
West End. He then went onto understudy Vincent Van Gogh
in Richard Eyre’s VINCENT IN BRIXTON, which led to
him starring in Channel Five’s soap opera FAMILY AFFAIRS.
As
Paul Vaughan Evans had been to the Director’s View
Film Festival, I thought it was fair to let another member
of the cast, who worked for free on the film, experience
the buzz and excitement of a big film festival.
Charlie
and I both flew from Heathrow to JFK thanks to www.cheapflights.com
The cheapest flights we could find were with Air India and
even the in-flight meal was a curry. On the flight over
Charlie read my brand new screenplay TSAVO.
Getting
from JFK to the hotel required a yellow cab, costing $45.
It took nearly an hour in the NY rush-hour. But from the
taxi I grabbed my first sight of the Manhattan skyline.
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Charlie
and I were in room 1306 in the Dumont Plaza, 34th and Lexington,
and as soon as we arrived we started to prepare the Summer
Rain promotion items to take to the cinema the following
day. After eating we planned our campaign for the following
day |
MONDAY
APRIL 7th 2003 |
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The
very first thing we did was write out on 100 sticks
of Brighton Rock, the date and time and venue of the
film on the Summer Rain label.
“FREE
SCREENING – Screen 7 Village East Cinemas Wednesday
9th – 2pm” |
|
The
freezing, biting, chill wind ripped through our clothes
as did the sleet and snow as Charlie and I trudged our way
around Broadway trying to find the Sande Shurin Acting Studio
on 311 West 43rd Street. On our way there Charlie stopped
off at the Golden Theatre, 252 W.45th St where VINCENT IN
BRIXTON had transferred to Broadway. He tried to leave a
message at the stage door for Jochum Ten Haaf and Clare
Higgins and had the following conversation with the aging
native New Yorker doorman. |
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We
finally made it to the Sande Shurin Acting Studio
and were surprised that despite our festival
VIP passes we had to pay $10 to get into the
seminar which was advertised as: The Future
of Acting and the fundamentals for casting your
film.
I felt the panel was too free-form and did not
address the title of the event. Renarta from
ITN Distribution did speak well about the relationship
between film-maker and distributor and confirmed
our fears that ‘names’ drive the
industry, and of course ‘names’
are hard to get when you have little money to
pay for them. The casting director was fairly
unhelpful in resolving this question of how
to get names with no money.
The panel highlighted a difference in British
and American Actors, one actress came in late
and raised her hand and simply asked the Casting
Director: “Are you taking Résumé’s
today?”
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CHARLIE
Can I leave a message for Jochum and Claire please?
DOORMAN
Are you Dutch?
CHARLIE
No I’m English.
DOORMAN
Then why do you have a Dutch accent?
CHARLIE
No, it’s an English accent.
DOORMAN
Are you an actor?
CHARLIE
Yes I am.
DOORMAN
Jeez… you should have been an accountant.
CHARLIE
But I wasn’t any good at maths.
Charlie
writes a note to Jochum
DOORMAN
I’ll tell you what you should have been.
CHARLIE
What?
DOORMAN
You should have been a doctor.
CHARLIE
Why?
DOORMAN
Cos your writing is so god-damn awful. |
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When
the event finished all the actors in the audience instantly
produced their resumes and headshots, which in themselves
were very revealing. Whereas in the UK headshots are quite
‘soft’, ‘welcoming’ taking the ‘hire
me I’m friendly’ attitude, headshots in America
are glamorized and full of attitude’ film work such
as BAD BOYS 2 being highlighted in bold before any theatre
work or training. One resume I was handed (once my occupation
was discovered) listed the many costumes that the actor
owned as well of photographs of him in those very outfits
– NYPD Summer, NYPD Winter, NYPD short sleeves, NYPD
leather etc… listing in his skills FIREARMS. |
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Charlie
asked the panel if an actor should walk into an audition
as ‘the character’ even maybe adopting the costume,
or go as himself and then ‘turn it on’. Once
again I found the answers vague and contradictory. The general
consensus finally settled on a compromise, enter the audition
in the ‘attitude’ of the character.
The
chairman of the group Sande Shurin has recently published
a book based on her own teaching called Transformational
Acting. Unfortunately Sande did not go into detail about
her ‘method’ but I asked a student of hers Jeff
Applegate what it was: “Sande's approach differs
from standard Stanislavski Method acting or Meisner's approach
in that it is not about coaching yourself to remember comparable
emotions from past situations in which you've found yourself
(as in Stanislavski), or to draw upon a potential emotion
you might feel IF you were this character in this potential
situation at some point in the future.
In
contrast, Sande's approach, with its mysterious title of
"Transformational Acting" (which, while accurate,
can be off-putting at face value), starts from the basis
that the greatest point of truth we can start from as actors
is that of the here and now in which we (as the actors)
find ourselves at that given point in time. Granted, if
you're pissed at the world and have to perform a happy love
scene, that may seem inconsistent. So the bridge therefore
is recognition that emotion is more of a raw form of energy
that is given its shape by our psyche and the circumstances
of the moment. If we try to go into that happy scene and
pull away from or suppress that anger, then we are actually
separating ourselves from the raw truth of the emotion that
is going on at this particular moment, and the best that
would come out of that process would be a good PRETENDING
of the happy moment. But by allowing the anger, handing
it off to the character in a way that allows the character
to segue the anger into the happiness or whatever based
on the character's own circumstance, it will produce a performance
that is far more truthful, and will have a wide range of
colors of its own that might be subtly different than those
that would come through if you came to the set after having
found out you'd won the lottery---- no less appropriate
or truthful, but tinged with different colors. One of the
best parts about this is that it allows for a subtle variety
of these colors in performance, rather than one that becomes
fixed and stagnant.”
Further
details can be found at
www.SandeShurin.com
After handing out many sticks of rock to confused Americans
and taking on board a vast amount of resumes, Charlie and
I met directors Martha Vaga of TRYST and Matt Schaffer the
director of PROZAC BABIES; and we promised to attend their
screenings. |
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|
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Charlie
and I then retreated to Broadway and saw a pro-life rally
outside Toys R Us. We then journeyed deeper into Manhattan
towards Rockefeller Plaza, and in a momentary lull in the
snowstorm I took this photograph of the only tree I had
seen in NY to that point.
That
night Charlie and I went to Village East Cinema’s
and checked out the presentation. We found thousands of
posters and fliers on display in the cinema lobby for
all the films due to screen. We put out several handfuls
of Brighton Rock on the tables and a couple of posters,
cast interview sheets and production information. Almost
as quickly as I put the information out it was taken,
instead of making me happy that just disturbed me as I
didn’t have the quantity of promotional materials
available to replace the missing items.
At
8pm we went to the New York premiere of CHROMA: directed
by Carrie Shultz. 17minute documentary. Colored sound,
colored touch, colored letters and numbers. Reviewed as
“psychedelic” and “meditative”,
CHROMA interviews three women possessing the unique neurological
phenomenon of Synesthesia ( “crossed senses”)
and illustrates their descriptions through a mix of film
and digital effect techniques. Best Student Documentary
– Independents’ Film Festival, and picked
as “Best of Fest” at the Dahlonega International
Film Festival. NYIIFVF Award Winner.
I
found the subject matter fascinating but the execution
I thought was far from impressive. A few digital effects
thrown over three talking heads was far from dazzling.
The subject matter was informative though and unusual
so perhaps this is why this film has won several awards.
|
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The
following film was the main feature of the evening.
A feature length documentary entitled MAD DOG PROSECUTORS.
Directed by Russell Richardson. 67 minutes. Documentary.
After an entrepreneur unexpectedly becomes the target
of an FBI investigation, he documents the truth behind
his investigation, the harsh realities of the American
legal system, and an unfair prosecution. |
|
I
found this film fascinating and it did reveal the ‘trap’
that the American legal system has fallen into. Just for
the defendant to mount his case to say “I’m
innocent” cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Then
it was easier and cheaper to say “Guilty” to
a lesser charge than deny the greater charge; even then
to a faceless prosecutor. As the prosecutor did not agree
to take part the film felt very one-sided and perhaps did
not make certain key legalities clear. However, it was a
huge insight into the unfairness of the American system. |
After
the screening the entrepreneur took a Q&A where
he admitted that he had done something wrong, but
it was a minor, unintentional infraction that did
not warrant the time in jail he had to serve. He smiled
when he admitted he had since met the faceless prosecutor
by accident. Mad Dog Prosecutors then hosted that
evening’s festival party at SERENA’S NIGHTCLUB
underneath the Chelsea Hotel, 222 W23rd St, where
Charlie and I invited everyone to our film. |
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TUESDAY
APRIL 8th |
| Charlie
and I battled through the torrential rain to the cinema
and went to the NY premiere of CANCER DREAMS: Jesse Knight
dir. 23 minutes. Science Fiction. In a hellish world, Captain
Alonzo Cowart finds out that in death, existence is purely
a state of mind and a direction of will.
Impressive
visual effects, grandiose visuals ruined by a dreary score
and an impenetrable story line. It had much to suggest the
film-makers had put vast amounts of time and energy into
making it. The special effects were quite a marvel on a
film obviously made by teenagers, as were the Ninja fighting
sequences – and there you discover the failings of
the film. Just because it looked good did not mean that
it made any sense whatsoever. A true film student, media
studies movie, important to the makers only. Perhaps given
a decent story the film-makers would stand a better chance
of making a good film. However, it did have much to suggest
the makers had talent. |
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That
was followed by Matt Schaffer’s PROZAC BABIES:
85 minutes. Drama. A young man refuses to take his
Prozac.
Like Cancer Dreams before it, there was much to recommend
Prozac Babies except for the final product. Charlie
was very taken with the truthful style of acting and
dialogue, but we both agreed that it had all the hall
marks of a low-budget independent film. It was badly
shot on digital, my inner director was screaming ‘buy
a tripod!’ and ‘light the scene!’.
The story had a disappointing climax leading the audience
to wonder how some plot lines had been so easily resolved.
However, the quality of some of the acting and dialogue
was outstanding. Many scenes had a raw, disturbing
power that suggested the director would go far given
access to decent facilities and an ‘audience
friendly’ script, at least one that didn’t
feature three genuine vomiting scenes. When asked
how he achieved the realism of the vomiting, Matt
Schaffer replied that his lead actress was a former
dancer and was use to ‘taking care of that kind
of thing’. |
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The
story followed a depressed young man and his daily trawl
through life; hanging out with his ‘intense’
Karate instructor, his junkie friend and his bulimic, obsessive
girlfriend. His life deteriorates until he finds himself
using his belt on his girlfriend screaming “I hate
you!” After an aborted suicide attempt he takes stock
of his life and starts using the Prozac.
After Charlie and I had congratulated the director we left
the cinema, traumatized, and went out for lunch at the Telephone
Bar & Grill – an English theme pub, decorated
by three red phone boxes. Inside we found that out that
there was a film-makers 10% discount on the bill. We were
even more excited to find that on TV was live coverage of
Manchester United being thrashed by Real Madrid. We also
discovered that the Bar ran it’s own mini film festival
on Wednesday nights. This month it was the James Bond season.
Whilst we ate many of our fellow film-makers joined us. |
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That
afternoon Charlie and I went to the local internet
café and copy shop. I sent out final e-mail
invitations to the festival and Charlie adapted the
Summer Rain artwork. The poster now included the date,
venue, time and the legend: “This
project has been enabled by Screen South and the RIFE
lottery funding programme.” Charlie
then manually cut all the posters to size. |
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We
went back to the cinema and put the Summer Rain posters
out on display in prominent positions, supported by
liberally strewn sticks of Brighton Rock (just to
confuse everyone).
The
cinema manager prevented me from taking further photographs
in case I breached the copyright of the other film
images on display. I tried to explain that Summer
Rain was my film and I was only interested in a photograph
of my main actor and my own artwork together for this
report; but I was told that the cinema didn’t
want to be sued so I had better put my camera away.Hence
to view the photograph of Charlie next to the Summer
Rain posters that appears alongside this paragraph
– please sign the non-disclosure agreement in
appendix A of this report.*
*No
such Agreement exists.
 |
That night we went to see the Broadway musical
‘THE PRODUCERS’ by Mel Brooks before
attending that night’s festival party
at Café Deville, 103 third Avenue and
13th Street. At the festival party we met as
many of our fellow film-makers as possible and
spread the word. |
WEDNESDAY
APRIL 9th
|
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At
last it was the day of the screening. I was very
nervous, partly because I was unsure how big the
audience would be. I was upset that my film was
in a 2 pm slot, midweek – how much of an audience
would that attract? To
my relief an audience came. True, it was not as
large an audience as previous film festivals had
treated me too, but nevertheless it was a reasonably
turn out. Many of the Director’s View Film
Festival staff came from Connecticut to support
the film. As did many New York based film makers
that I had met at previous festivals. Even my cousin
Staffan who I had not seen in twenty years came
to the screening. Sadly, Robert De Nero, Michael
Moore and Miramax did not come. |
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The
screening went well and the film was very well received.
I had a genuine thrill that after all the problems of making
the film here I was in New York with a member of cast reaching
an audience I would not have dreamed I would have the opportunity
to present the film too. |
|
Summer
Rain seemed to stand out as it was one of the few up beat,
positive, independent films to have been made, let alone
programmed. Its production values seemed considerably higher
than anything else that we had seen. Comparing my film to
everything else that we had seen reaffirmed my belief that
I have a career ahead of me.
The
Q&A with the audience went well. Firstly I thanked Screen
South for their support and help in allowing me to attend
the film festival and then Charlie and I answered any of
the questions that were thrown forward. How much was the
budget? How long did it take you to make? Where did you
get your actors? Why did you make it? All the normal questions.
The post-screening Summer Rain party was held at the Telephone
Bar & Grill and much of the audience joined us to celebrate
the film’s success. |
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THURSDAY
APRIL 10th |
|
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Finally
I felt that I deserved a day to myself, having survived
the trauma of another Summer Rain screening. As
part of the point of traveling to foreign film festivals
is to explore and take in other cultures I decided
to take on a journey to Central Park. We passed
the Chrysler Building and went into the impressive
terminus of Grand central station, up Madison, Park
Avenue, 5th until we reached the sanctuary of the
Park. The park is huge, and having walked deep within,
we noticed that you could not see the skyscrapers,
and although comparatively peaceful to the rest
of New York, the background buzz of traffic was
inescapable.
Having walked the length of Central Park to the
Jackie Kennedy Onassis reservoir, where we re-enacted
several scenes from THE MARATHON MAN, we diverted
to the Guggenheim Museum. Then we went to the Metropolitan
Museum before walking down Madison towards Bloomindales.
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However,
the highlight of the day was left until the night. We went
up to the 86th floor, the observation deck of the classic
Empire State Building. My disappointment that there was
not an impact crater and big chalk outline of a monkey on
the road outside disappeared when I saw the incredible of
New York. |
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That
night, Charlie and I finally met up with Jochum
Ten Haaf and Clare Higgins. Jochum was nominated
for an ‘Olivier’ award in London and
now he is on Broadway, he has been nominated for
a ‘Tony’ award. Jochum was obviously
pleased to see Charlie, a friendly face in New York
and we had a wonderful night talking about acting,
films and of course… “Soccer”.
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FRIDAY
APRIL 11th |
I
went early to the copy shop / internet store to arrange
the FedEx of the Summer Rain masters to the Bare Bones film
festival in Oklahoma where Summer Rain has been nominated
for ‘Best Foreign Film’. I then made sure that
the Beg & Grovel Film Festival had received the screening
masters from the Pensacola Bay Film Festival. When all was
in order Charlie and I took the subway down to Park Place
and walked the fifty yards to Ground Zero.
Ground
Zero is a scar, emotionally and literally on the Manhattan
skyline. Tall buildings abound everywhere and then there
is a sudden gap where the sky just looks empty. Beneath
this gaping hole is a massive building site the size of
two football stadiums. It was hard trying to visualize the
images of the mighty Twin Towers when presented with this
hole in the ground and equating that with the horror of
their destruction and the loss of 3000 people. The names
of the fallen civilians, firemen and police were listed
on a plaque, beneath which were several bouquets. Across
the photographic information boards were scrawled notes
of love and remembrance. |
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The
buildings around the site still bore the marks of destruction,
one building was shrouded entirely in a mourning cloak of
black. Beneath a massive mural of hope stands the last remaining
girders of the original building, standing as a cross, wrapped
in the American flag with tributes beneath to the firemen
who lost their lives.
Then,
the last New York landmark for Charlie and I to see was
the Statue of Liberty. We walked down to Battery Park and
looked out across the Hudson River… She’d gone
out for the day. |
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Charlie
then had to rush off to JFK to catch his flight back to
England. Arriving at Heathrow on Saturday morning, he was
then immediately flying to Manchester as he had tickets
to watch Arsenal play Sheffield Wednesday at Old Trafford
in the F.A Cup Semi-Final! Arsenal won 2-0. As I didn’t
have tickets to see Arsenal play I stayed in New York and
went to the penultimate night of festival films.
SO
MANY WOMEN, SO LITTLE HAIR: Jon Rubin, director. 15 minutes.
Comedy. A documentary following the moderately attractive
Jon Rubin as he fearlessly attempts to pick up beautiful
women on the streets of New York City.
This
was the only film of the festival that I can genuinely say
I loved. Jon Rubin is a balding, plumping Jewish New Yorker
who wants to marry the ‘woman of his dreams’.
So to facilitate this dream into reality he stops and talks
to ANY beautiful woman he passes in the street. Watched
by a hidden camera team he tries his opening line “Hey,
didn’t you use to go to Columbia University?”
on every woman in the city with hilarious results. After
the success or near 100% failure rate of the initial chat
up, the camera team would then interview the victim of Jon’s
attentions. Nearly all of them liked him but sadly only
as a ‘friend’, that’s if they hadn’t
given him a fake number. It was genuinely funny, insightful
and as the object of delusion was also the film-maker, how
could you not feel sympathy and affection for him. A lovely
piece of self-depreciating humour. A fifteen minute gem. |
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BIG
APPLE: Danny Lerner, dir. 83 minutes. Comedy. Angel
McGee knows everything about women, Max Rosenberg
has never had a woman, and Jackie is still looking
for the man of her dreams. They may have nothing in
common but they’re all about to get entangled
in a bizarre mystery of murder in the BIG APPLE. Starring
Jaid Barrymore (The Last Days of Disco), Carlos Leon
(The Big Lebowski). NIIFVF Award Winner. This
film won the ‘Audience Award’, ‘Best
Newcomer Director’ and ‘Best Actress’.
I’ll lay my cards on the table and say straight
up: I disagreed with everything about this film.
To
me, it was mock Woody Allen from the seventies. Trying
to recreate his persona and the slapstick style of
humour he created in films like ‘Banana’s’.
I found the execution painful, dull and predictable.
The lead character too Woody for his own good. That’s
not to say there was not some stand out comedic moments.
I laughed out loud several times and I thought some
of the lines were brilliant, but that does not make
it a good film. I did not like the editing, I thought
the timing was out. Acting poor (including the award
winner) and that the whole thing was predictable.
The story which concentrated on relationships was
entertaining but they threw in a half-hearted serial
killer which in a romantic comedy came across as distasteful.
I know it sounds like sour grapes but I genuinely
didn’t think it was very good. However, it sold
out the Greenwich East Cinema screening. (It was made
in Greenwich). |
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That
night’s party was held at DISCOTHEQUE, 17W 19th St.
After an hour or so I left the party with friends and went
to O’Neill’s in Soho where everyone excitedly
told me an episode of ‘Sex in the City’ had
been filmed. I was with the bar’s attorney who to
the shock of everyone lit a cigarette - smoking is now prohibited
in all public venues in the state of NY. He laughed “What
are they going to do? Sue me?”. As it was 3am and
the bar was shut to the public, he felt he was safe. He
lived across the road from O’Neill’s in the
same building as Calvin Klein. |
SATURDAY
APRIL 12th |
With
the festival winding down I was pleased to spend the day
in Greenwich Village and Soho with my cousin Staffan. He
introduced me to the Italians of New York and a wonderful
bar called Angolo’s where Football Italia was broadcast
live, Inter Milan vs. AC Milan.
It
was also the first day that it was not raining, sleeting
or snowing. Instead I had glorious blue skies and sunshine
and Greenwich Village came alive. Suddenly the area became
colorful and vibrant, filled with interesting stalls and
shops. I also passed a fire-station with over twenty five
photographs on their gate of the men who died from that
single station on September 11th. New York suffered badly
on that day and I think the wound is still fresh.
I
discovered a place called DVdojo – www.dvdojo.com
an independent film maker’s coffe shop and facility.
You could learn DV film making, editing, scriptwriting –
attend seminars, workshops and lectures whilst enjoying
a beer or coffee. Attached next door there was a poetry
and arts coffee shop. This was the very hub of creativity
and independent film making in New York that I had been
looking for. If I was a resident of the city I know this
would be the venue where I would hang out. I bought two
books “How to Enter Screenplay contests and Win”
and “Script Writing on the Internet”.
I
went to the last film of the festival, TRYST, the winner
of the BEST THRILLER Award at the NYIIFVF.
TRYST:
Mirtha Vega, dir. 75minutes. Thriller. A racy and sophisticated
noir/thriller. TRYST is a veritable knock-your-socks-off
roller coaster ride of sex and violence set during an afternoon
rendezvous in a boutique hotel room.
As
Mirtha had been on the first seminar that I had seen I had
been particularly interested to see her film. Sadly, I hated
the film. I thought it was overwrought, over-written, over-acted,
over-plotted and basically bad. Half way through the film
the girl sitting next to me turned to me and said “My
life is too short for this” and left the cinema. She
was the first of ten walk outs. I would have followed but
I was intrigued to see if the film was really as bad as
I thought it was.
It
was.
At
the closing night party at the CHINA CLUB, I once more met
up with Jeff Applegate, a student at the Sandi Shurin Acting
studio. He too had seen the seminar and the film and I asked
for his opinion... his venom exceeded mine. Then he pointed
out that both award winning films that I had seen had both
been on home turf, New York films in front of a local sell-out
audience. Safe programming for a festival director, he knows
he can find a full house for two otherwise unknown independent
films at $10 a seat. Whereas with the Brit-chick-flick Summer
Rain what guaranteed New York audience would that bring
in? Hence I was shunted to the 2pm midweek free slot leaving
the primetime $10 slots to the New York films. Awards for
the local heroes in front of the home crowd? Jeff then also
pointed out that (he may be mistaken) that both films were
distributed by ITN distribution, the sponsors of the film
festival. I can’t vouch for the factual accuracy of
his opinions but they were certainly interesting theories
when I hated both films. |
SUNDAY
APRIL 13th |
It
was the day of my flight from JFK back to England. I was
sad to leave New York behind, especially as the weather
had dramatically improved and I had discovered Soho and
Greenwich Village with my cousin. Part of the reason to
travel to film festivals is to experience other cultures
and see the world and New York is certainly an experience
to treasure. Surprisingly, I felt safer on the streets of
New York than I do in London or Brighton. The streets were
free of rubbish and chewing gum and they were clean, this
was not the New York I had expected.
The
festival had been an eye-opener into the standard of marketing
that independent films indulge in and the quality of the
competition out there.
Thankfully
I was able to conclude that Summer Rain is a quality product
and with some more concerted hard work I can forge a career
for myself in the film industry.
I
want to thank SCREEN SOUTH for their support in helping
me to attend the NEW YORK INTERNATIONAL INDEPENDENT FILM
& VIDEO FESTIVAL."
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Jonathan
Glendening |
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