Dallas VideoFest 30 presents the final series of films in its fall season: Alternative Fiction Fest, featuring dozens of narrative features, TV-focused special events and shorts, during four days, Nov. 2-5, 2017, on one screen at one theater, Angelika Film Center, 5321 E Mockingbird Ln, Dallas, TX 75206.
WHAT IS ALTERNATIVE FICTION?
“There is lots of talk today about alternative facts and political narratives. The line between fact and fiction in life and in cinema is blurring. Filmmakers are making TV; TV shows become feature films. Who can even define what the idea of television is anymore with networks along with the gamut of streaming services? DVF30’s AltFiction Fest devotes the weekend to ways of telling stories on large screens and small – film and TV and web – mixing media and mediums,” said Bart Weiss, founder and artistic director of Dallas VideoFest.
The narratives that make up the majority of AltFiction Fest explore this moment in time at the intersection between media and how cinema artists can create original work in this new world.
“Over the 4 days at the Angelika, a great palace of traditional cinema exhibition, AltFiction Fest features new works from local and international filmmaker telling unique stories, working the edges and sometimes the centers of this world,” said Weiss.
BART WEISS ON PROGRAMMING
“This has been a very challenging year in programming. Since we are going from nearly 150 films over a week at VideoFest down to a few dozen, I have had to say no to a lot of really great films – films I would normally say a resounding ‘Yes!’ to,” said Weiss. “As a result, this is going to be one of the highest quality years in films that VideoFest has presented. And everyone will have the opportunity to see all of them they desire to see since we won’t have 2 or 3 auditoriums with films competing for audience members.”
#DVF30AltFiction Features & Texas Show Program
(in order of scheduling though schedule subject to change)
Online Schedule:
Thursday, Nov. 2
SIGNATURE MOVE
Director: Jennifer Reeder
Zaynab, a thirty-something Pakistani, Muslim, lesbian in Chicago takes care of her sweet and TV-obsessed mother. As Zaynab falls for Alma, a bold and very bright Mexican woman, she searches for her identity in life, love and wrestling.
DAWSON CITY: FROZEN TIME
Director: Bill Morrison
DAWSON CITY: FROZEN TIME, pieces together the bizarre true history of a collection of some 500 films dating from 1910s – 1920s, which depict a unique history of a Canadian gold rush town. The films, lost for more than 50 years, were discovered buried in a sub-arctic swimming pool deep in the Yukon Territory, in Dawson City, located about 350 miles south of the Arctic Circle. DAWSON CITY: FROZEN TIME utilizes these permafrost protected, rare silent films and newsreels, archival footage, interviews and historical photographs to tell the story of how a First Nation hunting camp was transformed and displaced. The story, accompanied by an enigmatic score by Sigur Ros, and collaborator and composer Alex Somers (CAPTAIN FANTASTIC), chronicles the life cycle of a singular film collection through its exile, burial, rediscovery and salvation.
Friday, Nov. 3
THE BEGINNING AND ENDING OF EVERYTHING
Director: Ya’ke Smith
Filmmaker in attendance
Angelita returns home from prison in hopes of reuniting with the young child she left behind. Upon discovering the child is nowhere to be found, she goes on a quest to find the baby, her hope and her reason for living.
Andy Anderson tribute
To honor the memory of local filmmaker and teacher Andy Anderson who passed away this year, we are showing his film, DETENTION.
DETENTION
Director: Andy Anderson
After some personal trauma, Wilson Walmsley is invited to work as a substitute teacher in a suburban public high school. He finds lack of authority and interest in the school direction and teacher body; and uncontrolled and abusive students in an environment of disrespect and lack of discipline. Walmsley becomes close to the arts teacher Louise and to the smart and abused student Joey. When he saves Louise from a sexual assault by a student named Davey, he and Louise are sued by Davey’s family lawyer; then Davey’s girlfriend beats Louise. The upset Walmsley lures, drugs and kidnaps Joey and six troublemakers of his class and brings them to his isolated property in Alpine, Texas. When the seven students wake up, they are naked and locked in cages with electric fences. When Walmsley arrives, he advises them that his class will begin, and any disrespect or lack of discipline will be duly punished. He shoots Joey to make his intentions clear. And the class begins.
Saturday, Nov. 4
I DREAM IN ANOTHER LANGUAGE (Mexico)
Director: Ernesto Contreras
Sundance Audience Award Winner
A linguist (Fernando Álvarez Rebeil) travels to an isolated Mexican village to study a nearly dead language, but finds that its only two speakers (Manuel Poncelis and Eligio Melendez) refuse to converse with each other due to an ancient grudge. In time, the researcher works to reunite the duo in the hope of preserving their native tongue, and learns more about the language’s mysteries in the process.
AMS Pictures – Programs – David Koresh and Monica Lewinsky
AMS pictures have developed a unique style to mix archival film and historical recreations to reinvent the Reality TV genre. We are showing 2 examples of this.
Murder Made Me Famous-David Koresh
Director: Ya’Ke Smith (filmmaker in attendance)
produced by AMS Pictures
The unnerving psychology behind murder has long been source material for television, books and movies but why do certain killers capture the attention of millions and their stories generate so much interest that movies are made about them? Each one-hour episode of Murder Made Me Famous presents dramatic recreations of well-known crimes using archival material and insightful commentary from those connected to the case to help unravel the twisted personalities behind the grisly crimes. New episodes focus on John Gotti, David Koresh, Susan Smith and “The Night Stalker” Richard Ramirez among others. Featured commentator for every episode is author and PEOPLE crime reporter, Steve Helling, who has covered several high-profile crime stories including the Natalee Holloway and Laci Peterson disappearances. Murder Made Me Famous is produced by AMS Pictures.
Scandal Made Me Famous-Monica Lewinsky
Directors: Brad Osborne and Rijaa Nadeem (filmmaker in attendance)
produced by AMS Pictures
What happens when a face in the crowd becomes a household name for all of the wrong reasons? See the unforgettable stories that thrust everyday people into the spotlight when their scandals reach the public. Each hour-long episode of Scandal Made Me Famous unfolds in the storytelling tradition of the fan favorite original series Murder Made Me Famous. Dramatic recreations of famous scandals are brought to life through archival material and insightful commentary from those connected to the story but Scandal Made Me Famous proves you don’t have to kill to become a notorious celebrity—you just have to be a part of a killer scandal.
New episodes include the salacious stories of Monica Lewinsky, Rachel Uchitel, Heidi Fleiss, Jessica Hahn, Mary Kay Letourneau and Jennifer Wilbanks. Scandal Made Me Famous is produced by AMS Pictures.
QUEEN SUGAR
Producer and Director: Kat Candler
Kat Candler has had a successful career as an independent filmmaker making powerful shorts and features. She is now a great example of making the move from film to TV.
QUEEN SUGAR follows the life of three siblings, one brother and two sisters, who, with one of the sister’s teenage son, move to the heart of Louisiana to claim an inheritance from their recently departed father – an 800-acre sugar cane farm.
Kat Candler, who served as producing director on the second season of QUEEN SUGAR, has been named executive producer/showrunner for the hit OWN drama’s upcoming third season. She replaces Monica Macer who served as showrunner in Season 2. Macer, in turn, replaced Season 1 day-to-day showrunner Melissa Carter. Like her processors, Candler will work closely with QUEEN SUGAR creator/executive producer Ava DuVernay.
UNDOCUMENT (England)
Director: Kyla Simone Bruce
UNDOCUMENT is an episodic feature, following 4 stories of longing and love, immigration & identity. The vision of an Iranian and a European director, dealing with the complex theme of illegal immigration or ‘undocumented migrants.’ Each story is set at a different stage of the migrants’ journey, in three different countries: Iran, Greece and England.
Sunday, Nov. 5
Panel From Film to Television
Sunday 10 a.m.
In Dallas Film Commission Lounge
Mockingbird Station
It seems like many filmmakers these days want to try their hand in television. This panel discussion will talk about how to make that transition both from a technical point of view and an aesthetic point of view. Panelists will include 2 local filmmakers now exploring the world of creating TV in the 21st Century: Ya’Ke Smith, filmmaker of both feature-length and short films, now has a web series and has directed television; and Rijaa Nadeem, filmmaker, now has produced and directed TV for AMS pictures and Kat Candler, a producer and director, known for Hellion (2014) and Black Metal (2013).
TELEFÓTO
World premiere filmmaker in attendance
Director: Richard Bailey
In this unusual ghost story, a working-class family of artists reckon with the gentrification of their neighborhood. They are people of an older Oak Cliff (a borough of Dallas, Texas) who cannot afford the new. When the connection between history, possibility, and place is severed, the situation is like living in a ghost world. In this poetic film, the topical coexists with the metaphysical; just as the family is haunted by the higher cost of living, they are visited by troublesome ghosts.
ART OF DIRECTING: JOHN HUSTON
Director: Allan Holzman
World premiere
Filmmaker in attendance
Allan Holzman, who has brought us the great series of documentaries about directing film, is bringing the world premiere of ART OF DIRECTING: JOHN HUSTON to DVF30.
An eccentric rebel of epic proportions, this Hollywood titan reigned supreme as director, screenwriter and character actor in a career that endured over five decades. The 10-time Oscar-nominated legend answers questions like, “What is cinema?” as he reveals his thought processes in making great movies out of great novels, which happen to include: MOBY DICK, THE MALTESE FALCON, THE TREASURE OF SIERRA MADRE, THE RED BADGE OF COURAGE, THE ASPHALT JUNGLE, THE AFRICAN QUEEN, THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING, Tennessee Williams’ NIGHT OF THE IGUANA. Emmy and Peabody award-winning director/editor Allan Holzman interweaves Huston’s bold and daring movie gems of Mr. Huston’s masterful work with the master’s wisdom, completing his trilogy on the Art of Directing.
The previous films, restored from AFI’s Harold Lloyd Master Seminars from the late 1960s and ‘70s, covering Steven Spielberg, Alfred Hitchcock, François Truffaut and Frank Capra had their premieres at the Dallas VideoFest in 2015 and 2016.
THOM PAIN
Directors: Oliver Butler and Will Eno
Rainn Wilson brings Will Eno’s one-man show “Thom Pain (based on nothing)” to the Geffen Playhouse 10 years after it was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Thom Pain is just like you, except worse. One night, he finds himself on a stage, in the dark, in a theatre. In the audience are people who, just like him, were born and will die. Thom is going to try to make sense of it all. He’s going to try to save his life, to save their life, to save your life – in that order. A camera crew captures the night, as various forces align to produce a reckless and accidentally profound event.
WAKING DAVID (England)
Director: Kevin Nash
Texas Premiere
Filmmaker in Attendance
During a lecture tour of England, Scarlett, an American psychologist decides to look up Amy, her half-sister and find out about her father who died 10 years earlier. She is surprised to encounter a family that won’t communicate with her or each other about the past. Just when Amy starts to open up about their father, the family creates a wall of secrecy and lies surrounding his death. Scarlett delves further into the truth, but when the truth is finally revealed, it shatters the stability of the family, causing all of the family and Scarlett to reassess their relationship to one another. The film explores the dangers both of keeping secrets and digging them up.
TEXAS SHOW-shorts block
Blue Morning
Director: Paul Armstrong – Dallas
A grieving woman is given a chance for closure with her dead mother.
Hinge
Director: Peter Koutsogeorgas – Dallas
The key to a woman’s apartment is taken by something unseen.
1917
Director: Joshua Gallas – Arlington
Attempting to bury his past, an Ottoman soldier flees his home country during The Great War and struggles to find his place in America.
Good Person
Director: Daniel Garcia – Arlington
Samantha pretends to be tough and streetwise but in fact she has never had power over anybody. Without planning to, she terrifies a young undocumented man about her age, and in his eyes she sees and understands fear. After chasing him for a while she might discover a friend.
Alternative Math
Director: David Maddox – Dallas
A well-meaning math teacher finds herself trumped by a post-fact America.
Far From the Tree
Director: Dave Thomas – Dallas
Abbie is a good mom, strong and a survivor…but Abbie is struggling. She struggles in her daily routine and in her relationship with her teenage son, Evan. The effect of a sexual assault years earlier weighs heavy on her. As these deep embedded feelings work their way out like a splinter, Abbie and her son reach a pivotal moment in both of their lives
Casa de mi Madre
Director: Frank Mosley-Austin
A fire rages in the woods near a village. This fire triggers a memory in a lonely, middle-aged woman. And this memory pushes her to utter aloud the words she’s always wanted to say.
Produced in Cuba with the support of Black Factory Cinema and Escuela Internacionales de Cine y Tv in San Antonio de los Banos (EICTV), and made under the guidance of master filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami. The result of Mosley’s selection as a participant in the 2016 Workshop for Auteurs, the film examines grief, transference, and the consequences of role-playing.
The Feetles
Director: Brady Tulk – Dallas
Sock Puppet Parody
Thread Sullivan introduces “The Feetles” for their first TV appearance.
The Earth is Not a Spaceship
Director: Krista Steinke – Houston
The Earth is Not a Spaceship is an experimental film that remixes vintage educational source footage collected by the Texas Archive of the Moving Image. A woman’s voice narrates the film, functioning as a mother nature type character. The narration becomes haunting and robotic when coupled with glitchy film footage that has been re-recorded off of various digital screens. The reworking of the footage presents a new interpretation at the intersection of abstraction, the digital sublime, and an inconceivable dystopian existence. Various collisions emerge between the digital and physical world, raising questions about technology’s ability to function as a surrogate for experiencing nature and the role that technology plays in our lives.
DALLAS VIDEOFEST 30
Fact Sheet
WHAT:
Dallas VideoFest 30
VideoFest.org
#DVF30
#DVF30AltFiction
FESTIVAL BADGES and LINKS:
All-Festival Badges: $50
(Includes all film screenings and events)
https://www.prekindle.com/event/91348-alternative-fiction-badge-dallas
For membership in Dallas VideoFest year-’round:
https://www.prekindle.com/events/VAD
Connect with VideoFest: #DVF30
Sign up for the Dallas VideoFest Newsletter:
http://tinyurl.com/DVFNewsletter
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/Videofest
Twitter:
Tweets by videofest
Instagram:
http://instagram.com/videofest
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#DVF30AltFiction Shorts Programming
(in order of scheduling though schedule subject to change)
Online Schedule:
https://www.prekindle.com/festival/id/24898849266263782
Thursday, Nov. 2
The Day Before the Wedding
Director: Geoff Marslett
Narrative short screens before SIGNATURE MOVE
This is a Colorado mountain comedy thriller about weddings and deer hunting gone terrible wrong.
Sara the Dancer (Germany/Austria)
Director: Tim Ellrich
Short screened before DAWSON CITY: FROZEN TIME
A Google Street View camera’s newfound desire to dance makes her usability deeply problematic. Sara The Dancer is the first short film entirely made with images of Google Street View and spoken by the computer-generated voice of Google Translate. The animation consists of more than 10,000 edits and the editing took nearly two years.
Friday, Nov. 3
Ritual
Director: Andy Anderson
Screens before DETENTION
A deadly ritual with a clock, a door, and a knife. This film leaves you with questions and images that you will ponder for weeks. Powerful filmmaking.
Saturday, Nov. 4
Flicks by Chicks – shorts block
Bag of Tricks
Director: Julian Butler
A lonely mailman gets recruited by the government to deliver a letter to a hostile double agent.
Christine
Director: Kate Montgomery
A short film that follows the adventure of a young girl, Christine, as she comes to terms with being a woman and staying true to who she really is. In the process, she struggles with understanding the difference between inner and outer strength.
A Taylor Story
Director: Alex Yonks
A 15-year old girl who is battling cancer goes out on Halloween with her two best friends for a night to remember. On a family horseback ride, her parents notify her that her chemo has stopped working and that she must decide whether or not she wants to live the rest of her life to the fullest without medical attention or go through with an experimental trial that has a low success rate.
The Return
Director: Hira Nabi
A taxi driver agrees to drive a stranger around a town the man has never visited. The duration of their short journey gives the man a new destination.
Story Town with Weldon’s
Director: Susan Carol Davis
(shown on Frame of Mind on KERA)
Weldon Burgoon, rodeo calf roper, saddlemaker, charismatic small business owner and family man, spins stories and insight gleaned from over six decades operating Weldon’s Saddle Shop and Western Wear Store in Denton, Texas. Weldon’s closure in January 2017 is symptomatic of the passing western way of life, once the heart of this North Texas community. There is insight into the management of a family business and a glimpse of what the future brings.
The Jocelyn Ja’Net Story
Director: Nikki G Gleamed
1 in 5 girls and 1 in 20 boys is a victim of child sexual abuse. 3 out of 4 victims of child sexual assault were victimized by someone they knew well. Experts agree that the incidence is far greater than what is reported to authorities. This is her story.
If You Only Knew
Director: Allison Unger
An accomplished law student must endure her graduation party as she struggles to hide her obsessive compulsions that threaten to expose her.
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Big D Mobile Short block
The Dallas Video Fest brings to North Texas the first film festival with movies shot only with mobile phones. The “Big D Mobile Phone Film Fest” will level the playing field for all amateur and professional filmmakers. Creative minds do not need fancy cameras and equipment to bring their stories to life.
Italy | Motion Timelapse (Italy)
Director: Prakash Natarajan
This is the first video in a planned series of 12 days in Italy!
How Was Your Birthday? (Algeria)
Director: Mohammed Zaouche
Lubna is a little girl from Palestine, celebrating her eighth birthday.
Breathe (France)
Director: Thierry Rousset
A young woman wants to have lunch on the terrace, but too many people are smoking.
Auikyani (Nicaragua)
Director: Harold González Chaparía
Auikyani is an experimental short film that tells one person’s three-year life experience. The story draws inspiration from the beautiful country of Nicaragua, friends and travel partners in a search for new experiences. Auikyani is Nahuatl for “Traveler.”
A Free Way
Director: Miles Shepherd
The filmmaker turns a mundane trip on the freeway into the sublime.
Our Love is Beautiful
Director: Ethan Gold
For the first music video from his upcoming follow-up album, Ethan Gold circled the globe with only an iPhone 6 as his film crew, filming people speaking the words of his evergreen romantic/political song “Our Love is Beautiful.”
Socialphrenia
Director: Wes Sutton
If everyone acted in real life as they do on social media …Society would collapse into chaos, and cats would take over.
The Runner
Director: Tamitha Curiel
A student runs late for class, and another covers for him.
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Sunday, Nov. 5
Houston Film Commission’s 2017 Texas Filmmaker’s Showcase – short block
Five Star by Ryan Booth & Henry Proegler – Austin, TX
With 41 full-ride Division I scholarship offers, Brandon Jones is one of the most heavily recruited high school football players in the country. But beneath the stats, the college offers, and the very real possibility of achieving his dreams of playing in the NFL, he’s just a kid. And he’s facing the biggest decision of his life.
Flown by Mark Blumberg – Austin, TX
A former astronaut’s adjustment to civilian life is upended by the death of a young test pilot.
The Gold Line by Lance Childers – Houston, TX
The sun breaks the horizon and covers the Houston skyline in morning light and long shadows. This is the beginning of the golden hour. Inside his apartment, Steven just woke up and had an epiphany, an idea for a great graffiti mural. After roughly sketching his idea, he leaves his apartment and skateboards toward the Houston skyline. Along the way, he is inspired by the stunning visuals that come with a great sunrise. At the same time, five other young skateboarders are navigating their own individual paths through the urban landscape of downtown Houston. The day, and their lives have just begun. Few will ever be this alive and awake.
Imago by Liz Cardenas Franke – Dallas, TX
The courageous, life-altering decision to never let anyone bully him again – not even his own father – leads a 15-year-old gay teen to fully embrace his true identity. Based on a true story.
Native by Travis Champagne – The Woodlands, TX
While on a ceremonial walkabout a young boy must defend his tribe against a mysterious force.
Shilo by Tyler Russell – Austin, TX
In 2006 a young man on his second deployment with the 10th Mountain Division arrived into war-torn Baghdad. His name is Shilo Harris. He had left his home behind, as his father did for Vietnam, to fulfill his destiny and serve his country. Five months later, his severely burned body was recovered alongside three fallen soldiers and their exploded armored vehicle. How Staff Sergeant Harris survived against all odds and became the man he was meant to be is the unforgettable story of Shilo.
_______________
Curtis -Narrative Short, screened before TELEFÓTO
Director: John Yost
Filmmaker in attendance
After a mind-altering encounter at a party, Curtis must face his inner most demons…and his cat…who is trying to kill him.
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History of VideoFest: Cutting-Edge Art
Merging art and technology since 1987, Dallas VideoFest has specialized in independent, alternative, and non-commercial media, presenting hard-to-find works rarely seen on television, in movie theaters, or elsewhere, despite their artistic excellence and cultural and social relevance.
Even in a Web 4.0 environment where everything is seemingly available on the Internet, VideoFest provides curatorial guidance, a critical voice in the wilderness navigating the vast and diverse landscape of media, helping to interpret its cultural and artistic significance. The event provides a communal environment for real-time, face-to-face dialogue between makers and audiences.
About Dallas VideoFest
VideoFest (VideoFest.org) is now the oldest and largest video festival in the United States and continues to garner critical and popular acclaim. VideoFest prides itself on bringing films to the theater that are rarely available to be seen anywhere else. Films like Experimental/Art Films through its Dallas Medianale, Animation, Narrative and Documentary Shorts, as well as Documentary and Narrative Features and some hard-to-find Classic TV episodes and Classic as well as Silent Films are often in the mix.
MISSION OF DALLAS VIDEOFEST
The mission of the Dallas VideoFest is to promote an understanding of video as a creative medium and cultural force in our society and to support and advance the work of Texas artists working in video and the electronic arts. Dallas VideoFest is a 501(c)(3) organization incorporated on April 25, 1989, under Video Association of Dallas. It began in 1986 as a weekend event, “Video As A Creative Medium,” presented at the Dallas Museum of Art by independent curators Barton Weiss and John Held.
That first event, which included two nights of video by selected local and national video artists, was a great popular success, which led to the founding of the Dallas Video Festival (DVF) in 1987. Dallas VideoFest also presents the 24-Hour Video Race, North Texas Universities Film Festival, Dallas Medianale, Three Star Cinema, and other programs throughout the year.
DALLAS VIDEOFEST | 1405 Woodlawn | Dallas, TX 75208
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MAJOR SPONSORS: Jeff & Jani Leuschel; City of Dallas Office of Cultural Affairs; Texas Commission on the Art; Dallas Film Commission; AMS Pictures; David Nathan Meyerson Foundation; Alford Media Services; KERA; CharlieUniformTango; Dallas Producers Association; Mockingbird Station; Prekindle; and Selig Polyscope Company. Sponsors: Alamo Drafthouse Cinema DFW; Angelika Film Center Dallas; Earthx Dallas; Studio Movie Grill; Harry Moss Foundation; F R E E M A N Audio Visual Solutions; Jersey Mike’s on Greenville; MAP – Make Art with Purpose. Media Sponsors: KERA’s Art & Seek; AMS Pictures; Selig Film News; Sell.com; SullivanPerkins; TheaterJones; and KellyKitchensPR.com. Special Programs Sponsors: Fort Worth Film Commission; Houston Film Commission; Texas Film Commission; and Texas Association of Film Commissions. Sponsors and Contributors-Special Thanks: Jeff & Jani Leuschel; Jim & Deborah Nugent; Spencer Michlin; Andy Streitfeld.
