*****
Front Row at the Saints and Sinners Film Festival
By Pete Bauer
While the rest of the REwind community was recuperating from the 2002 RMAs, I attended a similar festival in St. Petersburg, called the Saints and Sinners Film Festival. The festival was very well attended by a varied group of independent film fans... everyone from metal goths, to tan yuppies, to spike-haired punks, to parents and grand-parents... they were all there to support local micro-budget filmmakers. Held in downtown St. Pete at the State Theater, this usual haven of up and coming metal and rock bands was quickly transformed into an underground, indie-edge style showcase of aspiring filmmakers, with uncomfortable chairs, over-priced drinks and pizza and a great amount of enthusiasm and communal support... it was perfect.
Saints & Sinners The festival started at 4:00 p.m. and the line formed around the block. Though there were some kinks in actually getting people into the theater in a timely manner (after all, it's frickin' August in Florida! Open the doors early and let us get in the air conditioning!), no one seemed to mind. The festival, which separated the entries into non-horror (Saints) and horror (Sinners), showcased projects made by Florida filmmakers. Feature projects were interspersed with shorts and the festival concluded with the premiere of TOXIC AVENGER 4: CITIZEN TOXIE. As most of you know, I am not a fan of horror movies... at least the real bloody ones, but I really wanted to show my support to the fest so I sat quietly, hoping I wouldn't get grossed out. And, to my surprise, I wasn't at all. The Sinner projects were horror, but not gory, which I appreciated.Now, I'm not sure if this was intended by the festival organizers at Renegage Films, but the best of the line-up came within the first four hours of this ten hour event. The fest opened with a local shot-on-video pseudo-documentary called BLEED, which was eerily like THE LAST BROADCAST. It was a nice project to start the festival and the audience was eager to show their support with appropriate hoops and yells. It was then followed by an effective film short called UNRAVELING AMELIA, about an old woman's trip into insanity as a result of being snowed in at a remote cabin. The highlight of the fest actually came from one of the guys at Renegade Films. He was home with the kids one day and threw together an absolutely hilarious and adorable short called WONDERBOY. It rocked! Other quality films were IT'S ONLY YOUR IMAGINATION and the very funny Clerks take-off called CLARKS, which ended with a hilarious homage to THE BREAKFAST CLUB.
Other projects were either not effective or just not that good. CHILD OF THE APOCALYPSE, about a Satanist having the Anti-Christ, though trying to be satircal look at tabloid media, was far too blasphemous for my tastes. And LOOKING IN THE FISHBOWL, a Crystal Reel Award winning short film, was very funny, but seemed to go out of it's way to bash Catholics. Being a card carrying Catholic, I couldn't help but ask the simple question... WHY? I'll never say Catholicism, or any other religion, is perfect. But, attacking any of them without it actually meaning something just seems lazy and a waste of a good story-telling opportunity. Falls into that oh-so-typical "rebelling against the institutions" thing that just isn't that original to me... so high-schoolish... rebellion-lite. But, that's just my opinion.
As all of you know, I have GREAT respect for anyone who can put a film together, not matter what the end quality. We've all been there and know that even unsuccessful projects take a hell of a lot of work. That being said, the worst short of the day was easily a mafia story called HIT & MISS... it was obviously their first effort. Shaky camera moves, bad audio, bad logic and bad framing all combined to make this one that will quickly fade from my long term memory. And one of the most memorable shorts was called GOOD GOLLY MISS DOLLY... it was so bad, it was charming. The story, about two hillbillies arguing over the love of Dolly (a peeing goat) was memorable because one of the guys kept his face down the entire time, obviously reading the script (which was visible on the table). It was hilarious. You end up loving those types of things even more because you know that these people have had no real training, yet are still driven to make movies. It was inspiring, in an odd sort of way.
Now, I'll admit, I must be getting old, because I could not make it through the entire festival. I ended up leaving after CLARKS at around 11:30 p.m. Unfortunately, there were some shorts I really wanted to see, but my eyes were starting to glaze over and I was struggling to pay attention. I didn't want to do the filmmakers an injustice by not paying attention, so after 7 1/2 hours I hit the road and headed home.
Major kudos go to the guys at Renegade Films for all the time and effort in pulling this whole thing together. I'm sure Jon and the Linns know what a Herculean task that can be. I was pleasantly surprised at the overflowing crowd that attended the event. There's obviously a larger mirco-budget film community in the area than I had expected. The only real down side was that I was hoping the event would have lended itself to being more conducive for networking with like-minded filmmakers. However, the nature of the venue and the tight schedule limited that opportunity. Perhaps, in future fests, there will be more of a chance to just hang out and talk shop with other filmmakers.
From what I hear, the guys at Renegade are trying to get together another festival... perhaps as soon as November. So, any micro-budget filmmakers out there, especially those located in Florida, make sure to submit your stuff and plan to attend. If the upcoming fests are as successful as this first effort, it can easily become one of the top mirco-budget festivals in the country... second to the RMAs, of course!
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