The 17th Annual Brainwash Drive-in, Bike-in, Walk-in Movie Festival: unique independent movies in a great East Bay atmosphere

The New York Times says the Brainwash Movie Festival “pirates a piece of that old Hollywood magic and challenges conventions on the role of public space in the process.”

Brainwash organizers say, “We show movies in a parking lot in Oakland.”

The movies shown at the Brainwash Movie Festival are a great mix of original humor, experimental art movies, innovative animation, and short live-action stories with high production values. The moviemakers are unique and skillful storytellers, and the movies themselves pack a real punch into anywhere from 5 to 18 minutes. This year, we will feature a love story set in a post-global warming dystopia, a science-fiction period piece set in 1972, a six-minute Japanese historical epic comedy, and many more.

What’s a Drive-in Bike-in Walk-in Movie Festival? It’s set up like a traditional drive-in with FM sound as well as two big amps. Arrive however you choose: drive, bike, or walk in, perhaps with your favorite chair or blanket. West Oakland BART is within easy walking distance.

The next festival will be held Saturday, September 3rd, Friday, September 9th, and Saturday, September 10th, 2011.

Admission is $10 in advance online (available soon) and $12 at the gate, with discounts for multiple people in the same car. A $50 Festival Pass gets two people into all three nights of the festival.

Brainwash Movies has been showing great underground mostly short movies since 1995, and we have accumulated the rights to over 500 titles to produce an ongoing broadcast series. We’ve been written up in Variety, the New York Times, the Chronicle Pink Section, East Bay Express, Bay Guardian, SF Weekly, and this year AAA’s Via magazine, among many others. We’ve toured the US Southwest and played at CBGB’s in New York.

We are also developing a broadcast pilot that includes footage filmed live at the festival. Stay tuned for a regular show of our short movies, held together with commentary, banter, and an as-yet confidential plot that may once and for all resolve the question: “Who is Shelby Toland?”