Montclair Village Hosts “Oakland’s Short, Short Film Festival”
presented by Red Oak Realty and Crown Wine & Spirits
Friday, September 9, 2016
8:00 pm – 10:00 pm
Red Oak Realty Parking Lot
6450 Moraga Ave. Oakland
Red Oak Realty Outdoor Cinema is expanding the summer movie series with the first ever OAKLAND SHORT, SHORT FILM FESTIVAL. These 10 short films are focused on life in Oakland. Filmmakers will be in attendance as the shorts are shown outdoors on a fifty foot screen. The film fest is FREE to the public and is family-friendly.
Sponsored by The Montclair Village Association, Red Oak Realty and Crown Wine & Spirits, the film festival will focus on social insights relevant to a changing Oakland and highlighting the work of local filmmakers. The festival features an array of genres from documentary to art, animation, and fiction.
Highlights of THE OAKLAND SHORT, SHORT FILM FESTIVAL include:
Documentaries from Oakland’s Camp Reel Stories. A non-profit, Camp Reel empowers 13-18 year old young women with the skills to create their own media, view current media critically and thoughtfully and aspire to leadership in their field. And they deliver great storytelling, too.
Film veteran, Pixar and Disney alumnus, and Academy Award nominee Jim Capobianco will show his independent film and animated short Leonardo. Jim was a writer on The Lion King and Ratatouille, and is currently completing production of the full-length version of his short with Disney.
The festival will also feature curated selections from the 2016 Brainwash Movie Festival including Reid Hemsing’s The Morning Ride, Jody Oberfelder’s art expose, Dance of Neurons, and Phil D’Asaro’s Death of Del Paso, the turn-around story of a not too distant city.
“There is so much great filmmaking talent in the area. Thanks to the support of Crown Wine & Spirits and Red Oak Realty, we were able to put together a fun and thought-provoking collection of short films,” said Daniel Swafford, Executive Director of the Montclair Village Association.
Some of the filmmakers and producers will be in attendance for a brief Q&A. The OAKLAND SHORT, SHORT FILM FESTIVAL will showcase 10 short movies projected outdoors beginning at dark. Bring your chair and a blanket, enjoy the Montclair Village community of restaurants and make it a night out!
We are happy to announce that the 2010 Brainwash Drive-in Bike-in Walk-in Movie Festival Audience Choice Award goes to — among several very strong contenders — “Morgue: A Love Story With Guts,” directed by Donald McQuade and written by Anthony Pizzo! Both of them came up from Southern California to see the 21 shorts we showed at the final weekend of the festival. Our congratulations, and thanks to them for submitting their movie and for coming up!
Speaking of which, we were really glad to get a chance to meet and talk to the moviemakers who came to the festival: Mark Poisella, writer and director of the feature “Dynamite Swine”; Jason Rose (director) and Leslie Rose (producer) of “Viola Concerto”; Matthew McKenna, who directed “Signatures”; Josh Self and Orlando Rivera, co-directors and writers of “Goodnight Harvey”; and Karl Schweitzer and Tony Turino, cast and crew of “Horror of Our Love”.
Congratulations again to all of our moviemakers and award winners! See you next year, if not sooner!
Thanks again to all who came to the festival and all of the moviemakers! Here are the first six awards — some time in the next couple days we’ll tally up the totals of the many ballots you submitted and award the Audience Choice Award!
1st prize: With Anchovies… Without Mamma by Thomas Justino
2nd Grand Prize: Way To Go, Christine! by Mark Thimijian
3rd prize: Goodnight, Harvey by Josh Self and Orlando Rivera II (IFYW)
4th prize: The Horror of Our Love: A Short Film by Dave Reda (Elftwin Films)
5th prize: Signatures by Matthew McKenna
6th prize: What Alex Understands by Sebastian Jones
Hi folks — tonight is the final night of the 16th Annual Brainwash Drive-in Bike-in Walk-in Movie Festival! Hope to see you there for some great movies and our always entertaining awards ceremony!
We’re screening a full-length feature called “Dynamite Swine” (facebook) by Mark Poisella, a rollicking action movie/buddy flick/poker movie that defies description but just works. This is the second year in a row we’ve opened with a feature film, and you seriously won’t see anything like this anywhere else.
We are preceding it with one of the best shorts I’ve ever seen (and I don’t say that lightly), “With Anchovies… Without Mamma” (facebook, trailer, website) an amazing mockumentary (by Brooklyn’s Thomas Justino) about pizza and revenge.
The moviemakers describe it as “an investigative look at love, loss, pizza and the depth of circumstance.” Whatever that means, it is incredibly tight — the acting and script are terrific, it’s hilariously funny, and it keeps you entertained until the only thing left in the box is a grease stain and that little plastic table. Want mustaches? It’s got mustaches, and people who sound like they’re from Jersey.
Anyway, I’m just babbling now, but you’ll really enjoy opening night TONIGHT, Saturday, August 7th. Don’t forget, it’s the Brainwash *Drive-in Bike-in Walk-in* Movie Festival, so you can come in on two wheels or four — or, just use the very convenient West Oakland BART station (less than a block away).
If you’ve been to the Brainwash Movie Festival before, you may have experienced some minimal technical difficulties.
As much as our occasionally rushing around at 8:59 pm has added to the ambience over the years, I’m glad to confidently say that that part of the Brainwash experience is increasingly getting left behind. Technology is improving, which means so is our festival. There are two big upgrades for 2010 that are exciting (to me, anyway):
We are borrowing a new projector thanks to an anonymous benefactor: a 3000-lumen 1024 x 768 pixel Epson that just looks incredibly bright and clear outdoors, even with streetlights on half a block away (which did affect our old projector). It’s very impressive (maybe I’ll post some footage I took from inside a car the night we tested our equipment).
Even better, we have a brand-new, incredibly powerful FM transmitter! It’s straight out of China and I, uh, assume it’s totally on the up and up with the FCC, yeah. According to the specs (and I am no techie at this level), it has 1 to 1.5 watts of output. What that meant in our little test was that you could drive all over the entire parking lot (it holds hundreds of cars) and have a crystal-clear signal. We acquired this small but powerful unit — and its compact little whip antenna — thanks to another anonymous benefactor named Michael Hawk.
The combination of these two new pieces of equipment means that every spot in the parking lot assures you of having an incredibly great experience and being able to focus on the REAL heart of the festival — the movies.
And for those of you who won’t be in a car, we will also be playing the soundtrack on a couple of nice, loud, full amps, so you’ll get stereo sound even if you don’t have an FM receiver.
Finally, check out our great new sponsors on our homepage, especially the always awesome, non-profit, City CarShare. I’ve been a member since 2004 or so and thus haven’t had to own a car in years. City CarShare members will get a 20% discount at the gate!
Among this year’s movies, we have a great raft of animation, as in years past. Voltaire’s Demiurge Emesis was also shown at the IndieFest and written up in ASIFA, the Int’l Animation Society newsletter, by Karl Cohen. Demiurge is narrated by Danny Elfman, better known for his fantastic work as the founder of the band Oingo Boingo (in the old days) and on movie soundtracks (including, recently, Milk). Duncan Maddux, our lead in the Brainwash broadcast series, who will MC our shows this year in person, was in Milk and ended up briefly featured on the 2009 Academy Awards.
Other animation to be shown includes:
Sunset to Sunset by Kent Hayward, about a walk across LA (that’s right – a WALK in LA!)
and the aforementioned Demiurge, both Friday night, Aug. 13th.
On Saturday, Aug. 14th, even more great animation includes:
The fantastic The Magnitude of the Continental Divides by Christopher Coleman;
Phillip the Safety Egg by Mike Owens (looks straight out of Adult Swim);
The Empress by Lyle Pisio (an Absolute MUST SEE for all animation connoisseurs);
Billionaire by Antonio Figueroa, about a game cataloging the roots of our economic collapse;
Frank DanCoolo: Paranormal Drug Dealer by Andrew Jones, not an animated movie per se, but featuring notable CGI while Frank and the world’s best reporter, Holly Malone, hallucinate;
and finally Goodnight Harvey, with some animation bidding a less than fond farewell to a formerly beloved childhood Muppets — sorry, “Muppos” — icon.
So bring a friend, bring a chair to enjoy the movies and see you there!
Without further ado, here are some images you can use if you’d like to promote the festival. I’d be glad to add something to the press release or to an image for any of our moviemakers, if you’d like.
The show will be August 7th, 13th, and 14th at the Mandela Village Arts Center, 1357 5th St., in Oakland, 9 pm each night, $10 each. Find out more about the festival!
City CarShare: the Bay Area car sharing non-profit - Members-Special ticket price: 2 for 1 at the festival if you show your fob at the gate! Drive in in a City CarShare car - all occupants free!!!.
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And many thanks to the following contributors — past, present, and future:
Founders: Shelby Toland, Dave Krzysik, Barbara Traub & Scott Arford Exec. Producer: Duncan Maddux 2016 judges: Neil Kaplan, Dave Krzysik, Kamala Stuart and Shelby Toland
Special Thanks to:
Amy Stabler, Dionne Stevens, Jason Gohlke, (General Partner Emeritus), Ron Baker, Simon Lang, Michael Mohr, Jalal Elhayek, Steve Mobia, Bekah Barnett, Ben the awesome fiddle and banjo player, Doug Campbell, Mark McGothigan, Gary Nakamoto, Dave Reda, Emmanuel Jonas, Steven DeCaprio, Sarah Fisher, Yvette Hochberg, Andy Kirk, D.J. Neel N. Kizmiaz, Lillian Phaeton, Bev Reiser, The Rhythmic Revolution, Hal Robins, Betty Tweedy, Jonathan Logan, Jesse Block, Ed Holmes, Vikki Vaden, Mark States, John Law, The SF Cacophony Society, (we're on pgs. 230-231), Scott Beale, Rob Schmidt, J.D. Boggmann, M2, Burning Man, Phil Shuey, Kathy Vaquilar, Annie Coulter, Mike Dingle, SomArts, Phil Snyder, Mark Thimijian, ALL of our moviemakers! and, in memoriam to Michael Hawk and Les Blank, whose movies live on.
