When Jasmine Dellal played her film “American Gypsy” at the Spokane International Film Festival in 2000, it was a hit. In fact, it was one of the biggest hits that SpIFF has ever experienced.It filled the 750-some-seat Met.Tonight’s screening of Dellal’s second film (she’s done…
By the way, if as the 2007 Spokane International Film Festival progresses you want to comment on your favorite films, use this blog as your forum. Just click on the “comments” tag of any or all of the appropriate posts and tell us what you…
Ninjas and skateboarders: What do they have in common? Besides a bit of blood flowing now and then, the correct answer is the Spokane International Film Festival.And let’s not forget the vomit.Up on the screen of the Bing Crosby Performing Arts Center during the first…
Received the following letter regarding my comments on the Oscar nominations (see immediately below):Hi Dan,First, Leo DiCaprio does not deserve a Best Actor nomination for either role. He does, however, deserve a Best Supporting Actor nomination for his role in “The Departed.” Leo is in…
We could easily have fit a sixth film into our Sundance Monday schedule. But I wanted to hook up our Kosovo film crew with three Spokane filmmaker who are spending 10 days here in Park City, trying to see as many films as they can…
Overheard at an 11 a.m. Sundance press screening of “Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten”:(To the room in general) “I don’t know if I’m up for hearing The Clash this early. … Have you ever heard them live? I did once and they were so…
Sundance has put me in a bad mood. And not just because I sat through three downer movies on Saturday. The protocol is that if I want to go to a screening, I’m supposed to request a ticket. So I wanted to see the controversial…
As for the people we met. I knew Kim Salyer when we were both seniors at Frank W. Cox High School in 1964-65. He now owns a video-processing company in San Francisco, and we connected between two of the movies, catching up on our lives.Equally…
Friday was a good day. Even though Sundance is harder than ever to navigate, particularly if all you really want to do is see films, we managed to see three pretty good ones. Plus, I met an old high-school buddy, we snared our third party…
First notes from Sundance 2007: I’m writing this about 4:49 a.m. Woke up with stomach ache and can’t get back to sleep.Impressions: Driving in on the shuttle, I meet a woman who says she works for “POV.” She’s here to “go to meetings and look…
If you’d like to catch a flavor of the Sundance Film Festival but don’t want to have to spend all the time and money getting to Park City, pay attention to this: Beginning Jan. 22, iTunes will sell downloads of 2007 Sundance short films for…
Just who are they graduating from public relations schools these days? Some people who send out press releases obviously aren’t familiar with the English language. Take the headline from this latest bit of news that I received from Home Media Daily: “2006 Titles: Less Films,…
One of the best parts of going to the movies has been, for me, always the trailers. Forget missing the opening minutes. Missing the trailers is the problem.Of course, these days, so many ads play before the trailers that it sometimes seems like one big…
Marshall Peterson, the Spokane guy who spends most of his time these days living in Mexico and taking photos of Mexican rock bands and at Mexican film festivals, saw my blog post on “Children of Men” director Alfonso Cuarón. That’s his photo of the filmmaker…
Here’s my quote for the day: “When people see some depth you never intended that’s really cool, you just put on a face and say, ‘Oh, yeah, that was deep.’ What are you going to say? I'm just a moron with luck?”The speaker: The humble…
If you were a kid growing up in the 1950s, you know all about Francis the Talking Mule. Starring Donald O’Connor – best known for “Singin’ in the Rain” – and boasting the voice of Chill Wills, the original six Francis movies began in 1950…
Got an e-mail from reader Dana Freeborn this morning regarding the shot-in-Spokane movie “Home of the Brave”:“I’d read in the S-R that ‘Home of the Brave’ – ‘should’ – be widely released around Jan. 5, but I don’t see it listed for any local theaters.…
First check of our online voting to rank the eight short-film finalists for the First Night 48 Hour Film Festival is fairly inconclusive. “48 Hour Therapy” has one vote, and “The Tradition” has one vote. Want to make your own voice heard? Click here and…
If you didn’t get a chance to get down to City Hall on New Year’s Eve, then you probably didn’t get to see, much less vote on, your favorite entry in the First Night 48 Hour Film Festival.Now’s your chance. We’ve put all eight of…
A Dan Webster joint, discussing news, notes and everything about movies.
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