Film
Last year, activist documentaries like Outfoxed showed that a new grass-roots distribution alternative was forming. Indie filmmakers don't have to rent out a theater: they can sponsor house parties and get their work directly to the people. Or they can turn clubs, coffeehouses and other neo-boho gathering spaces into microcinemas.
Springwater has already started a monthly movie night where local filmmakers like Michael Carter and Eric Williams have screened their work. Across town, in the promising Edgehill area, a new kino-club called the Sly Iris Cinema has made a home at the newly refurbished Edgehill Studios coffee-shop complex. Founded by Stephen and Suzie Lackey, it's an outgrowth of the Nashville Association of Independent Video & Filmmakers, the salon they started to bring film enthusiasts and filmmakers together.
On the last Friday of every month, Sly Iris intends to host an evening of several short films along with a local filmmaker Q&A. The first event was held last month, and, according to Suzie Lackey, it was a bigger success than she'd hoped. "We had about 50 people turn out," she says, "and we got contacted by several filmmakers who wanted to show their work."
Some of them will no doubt be on the bill for Friday night's second Sly Iris screening at 8 p.m. The lineup hasn't been nailed down—Lackey says she wants to be able to take submissions up to the last minute—but it will include award-winning shorts from the 2004 Nashville Film Festival, an animated short by gifted sicko Don Hertzfeldt, and an archival educational film. "The goal of this event is to give indie filmmakers a voice in the Middle Tennessee area," Lackey says, "and to introduce the public to films they may never get to see anywhere else."
Lackey says Sly Iris is considering a special horror-themed night for Halloween. Submitting a film is free: it must be on DVD or VHS and have content viewable by the general public, although restricted screenings are a possibility later on. To contact Sly Iris about showing your film, check out the web link at www.naivf.com.
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♦ Trey Mitchell and Greg Hallmark's "Pieces" took home the biggest prize at this year's 48 Hour Film Project, which handed out 70 awards among 30 filmmaking teams. Mitchell won best director for the short, while star Kai Porter was named best actress. (The runner-up was Jennifer Ives in "Therapy Time.") Eugene Parks in "Embrace" got the nod for best actor, while Jeff Wilson got runner-up for his intense turn as a gangster in Hal Sandifer's "The Disciple." Audience award winners were "J.W.," "Wild Card" and "Split." The full list can be found at www.filmnashville.org.