As a kid my friends and I made movies. Nothing terribly amazing, and nothing terribly deep, but to us, this was the center of our universes. We’d get the gang together, make something up on the spot and shoot it there and then. And sometimes the movie got finished, and sometimes it didn’t. As I got older though things changed. It got harder and harder to make the movies and far easier to sit back and watch them. I never lost my passion for movies, and really, for making them, but my priorities changed and I made a decision to pursue writing instead of movies. Movies remain, and always will, a huge part of my life, but it isn’t the center of my world…though it’s awful close. But for some, movies and moviemaking is their reason for living and through movies they are able to show the world their hearts, their minds, and their passions. If you are smart, you can make anything you want, for any amount, big or small. If you are determined, you can get favors and friends and by sheer will create something special. And if you are lucky you’ll find someone brave enough to bankroll your film and trust that you will not waste their faith. However it gets made, to a brave few, making movies is the be-all, end-all of existence. This weekend, I was lucky enough to see the works of a few brave filmmakers on their way towards reaching their goal – creating films as a full time job. Some will make it, some won’t, but all of them push forward, against odds and against what the world may tell them, and in the end, that’s what matters most. And for that bravery to continue after their passion, I applaud them.

Flint, if it is even a name known by those outside of the city limits, is known because of a little film called Roger & Me. Made by filmmaker Michael Moore (who, let it be known, ain’t FROM Flint, near, but not from), Roger was a wonderful jab at what equates to the rich fiddling as Flint burned. As great a film as Roger is though, it served to create a myth about Flint that isn’t fair. When I have told people I live near Flint they say ‘oh, geez, I heard about that place, ain’t that from that movie?’. And then you get the whole spiel about the crime, and the murder, and the factories closing and blah, blah, blah. Newsflash kids, Flint is no different than any other American industrial city in 2006. If it made a mistake as a city, it was trusting in industry to stay, trusting to the point of reliance on that industry, and when it left, so did the city. It has taken a long time, too long for some, but Flint is on its way back to becoming the kind of town people will want to visit and live in. With the addition of the first ever Flint Film Festival, which took place June 5^th and 6^th, Flint just got that much cooler and regained a bit of its former glory. Working diligently for two years on putting this festival together, the people responsible deserve to be applauded and patted on the back for sticking with something that must have felt like rolling a rock up a hill. Even if this festival had been a complete failure – something I can gleefully say it isn’t – they should still have been cheered for their vision and perseverance in getting the stars to align and getting this festival going. As I said though, I can happily say that this festival, the first of its kind in Flint, was a rousing success. Now, I can’t say I know from festivals, as this is the first I have ever attended, but if the rest are half as professional and well done as the Flint Film Festival then I definitely need to get out more. Featuring over twenty-five films in several categories (ranging from feature, student, short film, music video, high school films, and documentaries), this was as well put together as you could ask for of a first year festival. The festival, staged in the Mott Community College Regional Tech Center (a stunning building fresh off the presses and well utilized by the fest), was created in such a way that if you wanted to see a movie, by god, you’d have several chances to see it. Each film was shown several times, in different rooms within the Tech Center, and it was very, very handy for someone like me who wanted to see a few movies that were running against each other making it hard to see them all. The festival featured five rooms for the film screenings, the biggest of these being the auditorium that was used for the ‘bigger’ films, and four classrooms that varied in size for the rest. Each room was equipped with large pull-down screens and the films were shown via an overhead projector with sound coming from two front mounted speakers. None of the films I saw had sound or image issues aside from any that may have been inherent in the films themselves or from damaged source materials. There were a few glitches in the system, but I shall get to those later. But truly, you couldn’t ask for much better from a first year or tenth year festival.

I arrived bright and early at the Tech Center Saturday, the first day of the festival, and immediately made my way to one of the classrooms to see a documentary called Running Against Dick (www.runningagainstdick.com ), a brilliant documentary which was using the Flint Film Festival as its World Premiere. Shot in and around Missouri, Running Against Dick tells the story of ‘every man’ Dan Byington in his seemingly impossible mission to take a seat in Congress. Easy, right? All he has to do is beat out favorite and longtime politician Dick Gephardt and he’s home free. Knowing the odds are against him, Byington (and two other candidates who are running for office against equally daunting odds) pulls out every stop in order to get his voice and name out there in the hope that his message will be enough to turn the tides in his favor. From a barbecue/rally staged not long after he announced his intention to run, hoping this would create some volunteers to help him get his name out, to the use of his radio program to get his message across, Mr. Byington knows he has no choice but to put his head down and hope for the best. As time gets shorter and shorter before the November elections and the odds get greater and greater, Mr. Byington realizes that this is not just David against Goliath, but one average joe against a finely tuned political machine. Dan is not the only one facing a grim struggle though as the two other men running for office fall by the wayside early, after the first elections are held, and Dan is alone in his fight against fate. Mr. Byington though, an affable guy who remains hopeful even as his chances grow more and more dim faces down incumbent Gephardt – who is no more than a ghost in this film – as a Libertarian, which lengthens the odds even more. And as Election Day finally arrives, Mr. Byington suddenly seems to realize how great a feat he was hoping to pull off, though he still holds a distant hope of a miracle. At its heart, the film is an examination of America’s two-party political system and the inherent problems that are created because of this. What of the people who don’t believe in what those two parties believe in, asks director Srikant Chellappa, and frankly, who better to ask this question than a man who is new to America and who is trying to understand how its political system works and how so many voices can be served by so few choices. Allowing the story to tell itself and only interrupting the film (imagine that, a doc maker that DOESN’T want to be the center of the film, and yes, I am looking at you Moore, love ya as I may, I am looking at you) to strengthen his point that, frankly, two parties just don’t cut it, especially when any and every third party is all but laughed at by the dominating two. In a series of scary interviews, this point is made as clear as you could ask for as person after person is asked what party they vote for and why and without fail, each person says the same thing – I vote what my parents voted. Why? ‘Cause if it was good enough for mom and dad, it’s good enough for me. Another eerie moment in the film is when a compilation of news clips made by a man wanting to show the flaws in the way the media reports the news – what the clips show is that the news is nothing more than a manipulation of the facts and the people, everything boiled down to sound bites, each show beginning with a death it seems and ending with a laugh. A truly wonderful film, and a brilliant documentary, Running Against Dick was easily one of my favorites of the festival. Mr. Chellappa proves a very talented director and has created a very compelling, fascinating film. And three cheers for Dan Byington for doing what so few of us dare even consider – by putting his money where his mouth is and running for office, win or lose. Great movie, I hope you get the chance to see it. Running Against Dick – 8.

I missed the question and answer portion of Running as I was hurrying to make my second film, but it was pretty neat that Mr. Byington and Mr. Chellappa came all the way to Flint to show their film and discuss it. Bravo! The second film I caught was called Muffin Man (www.muffinmanthemovie.com ) which was a very sly, very funny pseudo-documentary about the decline and fall of mankind thanks to its obsession with snack foods. Presented as a class study on a distant planet, Muffin Man shows us a world where Mankind has pushed its love of pastries and treats to the outer reaches and has created a world of overweight people doomed to early death and unable to reproduce any longer. In this world it’s normal to push the outer boundaries of weight and an aberration to be thin, the thin people being referred to as ‘body Nazis’ because of their disdain for anyone not thin. We are presented with Muffin Man, a sort of every day schlep who is just trying to make it through the world as best he can. Finding sustenance in high calorie snacks and in the occasional romp with a large and lovely nymphet, Muffin Man is one happy fella. Happy that is until a beautiful but thin young woman sneaks into his apartment and into his life, gaining the favor of his unseen father and eventually Muffin Man when they learn of the life she is trying to escape, a life with a ‘body nazi’ who was abusive towards her. Though the Muffin Man’s relationship with this intruder begins roughly as she tries to take over for the family’s broken house-bot, this relationship soon softens as she eases her way into his heart via the wonderful world of snacks and sweets. And slowly, like the rising of a loaf of bread, the two fall in love, much to the chagrin of the girl’s boyfriend who appears to threaten the couple if she doesn’t return to him. Muffin Man’s mother, arriving for a rare visit, sweeps in just in time to brandish some heavy artillery and scare the boyfriend off, but not for long. And just as Muffin Man and his little honey bun are entwining their lives (much to her detriment as she has taken to eating as cavalierly as he does), the boyfriend appears again at their door, this time with a proposition – if Muffin Man can beat him in a physical sport of Muffin Man’s choosing, then he can keep the girl, but if he loses she has to go back to her ex. Muffin Man, feeling the need to prove himself and his love, takes the wager only to realize later that he can’t COMPETE in any sports due to his size and conditioning. MM’s sugar hatches upon a plan though that will keep her with her main squeeze and one that will utilize MM’s weight and size – the two men will have a tug-o-war. And may the best, and biggest, man win. A very sharp satire about the growing obesity problem in America, this is a very clever film that gets its point across without resorting to preaching. Mixing in moments of voice-over narration which show the rise of Homer Twinkus – the Twinkie Man – and the fall of his successor, the Muffin Man, it’s hard not to see what filmmaker Jessica Eisner is trying to say here. The film is very funny, and is at times equally disturbing but I did find it a bit long. There are too many moments that linger and meander when the story could be shortened and the pace made a little quicker. And, as with all satire’s, some of the gags work, and some don’t. The strangest of these gags are some scenes showing how the Twinkie man began to eventually equate food and sex, illustrated with several pretty freaky scenes of fruits and veggies show in the act of, well, copulation. Weird! This is a very strong film and was my cohort Oktober’s favorite of the festival. I liked it and thought it was damn clever but just a bit too long for its own good. A very good film though. Muffin Man – 7.

After catching Muffin Man I made my way to one of the smaller classrooms for an Independent Film workshop. Sort of a catch-all for newbies and those in the know, the workshop began with a brief explanation of the process of creating an indie film, moved to how scenes are lit, and then moved towards the most interesting segment of this lecture – the staging of a fight scene. Two local actors were given a crash course in movie combat, were lit, given a scene to play out, and were then set loose in what turned out to be a very funny ‘scene’ as both actors kept improvising their dialogue and motivations. The workshop closed with a quick example of on set makeup application, which in this case featured a bruised cheek and a blacked out tooth. The workshop was not as in depth as I would have liked but it was a very nice addition to the festival and I think could easily be expanded and improved in the coming years. I would like to see more workshops if possible, each one focusing on an aspect of making a film and I think that would really show that, daunting as making a film may be, it could be done.

The biggest problem of the festival occurred as I was trying to track down an intriguing sounding documentary called Ghosts of Vermont (www.vermontghosts.com ) . There was a problem with one of the classrooms being too full so the short subject films and a couple other films were split up and moved around a bit, creating some chaos for those of us who had hoped to catch certain films. It was one of a few problems, and was a hassle, but this is one of those situations where, bother though it may have been, it was a good sign – had they their druthers, I would wager that the people behind the festival would rather have too MANY people wanting to see films instead of too FEW. As it was, they made every effort to re-schedule the films that got interrupted but I was only able to catch the last half of Ghosts so it isn’t fair to give it a review. What I saw was interesting but seemed rather cold and heartless, more of a re-creation of who the ghosts might be (four ghost stories were presented), instead of showing us the haunted places and giving us evidence to the existence of the ghosts rumored to remain there. I did catch the High School films though and am glad I did. None of these are terribly professional films, and none are going to set the world on fire, but it’s very special to see these films that were made by friends with little to no money and with very limited resources available to them and done for the sheer love of making films. The most interesting of the four shorts was entitled Internet Detectives (www.coresoftcomputers.com ), which is a very well made, spirited adaptation of a young adult mystery novel. It is a far from perfect film, and these kids need to learn about pacing and need to strengthen their writing, but for fourteen year olds, this is one hell of a film, so bravo to all involved, especially young director Eric Wotila who was even filming stuff at the festival, he and his friends brimming with excitement at even being at the festival at all. Another notable film was Zombie Sports, a silly, strange short about the dangers of trying to teach your good pal the zombie how to participate in sports. Silly zombies. The best of the high school films and the prizewinner for this category was called Enigmatic Bounty Waldo, a brilliant pseudo-doc from director George Ettinger III about the various sightings of the mysterious Waldo, a striped sweater wearing young man known for walking the forests alone and said to be fond of blending into the background. Just when you thought you’d seen the last of dear old Waldo in popular culture, here he pops up in a well-nigh ingenious short that doesn’t hit on all its jokes but is as funny as anything I saw this weekend. Of all the films I saw, these high school films were the ones that made me mourn my filmmaking past the most, envying these bright, talented young people and their desperate love of moviemaking. Damn them! Ha, ha, ha.

The first day of the festival ended for me with a showing of Love and Loathing at the Ass-Lamp Lounge, from director Mike Andrews, which was hands down the best film I saw all weekend. A short and sweet tale of two strangers finding lust and then love in a quirky lounge, and, had this been longer, I think this could become a cult classic, as it is, it’s one hell of a calling card. A therapist visiting his local watering hole chats up a beautiful actress only to have her go ballistic on him and shut him down completely, angered at the audacity of his flirting. The next time the two meet is a rather awkward affair though as Ms. Actress walks in on our favorite analyst as he is in the midst of a make-out session with the new bartender, a pretty blonde who seems to have a penchant for making out with strangers. What should have been the end of their heated acquaintance though is really the beginning of a very heated tryst that ends up with Ms. Actress (hey, come on, I was watching movies, I don’t have time for remembering character names, what am I a machine to you people? Damn you, damn you all, ok, back to the review) and Mr. Therapist getting hot and heated themselves in the now empty bar (our lovely young bartender having since vacated, needing to take a walk after her bout of sluttiness). And when next we see our new favorite couple they are engaged in a tentative relationship, both desperate not to fall for the other but hoping, hoping for…but just as something real is forming between the two of them she gets a part in a play that is traveling the country for the next year and that appears to be that. A year passes though and the two make plans to meet at the bar on her return, both feeling ‘it’ again after having met up for a torrid weekend in Branson, Missouri, but is the chemistry still there? To read my synopsis this sounds like just another romantic comedy but then, it’s hard to explain a sub-plot about a rigged lottery system that dispatches goons to kill off ‘those in the know’, or to explain about the fourth bartender the bar ends up with who cannot hear higher vocal ranges so he has to have women speak in low tones to him, or hell, even the very nature of the relationship between the leads, which begins because the woman is SOOO turned on by the therapist’s smarminess. Great stuff, all of it. Do all the gags work? Not all of them, but we are speaking of a very broad comedy, and, as it turns out, a very sweet one. These may be two very mixed up, very aggravating people, but deep down they both really wanna fall in love. With each other. I am not sure if this will see release beyond the festival circuit but I cannot recommend it more highly. Sweet, silly, and funny as hell, this is a pretty damn good movie. Love and Loathing at the Ass-Lamp Lounge – 8.

Thus concluded day one, and thus left a very tired Mr. Grim.

Day two began bright and early again and first on the agenda was Coping (www.robinhoodfilms.com ), a film from a local filmmaker that Oktober and I watched with a sense of awe and horror. I have rarely seen a film, no, I tell you what, and I speak this with all honesty, I have not seen a film that offended me this deeply and upset me this much in a very, very long time. It wasn’t that this was a poorly made film, for it wasn’t, though it was shot far too much like a television program, but it was the subject itself and the film’s execution which chilled my blood. Coping is the story of two friends, both very successful inventors (I think) who are in the Flint city airport (yay Flint) to show their product to a prospective client. While there, one of the friends meets a beautiful young woman who has just arrived in town and the two hit it off very easily. A wrench is thrown into their budding romance though when someone reports that the prototype device the two friends were showing their client was in fact a bomb and the two friends are arrested as terrorists. Thus ends the brief encounter with our ‘hero’ and the mystery girl named Leslie. But that isn’t enough, the man refuses to give up hope on this strange woman, feeling their meeting was nothing less than Fate, and so he starts going to the airport obsessively with the dim hope of running into her again. His hope fades though as time passes. He tries to bribe an airport official for the passenger list to the plane she arrived on but is shut down and there seems to be no further options for him to try. When his friend, a seemingly misogynistic lothario (no woman is good enough for him, no woman is smart enough for him, not that we see him seek out anything other than women that appear to be nothing but sex on wheels, and this character is the movie’s comic relief?) sees Leslie at a strip club (he was stripping on amateur night, I kid you not), our ‘hero’ decides to turn to stalking to get his gal. He calls in a favor at the police station and has a crime artist draw up a handy rendering of Leslie and suddenly the city is flooded with hundreds of fliers offering a reward ( of one grand!) for any info on the whereabouts of Leslie. And this is where the movie began to freak us out. This is charming? Leslie finds out about the fliers and, more than a bit freaked out, she calls our guy to tell him to back off and leave her alone. But does he? Of course not, he only feels that her calling him means it really is fate as well, something we hear a lot about in this film, so he begins sending flower arrangement after flower arrangement to her workplace, leading up to one last bouquet presented by him. This understandably freaks out Leslie but, after a creepy speech from our ‘hero’ about how SHE is just like a flower, she agrees to go on a date. And that’s that. The date goes wonderfully and they are suddenly deep in like with one another. Cut to several scenes of the couple doing movie couple things like going to the amusement park, being silly, having achingly staged pseudo-intellectual conversations, and oh, hanging with his folks, which is odd since he hates his father so deeply, which seems fair when you see the way his pops treats him. And none of this behavior weirds out Mr. Best Friend, who serves no purpose other than to have random sex with random women and spout off holier than thou speeches about the downfall of the service industry. The romance, of course, leads to a proposal – which is scary as the longer the movie goes, the more it looks like our ‘hero’ is really a creep and psycho, but hey, it’s ROMANTIC – and this is easily the worst proposal in any movie. Ever. I was told by Oktober that during the post film Q and A that Mr. Hood said that the proposal’s lead in was to be trimmed, and I certainly hope so for his film’s sake. The lead actor goes into a ten minute diatribe about how fake everyone is and how very REAL he is, keeping it so real in fact that the guy made up some new word for love ‘cause other people abuse that word, and his proposal speech is so far out that even Leslie tells him to chillax. How do you ask a girl to marry you via telling her how screwed up and pathetic the rest of the world is and how they are all sellouts but that YOU aren’t? I have yet to meet a woman who wouldn’t run away from that guy and the ones that wouldn’t, I don’t care to meet. And who knew, but Leslie turns him down…only to say that she is no conformist herself and then she asks him to marry her. And just when I am about to puke from the fake romanticism in the movie, the film takes a turn into left field which comes in the part of a sudden car accident with a drunk driver (how were these two sober enough to drive when they were just engaged and drinking with dinner? Hmm…) which ends with Leslie being killed. From here on the movie spirals wildly out of control. Our ‘hero’, isolating himself from the world, builds, of all things, a scary diorama of the car accident and the surrounding area, the centerpiece being the wrecked cars and Leslie’s dead body. His madness spins out of control though when, no one seeming to really want to intervene in his life, our ‘hero’ tracks down the driver of the other car after he is merely slapped on his wrist by the law and endeavors to kill him in front of his family. He breaks down though and the other man apologizes and tells our man that he knows he took away his true love (who our ‘hero’ calls his wife, which is a bit creepy), and so our ‘hero’ leaves, crestfallen, only to return home and fail at his half-hearted suicide attempt. At rock bottom though our guy heads to the amusement park where he and Leslie had spent so many happy days together and who should step out of the pool there all flesh and blood and in a bikini is Leslie herself, who has no answer for why she is there, or how, but insists that they make the most of their time together. Umm, ok. Their time together ends with him pleading for her to take him with her and she telling him no, his place was there, and that he must forgive his father and reach out to him and he must move on and meet another woman. Oh, and she gives him the cure for Cancer, oh, wait, I made that up. And so our guy goes back home, makes nice with pops, goes back to work after a year off, tells his buddy he’s back, and good old buddy, two women waiting in his office to be sexed up, looks longingly towards his pal as he walks away. Fade out. And believe me, I am leaving oceans out – such as the smarmy, over-written dialogue which plays like speech after speech after speech, some awful musical choices, an episode where our ‘hero’ brutally assaults a man with a loaf of bread after the guy hits his son in a grocery store, and oh, there’s that extended scene where the best bud is ‘auditioning’ women to be his lady as they plays Scrabble in bed, naturally leading to the fact that all of them are dumb. And I wish I were making this up. This film is so utterly offensive to me as a skewed, insane view of romance, and worse as an ideal of women. It’s funny that the best bud uses women and treats them like crap. It’s cute that our ‘hero’ stalks his gal and she acquiesces after several weeks of stalking. Heck, it just shows he cares. It’s sweet that our ‘hero’ makes a diorama of death as a tribute to Leslie. What this film is is very a deranged take on Love and the hell of it is, it plays to the seats. The people we saw it with LOVED it, or seemed to. They laughed at the sexist jokes, they got a bit misty when Leslie died, and they were elated when our guy made nice with pops, despite the moment earlier on when dear old dad THROWS HIS CAR KEYS at his thirty-something year old son when the kid’s car is in the way and pops wants him to move his car out o the way. Wow. Oktober and I were both astounded by the sheer insanity of this film. I could not disagree more with the world Mr. Hood has created here and it’s my sincere hope that this is but one more step towards his making a much more mature, fully realized film and not a sign of what we can expect from him in the future. It’s obvious he can make movies, and it’s obvious he has the passion to make them, but he doesn’t yet have the heart, and it shows. I admire Mr. Hood for ‘doing it’, for going out there and being a full time filmmaker, and he has struggled to get to where he is, and good for him. And I truly wish him great success. But I cannot recommend Coping in any capacity. It offends my sense of truth, my sense of film, and my sense of decency. This film is a dark, personal piece, which showcases a very twisted and simplistic notion of love and relationships, the filmmaker seeming to say – if you want something, then it’s yours, which is a great idea, but doesn’t fly in the real world. This is a fantasy film at its heart, and its one it’s a fantasy of a world I pray doesn’t exist. I think Mr. Hood can do better than this, and I hope he does. And for the record Coping was awarded the special prize for fan favorite of the festival and has won prizes at several other small festivals as well. It’s sad when the fans fall for cheap sentimentalism and faked feelings instead of seeing sentimental string pulling for what it is. Coping – 2.

After Coping I made my way to the auditorium for a showing of Shattered Faith (www.fifthsunfilms.com ), another locally made feature written, directed by, and starring several of the people involved with putting the festival together. Shattered Faith is a much more straightforward film than some of the movies in the festival and I feel pretty safe in calling this film a classic noir. A man, trying to be a good friend, takes a female friend in when she begins having trouble with her husband, who she says has been hitting her. The man meets with her husband with the hopes of getting him to leave her alone but the two men begin arguing and a fight breaks out which leaves the husband dead. Shell-shocked after having killed this man he barely knew, the main character begins sensing something is amiss when the police detective who interviews him after the murder hints that it looks as if this was all a set up to kill the husband so the wife and friend could be together. Insisting that isn’t so, the strength of this statement begins to weaken as the woman starts a campaign to make her friend’s life a living hell. First she calls into his work, we learn later, to tell them that the two are involved – which looks rather suspicious after the murder, she tells his friend that he is on drugs and murdered the husband for money, calls the police and claims he had hit her, and slowly but surely his life is falling apart. Left with no one to turn to, the friend turns to a young woman he knows who has been suspicious of his suddenly dangerous housemate and with his friend’s help, he hopes to get to the bottom of what is happening to him and why. What he finds is a that the truth isn’t at all what he’d thought and when he finds that the husband is very much alive, the plot only thickens and his trust in his last friend weakens. What our the naïve lead learns is that he was but a cog in the greater plan his friend (murdered as the lead and his friend are looking for clues and it seems pretty obvious who the main suspect is) and her husband were involved in, their plan being to blackmail a mysterious company the husband was involved in and then to disappear, leaving the lead as the patsy. The film is very well made and, with the addition of actor Joe Estevez, has the feel of a Hollywood movie. A feeling that becomes even more palpable when the wonderful film soundtrack is taken into account, the music used very well to set and sustain a mood instead of trying to force ‘hip’ songs into the film just to have them. The dialogue and acting, as with many independent films, can be pretty rough, and the story has a few wobbles in the wheels when it comes to logic but all told it’s a pretty decent film. It was very well made and shot and director Stephen Vincent and writer John Dombrowski should be proud of themselves for having the tenacity to see their project through. The pacing drags a bit in the middle of the film – but that’s what happens with most noirs I fear – but this is a solid effort that shows a lot of promise for the future. Considering the production values and quality of the end product, I really hope to see further releases from the people behind Fifth Sun. Very well made but nothing that moved me too deeply, I’d give Shattered Faith a 6.

The final film I caught at the festival was a screening of the last of the big local films, a horror throwback called Deadly Intuitions. As beautifully filmed as any film in the festival, this is the story of a troubled young woman who is suffering from haunting visions of murder and horror. Uncertain what it all means, the woman takes a trip with her boyfriend and another couple out to a cabin in the woods her boyfriend is supposed to fix up for his father. What the kids don’t realize though is that there’s been a rash of brutal murders committed in the woods surrounding the cabin and they are next on the list. At its heart, this is a slasher film, and as such, it’s pretty fun. The killers aren’t fully revealed until later into the film, the victims are passable actors, the digital and make-up effects are wonderful, and the deaths are pretty inventive. As much as I like the technical side of the film though, it really does fall apart at its basest level – the story. The killers have no rhyme or reason, and it is frustrating beyond compare to make your film about slashers you never reveal. There are some that can pull this off, Black Christmas being the best example I can give you, but the rest of the story isn’t strong enough to make up for that huge problem. Too many questions are raised but not answered – who are the killers, what is their motivation, why does the girl have visions, can she change the fate of she and her friends if she uses the visions as a warning? Who knows? The dialogue can also be pretty cheesy at times but this I can forgive, as there are LOT of Hollywood productions that can’t string a series of words together and have them make sense. I think the reason I am so frustrated with this film is that it has SO much potential. It’s beautifully shot, flawlessly edited and filmed, and the other technical aspects on the film are wonderful. Director Jeff McPhee (I hope that’s the correct spelling as the fest program doesn’t list his name, eek!) and producer Erik Porn have put together a wonderful calling card. And I tell you what, given a better script and more capable acting, they could make one hell of a movie. I am sure there are people out there that will get into more than I did but it just wasn’t quite what it might have been, BUT, I have to give the team behind the film props for creating a technically beautiful film – Deadly Intuitions – 7.

The Flint Film Festival ended on Sunday, June 6^th with an awards ceremony that gave awards for seven categories and this was a wonderful finishing touch for a first year festival and a great gift to the filmmakers. If asked whether this festival was a success or not I’d have to say it was. Not a complete success as the attendance wasn’t as high as everyone had hoped, and the technical difficulties that popped up created some tension, but all told, those involved did an amazing job and with some fine tuning and more corporate funding money to play with, this festival will only get better. In the future I hope that the technical glitches – computer malfunctions and problems with source material – will be ironed out, that more time will be spent on the awards ceremony, which was far too brief, and that more high profile filmmakers will turn up. I love that this is an outlet for young indies just starting out, but had someone like Michael Moore – which would have been a long shot to get him but would have been worth looking into – or any number of other Michigan filmmakers turned up it could only help to strengthen the overall event and create more of a buzz beyond Flint. On a personal note, I am very, very proud of what the filmmakers and the festival planners have achieved and feel honored I was able to attend. Flint is a city be-set by a bad legacy and a worse image and something as well intentioned as the Flint Film Festival can only help make this the great city it once was. And I have to admit too that it was pretty neat speaking with Daniel Byington and Running Against Dick director Srikant Chellappa, who had both driven to Flint from St. Louis, Missouri to premiere their film. Problems or not, this was a really fun experience.

Having attended my first film festival now, I can say that no reviewer or journalist can really capture the divine insanity that lies at the heart of one of these festivals. It truly is Nirvana for film geeks and part-time video potatoes and reminds you just how hard it is to create a film and how very special the ones that speak to us are. And for me, it made me fall in love with film all over again, a passion that has lead me from making films with friends to a greater appreciation for what the world of cinema has to offer, to right here, as your silly movie nerd telling you how I see things. The Flint Film Festival wasn’t a perfect event, but with time, patience, and a great deal of love, it will get closer to perfection every year.

…c…