Lone Star International Film Festival - Day 3: “Movie School”
by Pete Wann
The thing I was looking forward to the most for Friday was the panel discussions taking place at the UTA Fort Worth Center. I had intended to sit in on several of them, but wound up only hitting two: the New Media panel that I described earlier, and “Acting for Dollars,” moderated by David Newsom.
I was particularly looking forward to the acting panel, partly because David mentioned it every time I saw him, but also because I’ve always been fascinated by that end of the entertainment business. I feel like the average person can sort of relate to the physicality of actually DOING the other aspects of filming, like running cameras, audio, stunts, etc. Acting just seems to be a more difficult concept to pin down.
The perfect example of this is a scene in Human Error when Xander Berkeley has just found out that his wife has left him to “join an order” and that he’s lost everything that mattered to him, including his status at the insanely Kafkaesque factory that consumes his life. Essentially it’s an extreme close up on his face for nearly a minute (that feels like at least 10), with just background sounds and dialog, but you can feel the rage and despair his character is going through. That’s the sort of thing that your average Joe who played a role in his church’s Christmas pageant thinks he gets, but doesn’t really.
The panel was really well attended, and the guests included Xander Berkeley, Sarah Clarke (Xander’s wife, who also brought their daughter Olwyn), Julio Cedillo, Matthew Tompkins, and Oliver Tull. Discussion on the panel ranged from the allure and impact of celebrity to how people who don’t live on the coasts find and maintain work as professional non-theater actors. The panelists also talked a lot about role selection and trying to avoid stereotyping, particularly Julio and Oliver, who as I’m sure you can imagine aren’t looking for roles as gang-bangers and/or slaves. Another interesting thread of discussion came up when all present agreed that they’d felt the effects of having their contribution to the creative process not given the credit it deserves. Julio detailed an incident where he tried to provide some creative input, and the question about his suggestion had to go up the chain through 4 layers of producers to the studio, then what came back down the chain was that the decision was made not to use his suggestion and also that he should stop being such a troublemaker on set.
After the panel, everyone was invited to attend the screening of Xander’s film (directed by Robert M. Young) “Human Error.” It’s too smart to get a major studio release, I think, which is too bad. If you get the chance to see it, whether on DVD or in an indie-film house like the Angelika, I wholeheartedly recommend you do.
After seeing Human Error, I honestly needed a little down time to rest and steel myself for the hoopla that would surround the screening of Fred Durst’s directorial debut, “The Education of Charlie Banks.” The screenplay was written by Peter Elkoff (he also executive produced the film), whom I’ve never heard of, but if this movie is any indication, we’ll be hearing a lot more from him. Expertly acted, and skillfully directed, all I could say afterwards was “wow.” I was starting to worry that the buzz I’d heard about it earlier in the week was just Hollywood insider back-slapping, but it is a REALLY, REALLY good movie.
The crowd for this movie was bigger than any so far (it was Friday night, after all), and had the most star-power as well. Fred Durst showed up, as did Jason Ritter, one of the stars of the film. Of course Bill Paxton was there, but he also introduced Harry Dean Stanton (who assured the crowd: “I am NOT a crook.”), and Paul Soter and Jay Chandrasekhar from Broken Lizard, whom I’ll be interviewing in a little under 2 hours!
The afterparty at the Longhorn Saloon was a bit of a letdown, and I left early, but not before Fred Durst and his crew. It was interesting to see the mix of crowds, though; the locals sort of forced to accept a horde of out-of-town interlopers, and the “Hollywood-types” being exposed to the cowboys and indians (literally) on horse (and longhorn)-back outside and inside the bar. There were a lot of looks of “what the hell is that?” being shot around in both directions, but at least until I left there were no major incidents.
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