Lone Star International Film Festival Day 5 - “The Not Dead Yet Award”
by Pete Wann
Sunday was the last day of the 1st annual Lone Star International Film Festival. Yes, it’s taken me two full days to recover from this experience and to gather my thoughts enough to write intelligibly about it.
Sunday morning started off with me hungover (again) and the awards brunch. Due to my hangover, I was late for the awards brunch, but I think I caught most of it. Steve has already posted the list of winners, so I won’t go into that. Pete G was there taking the included photos.
Martin Sheen and Keith Carradine say hello in the buffet line.
A couple of highlights for me were:
The collection of clips for Martin Sheen opened with the scene from Hot Shots: Part Deux where he’s riding down the river like in Apocalypse Now and passes Charlie Sheen’s character and they shout to each other at the same time: “I loved you in Wall Street!” Of course, the very next clip was of them together in Wall Street going at each other in the elevator.
Martin Sheen
Martin accepts the Lifetime Achiev.., err, Not Dead Yet Award
The other highlight was Harry Dean Stanton singing a Mexican ballad a capella on the spur of the moment during his award speech, then criticizing himself for the ending being off-key and doing it again.
Harry Dean Stanton sings a Mexican love ballad, which sure choked me up.
Nearly everyone has been to some kind of awards dinner (or brunch, etc.), whether for something they did in high school, or for work or a charity or whatever. This was really no different, it just happened to have more famous people attending than most others.
Fort Worth filmmaker James Johnston makes his entrance to the awards brunch.
Before you ask, no, I didn’t get to talk to Martin Sheen. He was more in demand than anyone else was all week, constantly in screenings or at private dinners and the like. Immediately upon leaving the awards brunch, in fact, several of the attendees and just random people in the hotel came up to get autographs. I wanted one, too, but I just couldn’t bring myself to be “that guy.”
Martin Sheen signs autographs at the Renaissance Worthington Hotel.
Martin Sheen signs some more autographs at the Renaissance Worthington Hotel.
Robert Rodriguez and Bill Paxton bro off.
Tall, dark, and handsome?
There were a couple of movies that I wanted to see on Sunday, specifically in the mumblecore program. As it turns out, though, I couldn’t possibly stomach sitting in a dark theater any more than I had to.
Instead I joined Steve for the screening of Donal Logue’s film Tennis Anyone? I really enjoyed it! I haven’t seen much of Logue’s work outside of his supporting roles in things like The Patriot, but I really enjoyed this. I’m going to rent The Tao of Steve to really get a feel for his other work.
At its heart, Tennis Anyone? is a buddy flick, and it was most enjoyable. Logue stuck around for the Q&A session, and he was really open about the making of the film.
Sunday night’s closing party was at the Flying Saucer. Theater Fire played, and the whole scene was really low key. Everyone I’d met that week was there, like David Newsom and the staff from the festival, and I also got a chance to have a long chat with Donal Logue. Logue turned out to be just as down to earth and nice as everyone else I’d interacted with the rest of the week.
Theater Fire were great, the party closed down the Saucer (which didn’t stay open any later than usual, I was disappointed to see). A select few moved on to an after-after party, mostly local filmmakers and festival staff. It was here that I got the REAL feel for how the festival went.
Overall, everyone (staff and local fimmakers) was really pleased. I’m sure it wouldn’t be hard for everyone to think of one or two things that could have gone better, but in my opinion, the folks that put this on have NOTHING to be ashamed of. It was also clear that these people had put everything they had into it. Most looked like they hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep in at least a month and were glad it was over, even though they knew they’d miss it.
If you didn’t go, you missed a seriously good time, and the opportunity to be part of something truly special. Keith Carradine commented during his introduction of Carolyn Pfeiffer that the festival will “…never be as good as it is now.” What he meant was that the feeling of giddiness that we all had at being a part of something new and special, and the intimacy of a small, fledgling festival would eventually be replaced by the Swiss clockworks precision and unmangeable hugeness of other, larger festivals.
Kieth Carradine at the awards ceremony.
How often does a budding young actor get to sit in a room with Xander Berkeley, Sarah Clarke, and David Newsom and ask them questions for two hours? Where else could a short filmmaker getting revved up for his first feature be one of 20 people in a room with Jay Chandrasekhar and Paul Soter waiting to answer their questions?
I agree with Keith, that it probably won’t get any more intimate or “new,” but I know it will get better over the years.
The hardworking crew of the Lone Star International Film Festival
No Comments, Comment or Ping
Reply to “Lone Star International Film Festival Day 5 - “The Not Dead Yet Award””