Films
Screening at RIIFF 2002
Feature
Films D-G
Thursday August 8th Columbus Theatre 7:15PM
Desperado Square
Director: Benny Torati
Producers: Haim Manor, Amir Harel
Director of Photography: Dror Moreh
Editor: Yosef Grunfeld
Music: Shem-Tov Levy
Sound: David Liss
Format: 35MM
At the morning of the commemoration day, Nisim, Moris Mandabon's son,
has a strange dream. In the dream his father appears and orders him
to open the cinema one more time and screen a movie. Signora Mandabon
objects. Her objection grows even stronger when she realizes that the
movie her sons choose to screen is "Sangam". But the order
in the dream is stronger than her objection and the preparations for
the renewed screening begin. But what seems to be an easy enough task
turns into a major problem when it is realized that the only copy of
"Sangam" is in the hands of Avram Mandabon, who refuses to
let it go. His condition to allowing the movie's screening is to speak
with Signora, but she refuses.The anger regarding his quarrel with her
husband is still fresh in her memory and she refuses to forgive.As time
passes by, clues start to float as to the real occurrences of the past
and beneath the "official" story of the brothers' quarrel
starts to unfold a tragic story of unfulfilled love.
Saturday August 10th Columbus Cinemateque 7:40PM
US Premiere
Filmclub Sonnenschien
Director: Raoul W. Heimrich
Runtime: 88min
Country: Germany
Format: VIDEO
This tart and provocative film traces a young couple's fascination with
people who are on the edge and contemplating suicide. In what starts
out as an attempt to document the suicides, it soon turns into something
more. Dramatic and shocking, this is a true original from a unique film
voice.
Sunday August 11th URI 6:30PM
Finding Jack Kerouac
Company: Garth Rach. Pictures
Director: Jeff Lyon
Runtime: 93min
Country: USA
Format: BETA SP
Eighth year senior, Mitch, reads "On the Road" by Jack Kerouac
and decides to hit the road, experience life and write the next great
American novel. Traveling by foot, rail and car with friends Dwight
and Lisa, Mitch tries to find Kerouac. His plan is flawed, as Kerouac
is dead. However, he learns valuable life lessons along the way.
Thursday August 8th Columbus Cinemateque 7:40PM
Fishing
World Premiere
Company: River Productions
Director: Joseph Lutton
Producer: Joseph Lutton
Cast: Joseph Lutton, Barry Snider, Jason Kolotouros, Jennifer Donlin,
Scott Decker, Michael Medeiros, Lynn Cohen, Anthony Lauria
Runtime: 108min
Country: USA
Format: BETA SP
After severing contact for three years with old friends, his girlfriend
Grace, and the last remaining member of his family (his father), an
unsettled drifting musician named Stephen Williams returns home to search
for the missing pieces in his life. In his uncertainty and his longing
for real connection, he begins to stir up emotions in himself and others
by acting on conflicted and dangerous impulses. Laced with humor, universal
conflicts, desires and struggles of the heart, we witness the changes
in the lives touched by the central character as he follows through
with his choices and actions. It is a moving story that addresses our
inability to truly grow and make healthy choices in life when we suppress
our core feelings.
Friday August 9th Columbus Theatre 5:00PM
Five Years
Company: D-Train Moving Pictures
Director: Brett Wagner
Producer: David Zellerford
Director of Photography: Chad Davidson
Production Designer: Suzanne Wang
Editor: Brett Wagner
Sound: Mike Dixon
Music: Deni
Cast: Kris Carr, Tim Altmeyer, Todd Swenson, Michael Buscemi, Cathy
Doe
Runtime: 90min
Country: USA
Format: BETA SP
Renee Unger is living the life she always hoped for: a little red-brick
house in the small town of New Russia, Ohio, a good husband, a prospering
construction business, and a baby on the way. When her husband's younger
brother turns twenty-one and is released from juvenile prison, where
he served five years for murder, Renee's cozy life begins to change.
Colson comes to live with them, an injection of danger in the form of
a strange, silent houseguest with haunted eyes and odd habits. Her husband,
Eric, becomes obsessed with monitoring his little brother's every move,
and Colson's moves become increasingly unpredictable. Nobody talks about
what happened five years ago, but something shifts beneath the surface
of their lives -- a secret that won't stay buried. Just when tensions
threaten to explode into violence, the brothers disappear without a
word, leaving Renee alone with a houseful of echoes and unanswered questions.
She must finally step out of her rarefied world and confront the assumptions
on which she's built her whole life.
Friday August 9th URI 6:45PM
Fixing Frank
Director: Michael Selditch
Producers: Michael Selditch, Randi Snitz
Music: Mark Strano
Costume Designer: Arlynn Wilson
Film Editor: Randi Snitz
Production Designer: Michael Selditch
Director of Photography: Tamas Bojtor
Screenplay: Ken Hanes
Cast: Dan Butler, Andrew Elvis Miller, Paul Provenza
Runtime: 104 min
Country: USA
Format: BETA SP
Frank Johnston is an "Arts & Leisure" reporter. Enlisted by
his boyfriend, psychotherapist Jonathan Baldwin, Frank goes undercover
to write an expos on Dr. Apsey, a therapist who purports to convert
gays to straight. Feigning desire to change his sexuality, Frank begins
sessions with Dr. Apsey. But Dr. Apsey defies Frank's expectations --
he's not hateful or close-minded -- and Frank begins to question his
own sexual identity. The reason for Frank's seeing Apsey becomes blurred
- is it for the article or for personal reasons? As Frank falls under
Apsey's spell, his relationship with Jonathan deteriorates, and a fierce
psychological tug of war erupts between the two powerful doctors over
the heart and mind of Frank. With relationships, careers and even core
identities at stake, Frank must make some decisions that eventually
explode the lives of them all. Director Michael Selditch will be in
attendance.
Friday August
9th Columbus Cinemateque 7:40PM
Get A Way
(Cavalcades)
Director: Noah Nuer
Company: Baleine Sous Caillou Productions
Producer: Sam Cohen
Cast: Maxime Desmons, Agnes Roland
Runtime: 88 min
Country of Production: France
Format: BETA SP
Life's events pass us by, but how often do we really shift the way we
run our life, especially when we don't intend to? Sometimes the magic
of two people, without planning on it, makes that happen for each other.
Didier and Anne, both trying to get away from their lives, literally
bump into one another on the streets of Paris and, through a series
of adventures, set about creating a revolution in their lives. Popular
French short moviemaker, Noah Nuer signs here his first full-length
feature film with two committed, up-and-coming talents you will grow
quickly attached to. Get A Way is a charming tale of a weekend of run-away
and transformation for two strangers who become touchstones for one
another. Clear-eyed, witty, earnest, and entirely original, this is
a film of friendship (and more?) in all its potential, an exploration
of what we all have in common: our need not to get away, but rather
to get a way - - to create what we really want. Director Noah Nuer will
be in attendance. French subtitled in English
Monday August 12th Columbus Theatre 7:15PM
Green Lights
Company: Ithaca Movies Inc.
Director/Producer: Robert H. Lieberman
Cast: John FitzGibbon, Daniel Dresner, Shawn Randall
Runtime: 96 min
Country: USA
Format: 35MM
Fiction collides with reality in this unique film, a collaboration of
best-selling novelist Robert H. Lieberman ("Baby," "Paradise
Rezoned") and Emmy Award-winning Slawomir Grunberg ("School
Prayer: A Community at War"). A drama/comedy featuring a small
but quirky upstate New York town, seeding scripted actors into real
life situations, blurring the boundary between fiction and reality,
created "Green Lights". It is a funny, fast-paced film studded
with original live music and even a dance number. When Bob Beeman, a
lowly film scout arrives in town, bellhops begin tap dancing, children
start singing and Shakespeare is waiting around every corner as the
rumor spreads that he's a big time producer. Snared by Alex and Jimmy,
a luckless writer/composer team, Beeman starts believing the myth swirling
around him and turns the community upside down with his 'folie de grandeur'.
In attempting to make their musical film, Beeman hopes to save his own
failed life, and with it, the hopes and dreams of the town that has
adopted him. Clearly Beeman and the town are headed for disaster.
Saturday August 10th Castle Cinema 7:00PM
Grownups
Director: Doug Finelli
Producers: Doug Finelli, Susan R. Rodgers
Writers: Mitch Galane, Doug Finelli
Cast: Jessica Walter, Meredith Salenger, Bill Sage, Tony Roberts, Daniel
London, John Stamos Format: 35MM
Country: USA
Runtime: 90min
The 70's. A time of sexual freedom. For twelve year old Steve Richards
and Eric Meyer, the future seems limitless. Their world is going to
be one of sex, fun and more sex. If the 70's are this wild, just imagine
how fun it will be when they grow up. Now in their thirties, Steve and
Eric are both married, living in the suburbs and wondering what happened
to the wild times they were supposed to have had. Instead of spending
their teenage years inside Studio 54 and Plato's Retreat, they have
Reagonomics and Rock Hudson's declining health. And with Eric's wife
Ami hinting about her biological clock, he's reluctantly accepting that
he's a "grownup." But Steve, not ready to admit defeat, goes
to work on a plan. A plan to do something crazy, something wild, something
70's - like wife swapping. "If we plan it out so there's no consequences,
no ramifications," Steve tells Eric, "What could possibly
go wrong?" UH, PLENTY.
Description
and Mission Statement
The Providence Film Festival
RIIFF
2002 Team
Films Screened at RIIFF