Pennsacola Connection
By Ken Manning
This month: Leprehauns,
kites, fairies, and a diamond blast from the past…
First: just when we
thought “Surv’i” couldn’t conquer
anymore boundaries, she did it again. Our nimble
wandering warrior queen
has now leapt across the Atlantic to the Emerald Isle, and stolen a Leprechaun
pot of gold! That is to say, she won the Spotlight Award at
the Elevation Indie Film Awards in Dublin, Ireland. According to feedback,
unlike other fests where short films compete against each other, each is judged
on its own merits. “Sur’vi,” the
short about a wandering female warrior who befriends a lost girl and defends
her from a band of marauders, stood out and earned strong points for premise,
photography, acting, music score, setting and story. Quite a “huge honor” for
her first international venture, said creator and Pensacola filmmaker Steve
Wise. (I keep pestering him for a retail release by next year.)
Next: my recap of last
month’s 3rd annual Kite Film Festival at Club L.A. in Destin. Not an
easy place to find if you’re not looking for it; it was way further up East
Highway 98 than I thought, away from the busy fishing harbor/resort district,
and in fact---right next door to Hurricane Lanes Bowling Alley. The playbill
had a full list of 24 local/regional shorts, including 4 from FSU Film School
of Tallahassee. This year’s winners included Best Actor Chris Knittel for the
dramatic short “No More Steps” about
an embittered former athlete turned paraplegic, Best Actress Kelly McQuail for
the comedy short “The Smell” about a
secret society of library book-sniffers, and Best Cinematographer Kevin
Almodovar for the sci-fi short “X’s and
O’s” where two government investigators discover a mind-control war game in
progress. The winners were selected by
audience write-in vote. Afterwards, local photo studio Five-Star Pictures took
free 5 x 7 selfies for all attendees. I passed on that. I don’t pose unless I’m
in cosplay. Perhaps next year I can come as George Banks from Disney’s “Mary Poppins” with broken umbrella and
mended kite in hand.
All in all, quite a show,
though the whole experience reminded me of an earlier film from FSU; the old
1993 horror short “Killer Kite”about a mutated
kite-monster ravaging public parks. I only saw clips
of it on a PBS documentary
about Florida State’s School of Film, that same year. Oh. well…
Back to the archives, I
guess.
Next: an update on “Spriggan.” According to Pensacola
filmmaker Dylan Gill, principal photography
has wrapped and the film is now in post-production. The film is a
feature-length live-action medieval fantasy, where a knight and archer
encounter a fierce magical wood nymph.
The forests of Brewton, Alabama, with its vast pinewood trees, lush ivy
vines and sparkling lakes, streams and ponds, served
as the film’s location
setting for last 3 calendar seasons. A
local premiere screening is tentatively
slated for January 2019,
venue TBA.
Finally: although baseball
season wrapped up last October with the World Series, here’s one final
ball to pitch before
year’s end. (This story broke last May in the Pensacola News Journal,
and I’m just now opening my mitt to
catch it! Johnny-come-lately.) Strong Films & the Haddock Family Foundation
of Orlando, premiered their sports documentary film: “Long Time Coming: A 1955 Baseball Story” on Friday, May 25th @
7pm, at the Pensacola State College Jean & Paul Amos Performance Studio. In
August 1955, the Pensacola Jaycees All-Star Team was the first all-black little
league team to win the regional championship for Northwest Florida, and go on
to compete in the State Championships in Orlando---
a civil rights milestone
in the segregated Deep South of that time. Haddock Foundation, dedicated to
advancing social justice
and civil rights, were researching racial differences in Florida baseball, came
across this story, discovered no books or films were made about it, so they
gave it a try. The result was
a 3-year campaign,
interviews with surviving players, and a reunion game with the remaining black
Pensacola Jaycees and the white Orlando Kiwanis Team. How’s that for a baseball diamond?
Home-run or
strike-out? Check out: www.longtimecoming.film, be your own umpire, and
call your own play.