Reviews

Triangle of Death
Pearl
Official Rejection
Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo
Weather Girl
Our Spirits Don’t Speak English: Indian Boarding School
Comedy Shorts

Liveblogs

June 11
June 12
June 12, Evening
June 13

Dispatches

Day 1
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5

Photo Galleries

Related posts:

1. deadCENTER Dispatches from OKC: Day 3
2. deadCENTER Review: Our Spirits Don’t Speak English: Indian Boarding School
3. deadCENTER Dispatches from OKC: Day 2

Ten For Grandpa — dir. Doug Karr

This slick little short follows a man wondering who his departed grandfather really was. The camera flows between scenes, across time, and across rooms to create the illusion of fluidity. This is extremely well executed, but I do wonder how much of this film actually qualifies as comedy. If anything is a joke, it seems to be the efforts the filmmakers went to to pull off these shots. Every time we enter a new space we are supposed to be wowed into a laugh; the form is so over the top for such a little film. The choice of the 2.35:1 aspect ratio seems like an arbitrary choice; the piece may be funnier with more vertical space. Of course, we would lose that slickness. Ten for Grandpa is tight, well executed, well acted, and fully realized. Overall, it is a very strong piece and I want to see more from all involved.

The Last Page — dir. Kevin Acevedo

The best part of this short is the Dodge College opening logo. Its self-assuredness provided me the biggest laugh all day, but sadly, all logos must end. The film goes on to depict the terribly tired premise of a writer envisioning the final page of his novel. The writer goes for a walk ends in him getting into all kinds of “wacky trouble”. I realize this is a student film, but still, it is fraught with problems. Again we have an unjustified 2.35:1 aspect ratio. The biggest issue of all is the runtime. At 22 minutes, the piece is more than twice as long as there is story. Most offensively, the laughs are unexplained. Why, Mr. Acevedo, is it funny when a rotund woman grabs the writer’s crotch? If you are out there, defend your joke. And to the professors at Dodge College at Chapman University, please guide your students to kill their favorite babies and cut their pieces down to size.

The SPAM Job — dir. Padraic Culham

Stone faced after the last bit of drek, I was determined not to laugh once through this cheap-looking documentary, but it wore me down over time. I couldn’t help but chuckle by the end. Through interviews and photos, the story of one prankster’s stolen spam becomes clearer and clearer. It sounds dumb and that is the point. The joke here seems to be on us for making it through the whole damn story. This “cheap” feeling I mentioned only adds to the charm of the piece, you simply don’t expect how far they are willing to take this joke about a can of spam ending up in different locales across the globe. The piece is a little fat, could be cut down to size. I could see this as a sketch on a late-night comedy show, that is if Mr. Culham and friends have any other notes up their sleeves.

Cherchez la femme — dir. Idit Dvir

Comedy has a darker side that is briefly explored in this short. A man dressed like a taco wants to kill himself over a woman until he finds a friend in another suicidal man with far different love troubles. Slowly we learn that the man’s wife cheats on him while he is home, so the taco concocts a plot to kill her off. The film takes too long to get to very little payoff, though one of the purest laughs during the shorts program came out of the film. Once the murder is imminent, the murderer must continue having sex with his victim through tears. As an audience, we are left with no emotional output except laughter because our other options simply won’t do given the rest of the film. This one laugh is impressive, but it doesn’t make up for the slow pace of the rest of the film, not to mention the pre-required misogyny one needs to find humor throughout. Ms. Dvir assumes a lot about her audience’s beliefs: that walking tacos are funny, that promiscuous women are sluts, and that murder is a natural progression from anger. Focusing in on these muddled corners will help to make better work in the future.

Tom’s Day Off — dir. Justin Stanley

Sigh. I believe in film criticism as a tool to help filmmakers better their work over time, but when I am given nothing to work with I feel there is nothing I can offer. This is how I feel about Tom’s Day Off. It’s such a mess that I would rather the filmmaker, Justin Stanley, go make something else and bring it back so I can actually give some critique. Apparently, after being dumped a lanky bank employee chooses to rob his place of business. Then he ends up in the back seat of a student driver’s vehicle with no plan. There are no laughs, no plot, no aesthetic quality to speak of. Mr. Stanley probably thinks he’s a genius with his use of an inner monologue interspersed with diegetic dialogue. The bigger question is what place this film has in any film festival. The 10 minutes of space this took up could have been used so much better.

Miracle Investigators — dir. Jeremy Dehn

The program finished off with this crowd pleaser. Overall, this is a lame mashup of kung fu action and outdated church humor. Still, the laughs are there, and that is respectable for a student film thrown into this mix. The film follows two priests charged with meting out justice against perpetrators of false miracles. Unfortunately, this goofy premise never really comes to fruition. The film bumbles along from joke to joke with a plot that hardly makes any sense. It seems that it didn’t matter since the laughs were there. The makers of this film would do better to cut it down to about a 5 minute sketch and really focus in on each joke. Nonetheless, a valiant effort.

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2. Deadcenter X Review: Okie Shorts
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The film is a straightforward educational documentary complete with interviews, photos, re-enactments and the readings of historical texts. It tells the tale of government and church financed boarding schools whose goal was to reform Native Americans, to make them more like their white neighbors. The facts are harrowing. In short, children were taken from their homes into the schools where their hair was cut, they were forced to speak english, and slowly the destruction of a culture set in for generations to come. If this is a topic that interests you you should absolutely check out the film. There isn’t the space here to get too deep into the facts.

Aesthetically, the film is nothing special, which is fine because the goal is to directly educate. The topic is so sweeping, so important, that it may be too difficult for the filmmakers to build an emotional narrative. I won’t excuse this as I believe this story would find a wider viewership if such a task were undertaken. The interview with Andrew Windy Boy, pictured above, is the strongest part of the piece. He spends much of his time on camera in tears, remembering the darkest pockets of his childhood. Mr. Windy Boy alone could fill a feature length documentary, but here he is only one piece of the puzzle. ( I do not want to minimize the stories of the other interviewees by any means, I am using Andrew as one example.)

Our Spirits Don’t Speak English is an important film that reveals a story that needs to be told before this generation of Native Americans can no longer tell it. However, it does not feel like the kind of documentary that runs in festivals. It reads like a book, not as much as a narrative docu. Perhaps I am too demanding, or perhaps the art of the educational film is lost on me. Regardless, I would recommend showing this film in schools across the country. We need to know the extent of our misdeeds as a nation, and Our Spirits Don’t Speak English exposes a great deal.

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1. Full deadCENTER Coverage
2. deadCENTER Review: Triangle of Death
3. deadCENTER Review: Comedy Shorts

• Screenplay:  Laura Looks Up by Keri Schreiner, Los Angeles, CA
• Narrative Feature: Weather Girl directed by Blayne Weaver, Los Angeles, CA
• Documentary Feature: Official Rejection directed by Paul Osborne, Los Angeles, CA
• Narrative Short: Gaining Ground directed by Marc Brummen, Germany
• Documentary Short: Forced into ‘Comfort’, Fighting for Apology directed by Theo Lipfert, Bozeman, MT
• Animation: I’m So Proud Of You directed by Don Herzfeld, Santa Barbara, CA
• Student Film: Science Fair directed by Dean Fleischer-Camp, Brooklyn, NY
• Oklahoma Feature: Barking Water directed by Sterlin Harjo, Tulsa, OK
• Oklahoma Short: Starvation Doctrine directed by Zac Davis, OKC, OK
• Grand Jury Narrative Feature: Yvette, directed by Rogelio Almeida, Duncan, OK
• Grand Jury Narrative Documentary:  The Day After Peace directed by Jeremy Gilley, London, UK

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2. deadCENTER Dispatches from OKC: Day 3
3. deadCENTER Dispatches from OKC: Day 2

To be honest, I only went to 2 screenings yesterday which I will post about either later today or tomorrow. It has been a whirlwind few days here and there is finally a nice reprieve. I’ll be here a few more days touring around. I will keep you all up to date, especially on film news. Interestingly, I’m currently at a book signing at a local book store. The book, Sooner Cinema: Oklahoma Goes to the Movies, features an essay fro my good friend (and future candler contributor, watch for it) Sunrise Tippeconnie. The book just came out, otherwise I would have read it in advance to help understand this state a little better. No matter, as more film related info comes to me, you’ll get it. Here are some pics from closing night, enjoy.

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1. Dispatches from OKC: Day 5
2. deadCENTER Dispatches from OKC: Day 3
3. deadCENTER Dispatches from OKC: Day 2

By days end I managed to see 3 features: Official Rejection, Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo, and Weather Girl. All attracted nice sized crowds and were recieved quite positively by the festival audience. As I settled into the 8:00 screening of Weather Girl, I finally realized that I hadn’t eaten all day. More than anything, I feared my critical rendencies being affected by the hunger pangs that would taunt me throughout. As you could guess, I was fine and ended up going to an Italian joint named Flip’s on the way back to the house.

Let me tell you about Flip’s. The food was okay, and the Oklahoma Belgian-style beer I had was delicious, but the real charm was the music. I swear, for the entire time I was there, they must have been playing the theme song from King of the Hill on loop. It was just plain awesome. Filmmaker coffee this morning was pretty nice. I got to talk to some filmmakers about the reviews I’ve given them, but more on that later. Right now I’ve got to head to another feature doc, Our Spirits Don’t Speak English: Indian Boarding School. I’m not sure what I’ll be seeing after that, but check back soon for the liveblog where I’ll keep you up to date.

Here is a picture of how intense filmmaker coffee can get in the morning. And yes, I did choose a pic that made everyone look bad on purpose.

Scott Storm, Aaron Hillis and Paul Osborne talking about stuff.

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1. deadCENTER Dispatches from OKC: Day 2
2. deadCENTER Dispatches from OKC: Day 4
3. deadCENTER Dispatches from OKC: Day 1

The film follows “sassy” weather girl Sylvia after an on air Network inspired freakout leaves her jobless, homeless and manless. She moves in with her slacker brother and his cute-in-a-dirty-kinda-way philosophy major neighbor. Hmmmmm, I wonder if she’ll find love under these wacky conditions? Wait! Maybe she’ll not only find love, but she’ll find herself while searching for it. It is formulaic to say the least, but like I said, who cares?

Over the years, festival films have become the next best thing for an audience always on the prowl for new surprises. I think we can look at them a bit differently. Mr. Weaver’s film is an excellent exercise in comedic timing, and I believe we will see wonderful things from him in the future. For my money, he should direct a film that someone else wrote as that seems where his strengths lie, but I’m just a critic. What do I know?

We get nice performances from Tricia O’Kelley, Patrick J. Adams, and Ryan Devlin, as well a gloriously smarmy Mark Harmon. My personal favorite perf comes from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’s Kaitlin Olson. She doesn’t get that much screen time, but when she does, she shines. I would also like to point out that, especially in the scenes that take place on the morning news show, editing plays an enormous role in the comedic tension that is built throughout the film. A huge pat on the back goes to editor Abe Levy who cut those laughs into shape.

Over the years, the rom-com has become something of an art form. Hitting the right emotional beats for a crowd that doesn’t want to invest too much of themselves in a story is not an easy task, but Weather Girl seems to accomplish this. The audience stuck with it and had some great laughs along the way. What more could they really ask for? A better movie? Yeah, get on that Mr. Weaver. What’s next?

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1. Candlercast #1: Interview with Blayne Weaver
2. deadCENTER Review: Official Rejection
3. deadCENTER Review: Comedy Shorts

The film follows female inmates at the Eddie Warrior Correctional Center in Taft, Oklahoma as they prepare for the second prison rodeo that women have been invited to. The event is a state tradition first instituted in 1940 and has attracted large crowds over the years, but only to watch the men. Mr. Beesley’s film has a lot of potential for volatility. After all, it is the story of hardened criminals being thrown in front of riled up cattle for the enjoyment of the masses. What transpires throughout the runtime of the piece is so counfounding, so disturbing, and so beautiful that one can’t help but be moved by this odd and untold story.

You need some backstory, which the film provides, to understand what makes the film so dog gone wonderful. Oklahoma has more women incarcerated per capita than any other state in the U.S. Approximately 80% of them are mothers and the majority of them are in there for methamphetamine charges. Here in Oklahoma, meth is widely available and probably the biggest social problem Okies have to deal with. When the drug stastistic comes out on screen, the crowd I was with didn’t budge, wasn’t surprised. It is a fact of life out here.

So we get to know some of these women who join the rodeo in an effort to get outside of the gray wals they call home; to be a part of a team and find the personal streghth they need to make it in the world once their sentence ends. It is a moving tale, but Mr. Beesley doesn’t spoon feed us anything. As an audience, we are forced to make certain choices about the characters and the film as a whole which speak volumes about our own personal values. Is it right to watch men and women be gored by animals, or is it alright for the animals? Are we okay to believe that murderers should be given a pulpit in cinema? Can we look the victims’ families in the eyes and say “I think Danny Liles deserves a second chance because I saw a movie about him?” Should we be given the chance?

These questions and more are not present in the world of Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo, and yet they are inescapable. This is why it is such a successful film. At points, there wasn’t a dry eye in the room watching this movie, and this is among a crowd who has the power to change the bleak state of things in Oklahoma. The social problems in the state (as in any state, don’t get me wrong) could fill a stack of papers a mile high, and female incarceration and meth use are only the result of such problems, not the cause. People need to get organized, get educated, and get together, but more than that they need to get motivated to move the earth here. I believe they can do it, and I believe that Mr. Beesley’s film will help push them.

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So yes, I liked it, because its heart. Mr. Osborne and his dedicated team traverse the North American festival wasteland in search of fame and fortune, but moreso recognition of any sort. A key player here is director Scott Storm, whose film,  Ten ‘Til Noon, is the main focus of the festival hopping. (Paul Osborne also wrote that film) Broken up into segments which parallel the process of distributing a film via the festival pipe, Official Rejection is tight, funny and generally easy on the eyes. The film is mostly successful as an educational tool for young filmmakers. It demystifies many of the paradigms that they may think they understand, particularly the idea that a screening at a festival is the first step to getting noticed, getting riches, getting famous, etc.

Also, the filmmakers call attention to the importance of the camaraderie that has become the lifeblood of many festivals. When you throw a bunch of creatives into the same volatile foxhole, you are bound to hit on something exciting, something electric. New relationships are forged, new perspectives are discovered, and people come together in ways that they may never have done under other circumstances.

Which brings us to the film’s greatest weakness: while trying to deconstruct the horrors of the North American film festivals, Mr. Osborne and friends become smitten with them. Their hatred of the majors brings them even closer to the minor festivals, though I should say that Chicago’s IndieFest gets the rawest deal of any of them in the film. I could amend that to say that feature director Blayne Weaver gets the rawest deal, but you’ll have to see the film to understand that reference. Nevertheless, no matter how much the filmmakers tell us that the festival system is broken, they keep returning to it as the same solution.

In my opinion (and you asked for it, that’s why you’re here), there must be a better way to get your films out there, to reach an audience, than the same old ways that we have relied on for decades. There is also no historical frame of reference in this movie. It should be noted that as long as there has been art, there have been critics; as long as there have been fests, there have been anti-fests. This is not a new phenomenon, just one that has been amplified by the prevalence of the equipment required to make a film. It is so funny that the same people who wish to democratize cinema (filmmakers) will end up getting burned by the inundation of new work being created faster, quicker, and cheaper every single day. We want everyone to make a movie, just not while we’re trying to sell ours.

All that ranting and raving aside, Official Rejection is a solid film that all film enthusiasts should see. If you are not in the mood for a discussion on the current state of cinema distribution, there is plenty for you to love here. And if you are on the inside and you absolutely hate this film, well, at least Paul Osborne has opened up the conversation.

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2:39:58 PM: People here are super nice, by the way. They keep calling me a journalist. Maybe I should pop my press pass in a fedora so I fit the bill.

3:06:47 PM: Official Rejection is starting up. Wimgo.com ad now. This thing is totally going to get stuck in my head. More Cox!!!

3:07:55 PM: I’ll get you some coverage after the movie. I output this Stella Artois commercial to tape at my day job. Neato. Crowd loves it every time.

4:59:28 PM: Lights up on Official Rejection, huge crowd pleaser. Big laughs ad big cheers.

6:04:12 PM: Filmmakers in the crowd were very appreciative of the panel, I think some people with a lot of potential are rethinking their film plans.

6:04:54 PM: On to Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo. Packed day, can’t see nearly as many films as I want to.

6:21:00 PM: Let’s see if I can’t upload some pics without breaking the liveblog feed. Standby.

6:27:27 PM: Well liveblog, did I break you?

6:34:03 PM: Alright, settling in for Sweethearts now that I’m done scrambling to get those pics up. Nice crowd here. 2nd screening in OKC, 1st indoors

6:34:53 PM: In other news, director Blayne Weaver “heard” I would be at Weather Girl tonight. Which one of you told on me?!

6:35:46 PM: The official rejection panel was surprisingly unbitchy. Very informational.

6:37:08 PM: SotPR is up now. Radio Silence. Wimgo.com!!! Cox!!!! Stella Artois! Yay sponsors. Just stop making the same more cox jokes, kids.

6:38:18 PM: Eep, not sure I’ll be able to make the panel after this film. We’ll have to wait and see. I’ll be back in 2 hours with some gut reaction.

8:11:32 PM: Sweethearts just ended. Wow is all I have to say.

8:19:09 PM: Phenomenal Q&A happening with some of the attorneys of the inmates featured in Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo. Also DP and producer.

8:20:17 PM: Speaking with these attorneys make this so much more than a movie. People here are really behind this film; want the prisoners out.

8:21:34 PM: DP talking about losing a shoe during the rodeo. Wasn’t sure if he should run from bulls or inmates.

8:22:18 PM: Applause about bringing attention to the drug problem in OK. Most of the inmates are in for Meth.

8:23:05 PM: Attorney is now saying longer sentences dot help. Women have worse programs behind the walls.

8:23:20 PM: Guy asked did you get hit on? Really guy?

8:25:03 PM: Not enough treatment for women in the state of Oklahoma. Prison Dr. says more prevention is needed.

8:25:57 PM: Tues. showed the film to the women at the prison. Lots of tears. 500 women.

8:26:55 PM: Question: Is there a better way for three women to feel free than gladiator like events. Brutal. Strange. But the women love it. Empowering.

8:27:20 PM: Paradox; it’s wrong but the women love it.

8:28:06 PM: Women are doing great after prison. Foxie should be out anytime. Most in the film are now out.

8:28:56 PM: 23% of women in prison had a parent incarcerated.

8:29:37 PM: End of Q&A. Crowd is very impressed. A lot of chatter. Time to get ready for Weather Gorl, my first narrative of the day.

Related posts:

1. deadCENTER Liveblog, June 13
2. deadCENTER Liveblog, June 11
3. deadCENTER Liveblog, June 12, Evening