Peter Bogdanovich
Within a month the 2013 Woodstock Film Festival will be history…and its new posters, t-shirts and other paraphernalia all collectibles. We’ll be running wrap up stories on the various celebrities who came to town — or nearby sites for the action including Kingston, Rhinebeck, Rosendale, and Saugerties — to mingle with the crowds of locals who attend screenings and workshops, concerts and parties, as well as the many who help out the big event each fall as volunteers, making it one of the community’s key events each year.
For now, though, the WFF headquarters are abuzz with activity as everyone starts the countdown to the festival’s October 2 through October 6 run. Press releases have gone out announcing who’s going to be getting the big honors this year, and what films have been chosen from local, national and global entries to play in the festival’s 14th outing.
Did you know that legendary film director Peter Bogdanovich, the former critic and Museum of Modern Art film programmer who made such late 1960s and early 1970s seminal works as The Last Picture Show, What’s Up Doc and Paper Moon before going on to become an actor on The Sopranos, among other roles, was born and raised in Kingston? From what we hear, he’s looking forward to coming back to old haunts as much as he’s geared up about getting a Maverick Lifetime Achievement Award.
“I am particularly honored to receive the Woodstock Film Festival’s Lifetime Achievement Award from an organization that promotes artists and culture, as these pertain to film,” said Bogdanovich, who will also be showing up for the New York premiere of Cold Turkey by Will Slocombe, in which he stars, and doing a one-on-one panel discussion on his career, in addition to scooping p his award in a space where his movie-loving started years ago…now Kingston’s Backstage Productions. “The spirit of Woodstock couldn’t be closer to my own sensibilities and I am looking forward to returning to the area where I was born.”
Also returning home to receive an award, as it were, is former Maverick Lifetime Achievement Award winner Mira Nair, picking up an Honorary Meera Gandhi Giving Back Award and participating in a special talk with Academy Award-winning film composer Mychael Danna. Along with jazz legend, saxophone colossus Sonny Rollins, for a screening of Sonny Rollins: Beyond the Notes.
Among the nearly 150 independent films, panels, events and concerts, including 25 world premieres, five U.S. premieres, two North American premieres, 19 East Coast premieres and 20 N.Y. premieres, will be actor Keanu Reeves’ filmmaking debut, At Middleton, featuring Andy Garcia (also participating in an Actor’s Dialogue session), the U.S. premiere of The Motel Life with Stephen Dorff, another Actor’s Dialogue participant, and a presentation of the documentary, Breastmilk, by Ricki Lake. Local films will include works by Annie Nocenti and the new short doc on Jogger John, a truly Woodstock personality.
Exposure films focused on current affairs will feature intimate looks into Tea Party politics, end-timers, Tibet politics, cancer survivors and other current issues. Music films will include a piece on MC5 founder Wayne Kramer, and music events will include a performance of Rocky Horror Picture Show by Paul Green’s Rock Academy kids…along with a number of rising local acts including Connor Kennedy and friends. World cinema will feature works from South Africa, Germany, Mexico, China, Poland, Sweden, Italy, Pakistan, Brazil, Turkey, France, Tunisia, Australia and Canada. Plus plenty of shorts, regional works from throughout the Hudson Valley, and cinema from kids.
Everything you need to know…
Panels will discuss acting, film financing, making television for the internet, film music, turning shorts into features, and everything you need to know about making documentaries…with a host of the business’s best, including Barbara Kopple, Joe Berlinger, Liz Garbus and Ron Mann. Indiegogo founder Slava Rubin will not only talk about how to crowdfund a film to completion…but also give a keynote speech for all the would-be and actual flmmakers on hand, as well as all who care about the future of this once-fragile art form.
“This year’s lineup is made up of a stimulating collection of independent films that truly push the envelope. These films open our eyes and ignite our hearts. We are looking forward to being able to share the filmmaking experience in all of its diverse approaches, with our audience come the beginning of October,” said Meira Blaustein, WFF executive director and co-founder. “With our panels and honorees, we’ll be looking back and forward at the same time…a real treat for our festival goers, who can get a sense of where film is headed from our busy weekend in October.”
For further information on all things Woodstock Film Festival, call 679-4265, visit www.woodstockfilmfestival.com, or stop by those bustling headquarter offices at 13 Rock City Road right in te heart of Woodstock.