With offbeat events and a quirky line-up, this year’s Santa Cruz Film Festival encourages audiences to ‘rethink the viewing experience’
In a 90-minute conversation with Christopher McGilvray, the new artistic director and president of the Santa Cruz Film Festival’s Board of Directors, we talked about just as many films that aren’t in this year’s festival as films that are. We nerded out on Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity and Sunset Boulevard; John Carpenter’s The Thing, Assault on Precinct 13 and Halloween. In the Mood For Love, The Big Lebowski, Empire Records, Dear White People, The Grandmaster, Snowpiercer, and on and on.
But of all things, it was when he started talking about Derek Cianfrance’s heart-wrenching divorce drama from 2010, Blue Valentine—quite possibly the second-most depressing film in history after Requiem for a Dream—that I understood how he came up with the theme for this year’s SCFF: “Rethink the Viewing Experience.”
He saw Blue Valentine at the Los Angeles Film Festival; his brother worked at a post-production house in L.A. at the time, and had gotten them both tickets.
“He was just going through a divorce,” McGilvray recalls. “They were in the process of signing the papers, they had two kids, the whole thing. And it was so intense sitting there next to him. He turned to me afterwards and said ‘Dude, that was my fuckin’ life on film.’ And he didn’t even have to say it. I was like, ‘I know.’ I will never ever forget that experience.”
One of the things he remembers is that despite the hopelessness of the film, it made his brother feel better, not worse. “He said, ‘it was actually really nice to see it, because it made me feel like I wasn’t alone—this is just life, this is what happens, people go through this kind of stuff.’ That’s the power of the shared experience of cinema. That’s what makes it so cool. He got to see this story that he could so relate to, and I got to see it through his eyes.”
As a filmmaker himself, rethinking the viewing experience is a constant process for McGilvray. In general, however, the movie-viewing experience is getting lonelier, and the organizers of SCFF have decided not to take it lying down (on the couch, watching Netflix).
“The general trajectory of the cinematic experience over the last 10 years has become much more of an isolated, home-based experience,” McGilvray says. “People are building up their home theaters, a lot of people are experiencing their video and their cinema on their tablets or their smartphones. It’s losing a little bit of that shared cinematic experience.”
To combat that, the festival—which runs Nov. 13-16, and will once again be clustered in Santa Cruz’s Midtown area—is offering some unusual events, like a screening of the budding cult film Big Trouble in Little China (see article, page 25) at Verve’s coffee-roasting facility on Bronson Street. The Del Mar will host the opening night screening of Kestrin Pantera’s comedy Let’s Ruin It With Babies, and the Rio will screen several films; other venues include the design firm Cosmic, the Crepe Place and the Pacific Arts Complex.
“We’re trying to approach it from making unique experiences that you will only be able to have one time. They will not live on. They cannot be replicated at home,” says McGilvray. “As an independent filmmaker, one of the big things that I’ve thought about is the theatrical experience. I’m a big lover of getting to go to the theater and actually experience cinema in a communal space. I love the shared emotions. I love laughing with everybody in the room. I love getting scared with everybody in the room. That’s really important to me.”
A BRIEF HISTORY
For the SCFF, this year is about rebuilding, after some hard choices last year. Festival Director Jeff Ross, in his first year with the festival in 2013, oversaw the cutting of the festival from 10 days to 4 days, re-centering it around the “festival village” concept in Midtown, and introducing unorthodox venues. He also upped the festival’s coolness factor with events like the successful Big Lebowski-themed party.
“I think the shorter, two-screen festival worked,” says Ross. “You do split your audience running two screens simultaneously, but with careful scheduling this seemed to work okay. I still like the festival village concept, with venues being within walking distance of each other.”
Organizers are in fact building on that concept this year by making the Midtown Café a hub of SCFF activity throughout the weekend for filmmakers and festivalgoers.
“We’re hoping patrons, guests, filmmakers, film lovers gather here before and after shows to talk movies and socialize,” says Ross.
Community has always been one the SCFF’s strengths. Founded in 2002 by Jane Sullivan, it was originally more or less a big Santa Cruz party, with a wildly inconsistent line-up of films—and far too many of them. But the novelty of having a film festival here quickly became a badge of pride for the community, and when Sullivan left after the 2009 festival, Elizabeth Gummere and Julian Soler stepped up to carry on the tradition. They built on the idea of the SCFF as a social platform, not only for local film lovers, but for political advocacy.
But by last year, the festival had spiraled out of control, pushing its all-volunteer staff (especially Gummere, who was on her own at the top after Soler left) to the brink. Gummere, who remains on as the festival’s treasurer, gratefully handed the reins over to Ross. Stepping in as artistic director this year, McGilvray wants to build on last year’s success.
“Jeff did a very good job of getting it down to its bare bones. I like to say that we had a pared-down, bare-bones kind of festival,” McGilvray says. “It’s interesting now to take the bare bones and build it back up.”
NEW FOCUS
Since the very beginning, the festival has had a strong emphasis on social justice, a tradition that continues this year with the documentary Kate Bornstein is a Queer and Pleasant Danger and the “Rise Up” program of short films, which includes investigations of the Syrian revolution, Bay Area police shootings, and state corruption in Brazil. There has always been a particular emphasis on environmental issues, which are highlighted this year in the documentaries A Will for the Woods and Searching for Nepal.
But the addition of Ross and now McGilvray has added a new emphasis on the art of film, as with the inclusion this year of Lenny Abrahamson’s much-talked-about Frank, a dark comedy starring Michael Fassbender as the lead character, who wears a huge paper-mache head for most of the film—yet another way audiences will be challenged to rethink their visual experience.
“Frank was a great ‘get’ for the festival this year,” says Ross. “I saw it at SXSW, and it’s been a big hit on the international festival circuit. It’s great to have a festival with a film like that on the bill, along with a program of short films by local high school filmmakers.”
He credits that balance “that both supports local talents and introduces Santa Cruz folks to some of the best films from around the world” to Logan Walker, who’s in charge of programming for the festival.
“There’s a lot we’re trying to build on,” says Walker. While some of the alternative venues got mixed reviews last year for their functionality, Walker says “we’re making some improvements this year. I think there’s a lot of potential there.”
He likes the energy and emphasis on special events that Ross and McGilvray have brought. “Jeff has so much experience, and he can answer any question,” says Walker. “Chris brings fresh eyes to everything. He’s coming up with more off-the-wall ideas. He’s concentrating on what would be fun to do.”
McGilvray’s also the first professional filmmaker to head up the SCFF. With Scott Krinsky, he founded the independent production company Six Finger Films, and some of his short film and music video work can be seen on their website. A UCSC graduate, he returned to Santa Cruz last year after living in San Francisco and Palo Alto. That’s allowed him more time for another of his passions, surfing.
“I’m a Pleasure Point guy, ’cause I’m a longboarder,” he says. “I love second peak at Pleasure, ’cause to me it is the perfect longboarding wave. I’m not a huge thrill junkie, I’m not the adrenaline junkie style of surfer. I’m much more a mellow, spiritual kind of surfer, I guess. That’s what longboarding is. It’s much more about understanding the wave.”
As is extremely apropos for the artistic director of the Santa Cruz Film Festival, his surfing style ties in nicely to his love of film. Despite his ability to discuss pretty much any movie, for any length of time, he says there’s something much simpler at the heart of his own viewing experience.
“I’m an observer. When people first meet me, I’m a pretty talkative guy, so people assume that I’m this really extroverted, showman kind of guy,” he says. “But I’m really not. Most of what I like to do is people watching. That’s one of the reasons I love movies. I love to just sit back and observe.”
The Santa Cruz Film Festival runs Nov. 13-16 at locations around Santa Cruz. For a complete schedule of films, go to www.santacruzfilmfestival.org. Tickets for each screening are $11 general/$10 students and seniors. All festival passes are $60 general/$50 students and seniors. Tickets are available at the website, or by calling 359-4888.
10 Picks for the SCFF
As the head of programming for the Santa Cruz Film Festival, Logan Walker watches every film that gets in—and all the ones that don’t. “I want to have a lot of variety,” he says of his general philosophy. “We’re trying to do a little bit of everything.”
But as much as one might want to see every film in this year’s SCFF, that is literally impossible, since some films screen at the same time. If you’re having trouble working out your festival schedule from the program alone, Walker helped us out with 10 recommendations:
1. Frank—In this dark comedy, Michael Fassbender wears a paper mache head. If that’s not re-thinking the viewing experience, we don’t know what is. Sun, 9:15 p.m.
2. First Period—It’s described as a cross between a John Waters film and a John Hughes film. Somebody pinch us. Sat, 9:15 p.m.
3. Love in the Sixties—Documentary about Aralyn Hughes, the first lady of the Keep Austin Weird movement, who went from housewife to Vietnam War protester to discovering BSDM in her 60s. Fri, 7 p.m.
4. I Can Quit Whenever I Want—Italian film has laid-off academics forming a criminal gang, Breaking Bad-style. Sat, 4:45 p.m.
5. Kate Bornstein is a Queer and Pleasant Danger—Find out why! Sun, Nov. 16, 4:45 p.m.
6. Big Trouble in Little China—Sat, 8 p.m.
7. I Believe in Unicorns—Troubled young love in a sensuous coming-of-age film. Sun, 7 p.m.
8. Let’s Ruin It With Babies—Writer-director-star Kestrin Pantera nails the best title ever for this story of a karaoke rock star with a great life whose husband really wants to RIWB. Thu, 7 p.m.
9. Indesirables—A young nurse stumbles into a career as a sexual assistant for people with severe disabilities. A French film, naturalmente. Sun, 9:15 p.m.
10. Friday Night Comedy—Indie comedy shorts program winds up with a send-up of the Santa Cruz punk and hipster scene from UCSC alum Christopher Guerrero, “Mike Garcia and the Cruz.” Fri, 7 p.m.
For venue information and full schedule visit santacruzfilmfestival.org
