oxford film festival Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Oxford Film Festival 2009: The Important Stuff
Filed under: Oxford Film Festival »
Let's start with the easy one: The people. I know the phrase "Southern Hospitality" gets thrown around a lot, but experiencing it first-hand from the Oxford Film Festival team was just lovely. My colleagues and I were treated like VIPs all weekend, which is both weird (I'm low maintenance) and very flattering, from the opening party at the lovely Donna Ruth Robert's house to the final get-together at ... someone's house that had beer, I was greeted with open arms, open bottles, and lots of adorable women who were way too young for me but way too pretty to ignore. Celeb-wise, this might not be Sundance or Toronto, but I wouldn't trade my laid-back conversations with Jason Ritter or Giancarlo Esposito for a dozen Jennifer Connelly interviews. (Well, not really. I'm not insane.)And a special mention is due to the dozens of organizers, programmers, and volunteers who sure ACTED like their local film festival was Sundance. I don't mean to sound condescending, but I was honestly surprised at how efficiently this little ship was run. I've been to several well-intentioned and entertaining regional festivals before, and this is easily one of the most organized, enthusiastic, and sincere I've ever seen. (The Oxford squad will probably chuckle when they read that, but it's true.) There's that indomitable "we're putting on a show!" spirit that comes with a festival like this one, and it's something I never get tired of seeing. Especially when good movies are afoot.
Cinematical Invades Mississippi! Again!
Filed under: Oxford Film Festival »
If you happen to live anywhere near Oxford, Mississippi and you feel a gnawing desire to talk movies with a whole bunch of great flick freaks, you could do a whole lot worse than to trek over to the Oxford Film Festival this weekend. Aside from esteemed colleagues like Lisa Rosman, Jennifer Yamato, John Beifuss, Kim Voynar, and Jeffrey Wells, the festival will also be attended by Eric Snider, James Rocchi, and (yep, me) Scott Weinberg. We'll be there to do all sorts of panels and juries and impromptu arguments and such...Oh yeah, and we'll be seeing some movies. Festivals are always good for that stuff. Debuting at Oxford before skipping over to SXSW will be two cool-sounding films: Crude Independence and Make-Out with Violence, both of which I'm hearing some really cool things on. Fresh from its Sundance splash is Prom Night in Mississippi, which promises to be a documentary full of pretty young southern women. Sign me up. And of course the genre bin is filled with titles like Night Crawlers, Interplanetary, and Psycho Sleepover -- so you know I'll have a good weekend. (Check out the full Oxford slate at Bside.com.)
And let's give it up to the Oxford Film Festival for their stellar taste in guests. Seriously, though, we're flattered to have several of our staff members earn the invitation. I've never even BEEN to Mississippi before! (Do they have Wendy's there? I just get antsy without a Wendy's nearby.)
BREAKING: Morgan Freeman Airlifted to Hospital After Car Crash
Filed under: Newsstand »
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WREG-TV in Memphis is reporting that actor Morgan Freeman was airlifted to The Med hospital in "critical condition" following a car crash in Mississippi late last night. According to the Mississippi Highway Patrol, the actor's car reportedly went off Highway 32 in Tallahatchie County at around 11:30PM and "flipped several times." A woman in the car with Freeman was also taken to The Med. WREG says they were told by police Freeman may have fallen asleep at the wheel.
TMZ reports that, according to their source, Freeman was "sitting up and talking at the hospital" following the crash, that the actor suffered some broken ribs and injured knees, and that his female passenger had to be cut out of the car using the Jaws of Life, but that she's also okay.
Freeman lives in Mississippi, where he took time out of his busy filming schedule in February to give a boost to the Oxford Film Festival as a surprise guest, showing up at the fest's first screening to kick things off with some words of encouragement for the fest and attending filmmakers, and encouraged the local audience to continue their support of independent film.
The venerable actor was most recently seen in box office smash The Dark Knight as Lucius Fox, and IMDb lists numerous projects in pre-and-post production on his slate. We here at Cinematical hope that Freeman will be okay, and we thank Michelle Emmanuel at Oxford Film Festival for letting us know about the accident this morning. We'll keep you posted throughout the day as we have updates for you, in the meantime, we'll be keeping Freeman in our thoughts and prayers.
Oxford Film Fest: Movies and Panels and Parties, Oh My
Filed under: Independent », Awards », Festival Reports », Cinematical Indie », Oxford Film Festival »
Eric Snider and I spent this past weekend in lovely Oxford, Mississippi with our friend Jen Yamato from Rotten Tomatoes, where the three of us participated in a panel on Film and New Media for the Oxford Film Festival. I also served on the documentary features jury for the fest. Scott Weinberg was supposed to have been here with me and Jen, but a serious tooth issue kept him home in Philly. Scott still pulled duty on the dramatic features jury for the fest, and Eric very kindly dropped things on a moment's notice the other day to fly to Oxford in Scott's stead. The three of us had an absolute blast in Oxford. I love these small town film festivals ... everyone is so nice, the pace is laid-back and mellow -- a nice change coming off the craziness of Sundance. We got into Memphis on Thursday, and Jen and I had some yummy BBQ at Corky's -- Memphis-style "dry" ribs and brisket that was to die for. Mmmm. After Eric got in, we drove the hour or so trip to Oxford.
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