by Nancy Jundi
After the debacle that was last years’ TriBeCa Film Festival, I have to admit that I wasn’t much looking forward to attending this years’ slate of films, parties and panels. However, the draw of New York City brings me in every year. Living in Los Angeles for the past four years I forget what it’s like to walk along crowded streets and talk to someone at a coffee shop that isn’t Starbucks or Coffee Bean. It’s nice just to hit a jazz club or watch a game of handball at the corner court. Regardless of whatever hassles and let downs I would face from the Festival, I had friends to see and movies to watch.
Celebrating its 6th year, TriBeCa Film Festival had made a near 180-degree turn from the mess that was its 5th anniversary. Last year saw the festival spread out over Mid-Town, SoHo and even Queens. This year they remembered they had a name to live up to – TriBeca. They kept the screenings local. Matter of fact, they kept them within blocks of each other. The panels were a short cab or train ride away, but for as nice as opening weekend weather was, I walked there instead. That walk lent itself to far too much shopping on my part, but that is the point of the Festival after all. Yes, spending money, a lot of money, in Manhattan is, and always has been, the point of the TriBeca Film Festival.
Robert DeNiro co-founded the TriBeca Film Festival not in some vain attempt to compete with Robert Redford’s Sundance Film Festival and not in an pretentious vie for cinematic snobbery – he founded it to bring money and film back into a community that had been crippled by 9/11. Businesses were faltering, travel was slowing and there was a huge hole in the city, literally and figuratively, that we had reminding us of why our lives and skyline had changed. Festival Co-Founder Jane Rosenthal said at this years opening press conference “We started this Festival to heal our neighborhood and bring the magic of film to the city we love.” In the ten years I’ve been making regular trips back and forth to NYC, I can’t say I’ve ever seen more than a couple film shoots taking place on the streets of lower Manhattan. Midtown sees a few minutes here or there, but when you have stock footage of it all for sale, quickie establishment shots to fall back on and tremendous street blocking fees, Hollywood found ways around filming in the Big Apple. Ten years of “Friends” sitting around at Central Perk still stings when you think of the money and jobs that show could have brought to the city.
“New York City offers the best backdrop in the world to make movies, and every spring, Lower Manhattan offers the best place in the world to celebrate them,” said Mayor Bloomberg at the Festivals opening ceremonies. “The TriBeCa Film Festival was founded to spur revitalization downtown, and its ongoing success reaffirms Lower Manhattan’s role as a vibrant cultural destination and New York City’s place as a center of movie magic.” The freshly appointed Governor Patterson was also on hand to oversee the kick off. “New York has inspired filmmakers since the industry’s beginning,” said Paterson “but recently, we started losing business to our neighbors, like Canada, Connecticut and Massachusetts. New Yorkers never go down without a fight, and with the significantly expanded state film tax credit I announced today, New York will continue to serve as the most fascinating backdrop in the world.”
That was honestly my largest gripe with the past few years of the Festival. They weren’t really doing anything to bring films back into the city and they weren’t concentrating money into one area that would show significant spikes in the retail intake. Lower Manhattan is ripe with boutique clothing shops and shoe stores. Little restaurants that could really use the business and some of the best street fairs in the country reside in there. With huge premieres like Spider-Man taking over the Festival and people being shuffled all over (and off) the island, I wondered where they had set their sights and why their goals had changed so dramatically. Keeping everything close is what lent to popping into local shops and spending too much money on a dress I knew I couldn’t find anywhere but in Greenwich Village. I had dinners at the little restaurants in Seaport and partied up and down 6th Ave. That was the point. This year finally brought us back to that. Checking into the press office I saw the difference immediately. They had a much more welcoming atmosphere with far more computers and an environment better suited to conduct interviews and make phone calls. The press team had improved; they were actually on top of their game. Last year they had lost over a third of the press passes. This time I was brought up on the computer and handed my packet within minutes and off to my first screening.
My first film proved to be one of my favorites of the Fest. War Inc., starring John Cusack, Marisa Tomei, Hillary Duff, Ben Kingsley and Dan Aykroyd. In a lot of ways this felt like a sequel to 1997 hit, Grosse Pointe Blank. Cusack served as star and writer on both projects, which saw him as a hit man dealing with an internal struggle over his profession. Swapping Tomei for Minnie Driver, there was the love interest he sought only to be cast aside for his low moral ground. The fun twist with this film came in the surprising performance given by Hillary Duff. Duff plays Yonica Babyyeah, a Middle Eastern pop star with antics and publicity stunts that would make Britney Spears look tame. The humor is hit or miss and the scenarios presented require some suspension of disbelief, but overall I enjoyed the film for what it was – a wacky Vonnegut like comedy of redemption and discovery.
Another buzz of the festival, well, it felt like a buzz to this technical junkie, was the ever-present evolution of HD cinema. With Seattle’s Alpha Cine making an appearance to showcase the differences in Viper, Red, Phantom, P2, and trusted film cameras, it was a delight to move from their educational panel onto my next film, which happened to be shot on, of all things, Super 16. The Objective, director Daniel Myrick’s first theatrical release since 1999’s Blair Witch, was filmed entirely in Morocco. I couldn’t believe how brilliant the cinematography was. For what it lacked in story, which was quite a bit, it made up for in scenery. The film, to put it bluntly, was Blair Witch in the desert. There really weren’t any redeeming qualities outside of the visuals, but that alone might be worth checking it out if you’re a fan of cinematography and sweeping landscapes.
Hands down, my must see out of TriBeCa was the documentary Chevolution. Ever wonder how or why the image of Che Guevara wound up on beer bottles and beach towels? One image of Guevara is used time and again to incite revolt or sell a product. The documentary traces the origin of that iconic photograph and how it went from an emotionally stirring representation of struggle, hope, sadness, and murder to becoming a symbol running amok without much intelligence or information behind its usage. With the heightened interest in Cuba now that Fidel Castro has stepped aside, I would encourage anyone interested in the country’s culture to take a look at this film when it finds distribution. You’ll get to see Cuba as it was, as it is and, if you’re keen, a scary foreshadow of what it could be.
The most improved portion of the TriBeCa Film Festival may have been the parties and cocktail hours. From daily events at Wolfgang’s to a Target Industry hour that resembled that of Los Angeles Film Festival’s, the atmosphere and networking opportunities appeared to have finally been thought out properly. One could talk, sit, enjoy a drink and not worry about being thrown out so the next event could shuffle in. Press wasn’t as laughable as it was in years past. I’m just as big a fan of blogging as the next gal, but last year was embarrassing. Credentials seemed to have been given out to anyone with more than 50 hit counts and a picture. This year found a much healthier mix of journalists and talent at the parties. Instead of being herded like cattle to red carpet press lines, TriBeCa seemed to realize that the filmmakers best shot at getting their film covered was to put them in an atmosphere conducive to an actual conversation rather than a two-minute walk along the entrance.
TriBeCa had actually been such a good and productive experience that I wasn’t ready to wrap up. It was like the movie you just don’t want to see end. On the drive to Newark I got stuck in traffic right at Ground Zero. The image still stings. More than six years later we’re still looking at that hole in the ground. The pictures of the new Freedom Tower are up at the site. Two weeks before I arrived they had begun pouring concrete for the new basement floor. It’ll be ready for occupancy in 2011. “This is why” I thought… We all came here not because we love film, in part, yes, but not just because. We came for New York. We came because it calls us and because it deserves our attention. TriBeCa Film Festival, as young and hopeful as it is, will grow with NYC just as the new World Trade Center will. Progress was made on both this year and as it continues, I’m excited to see what develops next.
