Dramas, Docs and Shorts in Annapolis
4-Day Festival Has 94 Films And a New Site

By Lauren Wiseman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, November 9, 2006

More than 90 films will be shown tomorrow evening through Monday at Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts, the Annapolis Harbour Center's Crown Theatres and Bowie State University in the fourth annual Annapolis Film Festival.

Organizers Maria Triandos, Demetrea Triantafillides and Ken Arnold have been screening films, securing sponsors and planning filmmaker panels since January. Last year's festival attracted more than 3,000 people, and this year's could exceed that, with Bowie State added as a site.

"Our films are good, our content is good and our programming is good," said Triandos, an Annapolis resident who is married to Arnold and is a sister of Triantafillides.

More than 500 films were submitted through http://www.withoutabox.com , where filmmakers can apply to more than 2,900 film festivals.

The organizers reviewed the films with a selection committee and scored them on three criteria: technical, which includes sound, lighting and editing; acting; and narrative. They also considered a vital fourth component.

"We want the audience to enjoy it," Triandos said.

This year's lineup includes nine feature films, nine documentaries, 50 short films, 10 short documentaries and 16 animations.

The Washington Post watched five of the films and spoke with the filmmakers.

'The Shovel'

Nick Childs's short thriller sends a clear message: Some things are better left buried. Paul Mullin, who is visiting his country home, is played by David Strathairn. Mullin becomes curious when his neighbor is digging a hole late one night.

The suspenseful tale was shot over two days in upstate New York. The film won best narrative short at New York's Tribeca and Woodstock film festivals.

"The reality for shorts is that I want to get as many people to see the film as possible," Childs said. "That is what I love."

Childs, 38, also directed and produced "The Shovel," which he adapted from a Steve Hamilton short story. He has created corporate films for the Pfizer pharmaceutical company and written scripts for HBO Films.

"The overall thing to me is that you work hard but there is sheer dumb luck," Childs said. "Having all the actors makes such a difference. They are huge actors. When they sign on, you feel lucky."

'Murder Game'

Baltimore filmmaker Robert Harari is a fan of horror films, so he decided to make one for fun. It also was a way for Harari, 30, to break into the competitive and highly saturated film industry.

"Horror is the path that is most likely to give you success early on, because there is a huge market for it," he said.

In his first feature film, a group of teenagers play a game in which murder is the object. The movie includes the standard elements -- blood, gore, suspense and even a spooky, troubled teen.

"Murder Game" has appeared in genre-specific film festivals including the Freak Show Horror Film Festival in Hollywood, Fla., Terror Film Festival in Philadelphia and Salem Independent Horror Film Festival in Salem, Mass. Annapolis is the first non-horror festival to showcase the film.

"My film is very genre specific. The fact that Annapolis accepted it is a huge honor," Harari said.

'Across the Hall'

Producer Gary Gimelfarb said he was lucky with his film "Across the Hall." Unlike most independent filmmakers, Gimelfarb, 28, secured funding for his suspenseful short before it hit the festival circuit.

It has won awards at the Red Bank, Harlem, Palm Springs, Chicago and San Francisco film festivals. Gimelfarb and director Alex Merkin said they never received that kind of exposure when they were creating music videos.

"The film festival circuit has given us a lot of exposure to cross over into feature films. A lot of studios have contacted us offering us other projects," Gimelfarb said.

In "Across the Hall," Julian, played by Adrian Grenier of the HBO show "Entourage," tries to calm his best friend, Terry, played by James Oliver, who is staking out his unfaithful fiancee in a seedy hotel. The 25-minute film ends abruptly, leaving viewers shocked.

Funding for the film came from Samsung, whose video cellphone customers can download "Across the Hall" through http://www.anyfilms.net .

'I Will Not'

By day, Annapolitan David Butler makes commercials. But his aspiration is to work on films. So this summer, Butler participated in Baltimore's 48 Hour Film Project.

Butler, 45, and his team had to write a script and shoot the film in two days. The guidelines required that the film include a detective, medication as a prop and a character named Jo or Joanne, who is a physical education teacher, and use the line "Just give her some time, she will figure it out." Butler and his writing partner, Sean Murphy, created a comedy that won accolades from the Annapolis organizers.

"When it was first shown, the whole room broke out in laughter. It was really great," Butler said.

Although Butler is hoping for a similar reaction this weekend, he is also just happy to have been selected for his hometown film festival.

"You usually have to go across the country, and there is no one you know and a room full of strangers," he said.

'Disarm'

Washington-based graphic designer Brian Liu teamed up with humanitarian Mary Wareham to shoot one of the most provocative documentaries to be shown this year at the festival. "Disarm" looks at the challenges of achieving a land-mine-free world and includes graphic and harrowing images from a dozen countries. The filmmakers traveled to Burma, Iraq, Colombia, Thailand, Afghanistan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cambodia and Kyrgyzstan.

"The film is supposed to not be just about land mines, but about how we think about what is ethical in warfare," Liu said.

The feature-length film won awards at the Newport Beach Film Festival in California and the Jackson Hole Film Festival in Wyoming. Liu said he has been approached by people who want to distribute it.

Liu and Wareham, who was part of the team that won the Nobel Peace Prize for the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, filmed for 10 months.

"Our goal was to finish the film and not get hurt," Liu said. "A lot of filmmakers don't finish films. We just wanted to get the word out.

"The Annapolis Film Festival is a continuation of getting the word out," he said. "The more people that see the film, the more people who will understand the situation and what we are trying to get at with the film."