These New Bedford area filmmakers are screening at New Bedford Film Festival
NEW BEDFORD — On Thursday, the New Bedford Film Festival launches its four-day festival around the downtown area. Several of the selected films are from the South Coast area, set to screen April 18 to 21.
The New Bedford Film Festival celebrates authentic cinematic stories, cultivates bold storytellers and champions the city’s growing creative economy. The festival is committed to spotlighting the diverse human experience through cinematic storytelling with short and feature films, episodic, music videos, documentary and PSA shorts.
The New Bedford Film Festival will use spaces at New Bedford Groundwork, The Whaling Museum, second floor in the New Bedford Creative offices, Gallery X, the Co-Creative Center, Ground Floor Coffee and Steeple Playhouse, with a late-night encore presentation at Harbor Hotel from 11 p.m. to 1 a.m.
Tickets for the award show and pre-cocktail hour, which will take place at Gallery X and Steeple Playhouse on April 21, are now on sale. The festival's opening night at the New Bedford Whaling Museum on April 18, featuring the award-winning documentary "Love Letters for New Bedford."
Ground Floor Coffee, 61 Merrills Wharf, will be the hub for the festival holding networking events on its fourth floor in the evening and an informational check-in area during the day on its first floor.
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Music videos set to screen April 20
The local music, theater and video nonprofit Dream Out Loud Center, 127 W Rodney French Blvd., celebrated the selection of a hip/hop music video titled "Better Days" by students Noah Belli and Daniel Bejarano.
"They were 13 years old at the time of creation and wrote this as part of our Creative Careers Publishing, Performing and Graphic Arts Youth Program," the organization wrote on their official Facebook.
The two students wrote the lyrics and worked with Music Program Coordinator Chris DeOliveira and Program Director Kris Motta to produce the music. Instructor Megan Holden directed the video.
"We are very honored to be part of this inaugural event, and we are grateful for all of the funders involved who have helped to make this video and festival happen. These opportunities truly make dreams come true!" the post said, adding that they screen Saturday, April 20 at 2:30 p.m. at the Co-Creative Center, at 137 Union St.
The music video "Polaroid Dreams," created by Scott Bishop, explores time, space, and memory, and how a new place, new friendships and new experiences can put whatever has come before into a new context.
The song is part of NBWaves, a music project created with support from the New Bedford Whaling National Park. All songs in the project have at least one sound of New Bedford embedded in the music; for Polaroid Dreams, one of the synthesizer sounds was created from the sound of a brewing tank at Moby Dick Brewing.
A nostalgic music video titled "Back in Time" is set in a downtown New Bedford barber shop where three elderly men reminisce about their youthful adventures. The video captures their singing, dancing, and heartfelt reflections on why they long to go back in time to alter past events and relive moments of joy and camaraderie. The video was directed by New Bedford's Dereck Boyd.
"I am thrilled that my film has been selected for the film festival; it means a great deal to me," wrote Boyd." My ultimate goal is to share my work with the world, and this opportunity marks just the beginning of that journey."
Boyd also directed two other projects featured in the festival, "Haunted" and "The Rebirth."
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Local animators to screen their films together on April 20
The Our Sister School, 145 Brownell Ave., had two of its seventh grade student short films "Good News" and "A Visual Interpretation of Oppression by Marilyn Fry" accepted. They screen at Gallery X, 169 William St., on Friday, April 19, at 12:30pm.
The animated short film "Widow's Peak," Produced and Directed by Julia Harley Francisco-Simoes, is also set to screen on Saturday, April 20, at noon at Groundwork, 1213 Purchase St.
The film is about a sailor who gets lost at sea and his wife has only one choice but to find her true love. Saddened Mimi gets dressed as a cabin boy to sneak aboard her love Loui's old ship. With the turmoil of disguise among gritty men, will she find where her love Loui resides?
"Absolutely so thrilled to see my film based on New Bedford at the Film Festival! A true dream come true," said Francisco-Simoes.
The animated short film "Appalachian Horror," features stop-animation across a ruined landscape of Appalachia. The film is by Dartmouth's Christian Camarao. Dartmouth filmmaker Tommy Whalen's short film "Impunity" will also screen, based on ?Edgar Allan Poe's ?"The Cask of Amontillado."
The short delves into the disturbing nature of warranted retribution amongst the backdrop of the modern civilized.
Horror to comedy, local filmmakers have great stories to tell
Filmmaker Carley Byers' "Don't Fall From Grace" was also accepted into the festival to be screened on Saturday, April 20, at 4 p.m. The film is set in 1954, and about Grace, a young woman possessed by a mysterious entity, who is trapped in a sinister trance as her Mother is desperate to release her.
The film screening is paired alongside two other local filmmakers. The first screening is a folk horror short by Alyssa Botelho's titled "To Dust All Return," set in Colonial New England, about a Puritan girl is visited by a man of stature who suspects she is following in her mother's footsteps of practicing witchcraft.
The screening also has a feature film set in New Bedford titled "Plaga Zombie: American Invasion," featuring the area overrun by an alien zombie outbreak. Four survivors must fight back and try to escape before it's too late. An over-the-top roller coaster ride of gory fun. The film is directed by local Garry Medeiros.
"Being born and raised in New Bedford and Dartmouth, I feel honored to be a part of the first New Bedford Film Festival," Medeiros said.
On Saturday, April 20, at 1 p.m., Westport's Vincente DiSanti titled "Never Hike Alone 2," about the last sighting of Jason Voorhees, 20 years later, Crystal Lake resident and former victim Tommy Jarvis still lives with the haunting notion that Jason will one day return.
Public Service Announcement category features piece of whales
Screening on Saturday, April 20, at 10 a.m. at Groundwork is the Public Service Announcement "We Were Whales" by local Elaine Alder. The PSA is about a pair of entangled whales struggle to feed and care for themselves until they discover they have the power to change their environment and circumstances by reaching for each other.
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"I'm honored that were were chosen to be be screened. ... I hope it will inspire viewers to imagine themselves as whales, and whales as people, for our fates and outcomes are inextricably entwined," Alder said.
There are several other filmmakers featured beyond the New Bedford area. North Dartmouth filmmaker Parker Sowersby will screen his PSA "A Brief Commercial Break," urging viewers to pause, reflect, and redefine their relationship with material goods before it destroys the planet in a world driven by consumption.
New Bedford locals also star in short films featured at NBFF
New Bedford actor and director Adam P. Cray will screen his short film "Which Hunt" on Sunday, April 21, at 2 p.m. at the Co-Creative about a hitman who approaches the old Victorian mansion to finish the job. He's always relished the thrill of the hunt and the joy of the kill. The film is also produced By Alberto G. Rodriguez.
Cray also leads the feature film "Where the Dead Go," featured in the same screening. The film is about Caleb Murdock, living the American dream, one bloody nightmare at a time. He lost his last fight and everything he had betting on himself. Living on the streets, and with no one to turn to, he now sleeps, dreams and kills to pay back his debts or die trying.
Bill Hendricks, another New Bedford filmmaker, will screen his short "Monogamish" about a couple's surprising lengths in an attempt to put the spark back in their relationship.
The short-form documentary, produced by The New Bedford Light's Eleonora Bianchi "One Step at a Time," screens at 11 a.m. on Sunday, April 21. The short is about New Bedford’s homeless, featuring some of the most vulnerable among us, battling neglect, addiction, abuse, stigma and hopelessness.
New Bedford filmmaker Ryan Nunes has two shorts also set to screen at the festival. His short film "Invisible," is about a woman dealing with the crushing weight of living with her chronic illness. Nunes also stars in the film "After the Beep," about a man's anxiety getting the best of him when he attempts to reach out to his father around the holidays.
"Invisible" screens Saturday, April 20, at 5 p.m. and "After the Beep" screens Friday, April 19, at 2:30 p.m.
"The New Bedford Film Festival is charting its course for being one of the most ambitious festivals on the South Coast. Not only am I proud of playing a part in it, I'm honored to be a part of it as well," Nunes said.
South Coast filmmakers featured in documentary category
Westport's Alex Haggert's documentary short "Burning the Mishoon," is about the traditional Native American canoe, a dominant watercraft in North America. The documentary features an event in May 2023, at the Westport Town Farm, involving the ceremonial burning of a traditional mishoon.
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Annawon Weeden, a member of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe, and Andre StrongBearHeart Gaines Jr., from the Nipmuc Nation, along with various tribal and non-tribal supporters, skillfully oversaw the mishoon's burning, which lasted 24 hours a day for a full week.
"What an incredible honor ... being recognized by this festival marks a significant milestone for me. I am sincerely grateful for your consideration and eagerly anticipate viewing all of the submissions as my schedule permits," Haggert wrote.
Fairhaven filmmaker Mackenzie McCree has three short films accepted in the festival. Her music video "Don't Touch My Hair," as well as her student documentary-short "The Fall of 1985," which follows her uncle Iroquios McCree, who was shot multiple times and killed by the police.
"Almost 33 years later I interviewed his brother, mother, and cousin. Each person shares their perspective on Iroquios as a person, his death, and their experience with internalized grief," McCree said about the film.
McCree also has a documentary-short titled, "A Video Essay on Ballroom," on the not so adequately represented and historical truths of ballroom and vogue.
Local New Bedford students all set to screen
Student filmmaker Michael Cabral, from Dartmouth, will screen his film "Josie," directed by Michael Viveiros. The short is about a boy and a dog who connect while facing similar losses.
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While struggling to find inspiration, Fairhaven High School student Adam Marashio channels these emotions into a short film "What Next," using the very medium that has become a source of frustration.
"I’m so beyond thankful for the opportunity to share my passion with others. This was the first big project I had tackled in a while so it is surreal to think that something I made on my own was considered good enough," Marashio said.
"It reaffirms the message of the film: that I’m still capable of creating art."
Fall River films make the cut
In Fall River, the PSA "Dr. Tammy Silva - Marine Ecologist," features a Research Marine Ecologist from Fall River. She shares her story as she persevered to a career where she now studies her favorite animal: whales.
Fall River native Pamela Jayne Morgan produces and stars in the short film "The Principal's Assembly," about the tragic loss of a student and a high school principal insisting on delivering a sobering speech on the first day of school. However, her emotional stability is called into question.
"I grew up in Fall River - just 20 minutes from New Bedford - and two of our locations were in Massachusetts, so this is like a hometown festival for us," said Morgan. "It's exciting to share our film and its story with our local community."
How to purchase tickets for April 18-21
The films featured in the New Bedford Film Festival are not only from the South Coast area. There are other films from Boston, New York, California, Rhode Island, Georgia and New Jersey. There are also films from other countries such as the United Kingdom, Afghanistan, Canada, India and Germany.
All screenings throughout town and Groundwork workshops, are free to the public, with limited seating available on a first-come.
VIP day pass holders will have first access to seating, while general admission ticket holders will have to wait in line for any remaining seats up to five minutes before the start time.
The closing night award ceremony is a ticketed event only. VIP all-access pass gets you into everything including screening, workshop and all events including the April 21 award ceremony.
Online tickets sales are on sale through April 17.
Standard-Times staff writer Seth Chitwood can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on twitter:@ChitwoodReports. Support local journalism by purchasing a digital or print subscription to The Standard-Times today.
This article originally appeared on Standard-Times: New Bedford Film Festival selects local filmmakers to screen in April
