Second City Chamber Series goes to Israel

Second City opens its new main season with a program of music with Jewish roots: Bloch, Schiff, Lavry and Schulhoff, played by piano trio and Eb clarinet. 7:30 p.m. Oct. 8. $32/$29 seniors/$10 students/free for under-18. Great Hall, Annie Wright School, 827 N. Tacoma Ave., Tacoma. 253-572-TUNE, www.scchamberseries.org

Tacoma Film Festival opens

This local festival features dozens of short and long independent films, many made in the Northwest, and ranging from documentary to feature to animation. Oct. 7-14, see website or brochure for schedule. $8.50/$6.50 matinee. Various Tacoma venues including the Grand Cinema …

Read more »

The 2010 Tacoma Film Festival is still months away (October 7-14) but if you want to enter a film or design the festival’s poster now is the time to make your mark.

First up, the final (extended deadline) date for film entries is June 15. The festival is accepting short, feature and student films. While films come in from all over the nation – and world – local filmmakers are heavily encouraged to enter.

Second, the Grand Cinema will accept entries for the annual poster contest through June 23.

The winning poster will receive $350 plus passes and membership to the Grand. Read more for details from the press release
Read more »

The Tacoma Film Festival wrapped up last night in a big way.

The closing night film (with a party catered by Adriatic Grill) sold out. Director David Russo, the Seattle filmmaker behind “The Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle,” was on hand to answer questions after the screening.

After seeing more than one dud in the past week I went in to the theater with more than a little trepidation. I came out blown away.

“Dizzle” is one of those movies that film festivals were invented for. Too bizarre to ever see wide distribution it’s a gem of a film that expands minds even as it wallows in, well, the toilet.
Read more »

The Tacoma Film Festival wraps up tomorrow but you’ll have a chance to see the winners next week.

Here’s the schedule:

6:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 12
Best Feature Film: “White on Rice”
Best Short: “Sebastian’s Voodoo”
Best Regional Film: “Otis v. Monster”

6:30 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 13
Best Documentary”Freeing Silvia Baraldini”
Best Short: “Sebastian’s Voodoo”
Best Regional Film: “Otis v. Monster”
(the last two repeat because they are very short)

6:30 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 14
A selection of some of the best and most popular local films:
“It Don’t Rain …

Read more »

Day six of the Tacoma Film Festival, and screening just now at 7 p.m. at The Grand was “Four of a Kind,” the first drama feature from Australian director Fiona Cochrane (who’d made the trip to attend.) And it was worth seeing, though it took awhile to get there.

Two hours long, the film spends half an hour on each of four women, each seemingly disconnected but dealing with uncannily similar issues and each, in the end, interlinked like strands of a spider’s web.

Each quadrant is constructed as an interview, with flashbacks detailing action. It’s a dialogue (often …

Read more »

Announced this morning at the Tacoma Film Festival awards brunch (hosted by filmmaker Warren Etheredge), here are this year’s festival winners:

Best Feature Film: “White on Rice,” a comedy following a 40-year-old divorcee who bunks with his 10-year-old nephew while looking for a wife.

Best Documentary: “Freeing Silvia Baraldini.” A nice award for The Grand, whose former projectionist Lisa Thomas is the co-director of this profile of a radical activist.

Best Regional Film: “Otis v. Monster.” See my previous post: This three-minute claymation tale of a logger hunting Big Foot is a good ‘un. Screens again 6:30 p.m. Wednesday …

Read more »

Yes! We have a winner! The Tacoma Film Festival, breaking the mold set by most other indie film fests, has compiled two hours’ worth of comedy shorts that are mostly very funny. Screened tonight at the School of the Arts theater, the ten shorts will replay at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Grand, where they’ll be even better on a big screen (and hopefully without the tedious waits in between DVDs.) Here they are, in screening order:

“Otis v. Monster”: This one’s good, but could be even better if longer. A cute claymation to a tongue-in-cheek tango score pits …

Read more »

Any collection of shorts is almost always a grab bag. You’re bound to get a few plain rocks along with the gems.

Friday night’s series of drama shorts at the Tacoma Film Festival was no exception. Some sparkled, others were rather dull.

This series repeats at 6:45 p.m. Monday at The Grand Cinema.

Click on “more” for a rundown of the shorts.

Read more »