Our Festival

50th Festival April 30-May 3, 2008

Sessions

Wednesday, April 30, 7pm

INSTANT KARMA

Director/Producer/Writer: Tristan Higgs; US, 2008, 8 minutes

Alex attempts to end a run of bad luck by trying his hand at credit card fraud.

MURDERING MAMA’S BOY

Director/Writer: Katherine Cunningham-Eves; US, 2007, 18:27 minutes

A young girl’s obsessive jealousy towards the seven-year-old boy her mother nannies for, drives her to desperate actions.

TEMPORARY VIRGIN

Director: Tatsushi Momen; Japan, 2007, 3 minutes

The visual images depict metaphors of a love fantasy in a very romantic and abstract way.

STILL(E)

Director/Producer/Writer: Susan Schwarzwald; US, 2006, 25:38 minutes

Through the lens of memory, the daughter of a refugee from Nazi Germany revisits the pain of remembering, tinged with the fear of forgetting that silently haunts her father, herself, and now her young daughter as well.

ERIN GO WRONG

Directors/Writers/Animators: Brian Kavanagh and Joshua Huber; US, 2007, 4 minutes

Things go awry for two leprechauns who have kidnapped the Easter Bunny.

CHAIN

Director: Hyunmi Park; South Korea, 2007, 16:20 minutes

How far would you go to save a loved one?

CLARITY

Director/Writer: Miles Duffy; US, 2007, 10 minutes

A schoolteacher awakes in a cold sweat from a bizarre dream.

Sessions

Thursday, May 1, 8:30pm

THE REPLACEMENT CHILD

Director/Writer: Justin Lerner; US, 2007, 25 minutes

Todd returns to his conservative, backwoods hometown to find that his best friend, Michael, is deathly ill and his family refuses medical attention for him.

TELL ME WHAT TO DO

Director: Lee Ji Sung, Producer: Joanne Hurley, Writer: Ivaila Minov; UK, 2007, 11:21 minutes

Everything you ever wanted?

OUT OF THE SHADOW

Director/Writer: Andrew Bartels; US, 2007, 8 minutes

A young man being raised by a racist father re-evaluates his upbringing after witnessing a lynching.

MEDIUM RARE

Director: Stefan Stuckert; UK, 2007, 14 minutes

Carl is running for his life. When a beautiful woman offers him an unexpected hiding place, his life seems to change. But desire is about to lay its own subtle trap…

KIRKSDALE

Director/Writer: Ryan Spindell; US, 2007, 22 minutes

A troubled teenager and a lecherous deputy fight for their sanity and their lives in Kirksdale Hospital, a decaying mental asylum in 1960’s Florida.

SOLDIERS OF SISYPHUS

Director/Producer: Bob Barancik, Animator: David Puls; US, 2006, 4 minutes

A meditative look at the futility of war.

G8

Director/Producer/Writer: Make It Short Movie Project; Canada, 2007, 10 minutes

World leaders gather for a G8 summit in Thunder Bay, Canada just as known terrorist, Lutero Babych is spotted in the city.

DAVID BIANCHI’S SOLDIER

Director/Daniel J. Pico, Writer/Producer: David Bianchi; US, 2007, 11 minutes

An experimental film told in performance poetry outlining a day in the life of a soldier on the front lines of the Iraq War.

Sessions

Friday, May 2, 7pm

Movies on a Shoestring 50-Year Golden Retrospective

Director Dan Reardon Producer Josephine M. Perini

Enjoy a short compilation of some of the notable films of the original 1,062 that have been screened in the Rochester International Film Festival since 1959

L’ORO ROSSO (THE RED GOLD)

Director: Cesare Fragnelli, Writer Alessandra Recchia; Italy, 2006, 12:22 minutes

Erika, who has run away from Romania, lives her life in Apulia in southern Italy with a lovely daughter and terrifying memories of the past.

MIA

Director/Writer: Catherine Rehwinkel; US, 2007, 7:43 minutes

A ten year-old girl struggles to reconnect with her childhood crush, an older cousin who has returned from Vietnam frighteningly different

PISMO (THE LETTER)

Director/Writer: Matvei Zhivov; Canada, 2007, 15 minutes

A wounded Russian soldier puts his wife to an emotional test with a result he does not anticipate.

MOJADO

Director/Producer/Writer: Angela Trevino; US, 2007, 22 minutes

After 15 year-old Anne plays a prank on her maid, Sofia, grave repercussions result for Sophia and her 16 year-old son, Miguel.

REBEL SONG

Director/Writer: Simon Arthur; UK, 2006, 14:52 minutes

A woman and two men play out their broken lives amongst the swaying trees.

THE WALL

Director/Writer: Michael Lloyd Green; US, 2007, 7:30 minutes

A New York City cellist plagued by years of unbearable guilt, seeks solace in the music of a Holocaust survivor with whom he shares a tenement wall.

SPEED DATING

Director/Producer/Writer: Crystal Liu; US, 2007, 15 minutes

A yellow comedy about a young woman who devises a sure-fire way to meet the man of her dreams.

Sessions

Saturday, May 3, 2:50pm

BORDERLINE

Director/Producer/Writer: Sam Lembeck; US, 2007, 10 minutes

A dark comedy about maternal love and first dates.

CONFLATION

Director/Writer: Stéphanie Joalland; US, 2007, 14 minutes

Carol wakes up one more time totally confused. Is she a single mother struggling to get by as a free-lance photographer or a brilliant scientist with a loving husband?

COSMOS

Director/Writer: Clayton Hable; US, 2007, 22 minutes

During the fall of the USSR in 1991, a lone cosmonaut circles the earth in Space Station Mir without communication and unaware of his country’s collapse. Some will call him the last Soviet Citizen.

FORASTEIRO

Director/Writer: Thiago Fogaca, Producer: Priscila Andrade; Brazil, 2007, 12 minutes

The son of circus performers avoids intimacy with anyone because he is always moving.

ZEFIRINO: THE VOICE OF A CASTRATO

Director: Gerardo Puglia; US, 2006, 22 minutes

A celebration of the art of a castrato singer named Zefirino, an imaginary character written and performed by Anthony Roth Costanzo.

RACCOON AND CRAWFISH

Co-Directors and Animators: Calvert J. Waller III, Karabo Legwalla, Peter Hale; US, 2007, 7:30 minutes

Like many Oneida Indian legends, this story uses characters from the animal kingdom to teach a moral. A hungry raccoon searches for food, ending up in a battle with a crawfish.

EDGAR AND ELIZABETH

Director/Writer: Renee Webster, Producer: Melissa Kelly; Australia, 2006, 17 minutes

Elizabeth is the shy, new photocopy girl. Edgar is the stuttering photocopier repairman who comes to repair her extremely vicious copier. Workplace attraction has never been so dangerous.

PENGUIN: THE MUSICAL

Director/Writer: David William Metzger; US, 2007, 8:21 minutes

Abe is madly in love with Lilly. He must find a way to tell her before she leaves to tag penguins in Antarctica.

Rochester

International

Film Festival

about Us

The Rochester International Film Festival is produced and presented by Movies On A Shoestring, Inc., offering four distinct screenings each year at George Eastman Museum’s famed Dryden Theatre in Rochester NY.

Films

3 Days. Dozens of Films. 1,000s of Film Lovers. See short films of ALL genres from filmmakers worldwide! Join us! All (4) distinct screenings are FREE to attend.