(And because this was a RESFEST crowd, dozens of audience members quickly whipped out their cell phones, digital cameras, and camcorders to document the light display.) When the audience filed out of the screening in New York, which happened to be held on September 11th, a few blocks away from the venue were the towers of light commemorating 9/11, which seemed all the more poignant after the screening we’d attended. The Yes Men’s “The Horribly Stupid Stunt,” about their WTO impersonations at one particular conference, was entertaining and also provided an enticing preview to Dan Olman, Sarah Price, & Chris Smith‘s forthcoming feature film, “The Yes Men.” The program was laugh-out-loud funny, frightening, and ultimately enlightening. “Closer: The Fall of Baghdad” offered war images and a news ticker that revealed the true cost of the war. Filmmakers also found musical inspiration - having politicians seemingly lipsync to songs such as “Gay Bar” by Electric Six and soft rock classic “Endless Love” (a hilarious duet between Bush and Tony Blair). Many of these films used existing news footage of speeches and edited them to create new messages - “Bushwacked 2” turned a State of the Union speech into a platform for Bush to utter statements such as “We are building a culture to encourage international terrorism,” and “I have a message to the people of Iraq: Go home and die.” “Terror, Iraq, Weapons” edited Bush’s speeches into a frightening repetition of those three thoughts. One highlight in this year’s fest is the topical “Bushwacked!” program featuring politically motivated shorts, most starring George W. “There was a lot of clapping and cheering.” “As always, the audience was really great and emphatic,” he told indieWIRE. He was very pleased with the response in New York. These new commissioned films projects involved young filmmakers, much lower budgets, and the results are much more innovative.” Stefan Nadelman, who showed his award-winning short “Terminal Bar” at RESFEST 2002, came this year with his new project “One Step Ahead,” which is part of the Nike Art of Speed series. Unlike the BMW Films project which commissioned big budget short films from Hollywood directors, these new films are much more risky. Martens among many others all have new short film projects and they’ve chosen to launch them at RESFEST. “One trend that we’ve spotted is the explosive growth of commissioned short films,” Wells says. The festival may have lauded underground work, but it also showed plenty of commercially viable projects, and even held a commissioned films panel to discuss how digital artists are working with major corporations. But the audience was great - and RESFEST generally attracted a lot of people.” Also, one beauty of the festival is that his film will also get 32 more screenings, and Wishnow hopes to also attend the stops in San Francisco and Los Angeles. “It was the week after Labor Day, it was the week after the Republican National Convention, and it was the start of Fashion Week, so I think that bit into the crowd size a bit. Jason Wishnow, who offered the New York premiere of his short “Oedipus,” was happy with the audience response, and even the size despite some challenges. This year was particularly strong across the board for innovative filmmaking.” “In some cases that work is made with digital video tools, in other cases it is made on motion picture film, still cameras, crayons or - in the case of one music video this year - a flatbed scanner. “We’ve always shown work that has inspired us - made us laugh, cry, or just go, ‘Wow!,’ says festival director Jonathan Wells. Like the digital film biz, RESFST has itself evolved over the years. This international touring film festival (which will visit a record 33 cities from Austin to Osaka) is now in its eighth year, and while the digital realm becomes more mainstream, RESFEST continues to present selections that show the film and design world’s more innovative minds at work. Nowadays, nearly every film festival in the world will offer at least a few digital selections, but few truly revel in the medium the way that RESFEST does. The New York opening of RESFEST added a tent to serve as a lounge where audiences and filmmakers could gather.
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