The prize for winning Cinegear is an extremely generous production package sponsored by Deluxe Labs, Fujifilm, Mole Richardson Co., Pro8mm, and The Camera House.  We’re looking very forward to putting it all to good use!

The first, DC Shorts, is the premiere short film festival in the nation’s capital, Washington DC.  In fact, MovieMaker Magazine calls DC Shorts “one of the nation’s leading short film festivals.”  Lucas is from DC, so it’ll be a particular honor for him to screen there.

The second fest is the Palm Springs International Shortfest Short Film Festival & Film Market.  Shortfest is renowned worldwide for the extraordinary community of filmmakers it attracts, and for the quality and scope of its programming.

These are two phenomenal film festivals, and we’re thrilled to be invited!  If you live in or near either place, please come join us!

For tickets and info, go to the Cinegear website.    We hope to see you there!

UPDATE: Apparently, if you want to attend the screening, you must also register so you can get on to the Universal lot.  Please do!  Thanks!

Oh man!  We are still reeling from an unbelievable weekend.  We met so many great people and saw such powerful, funny, and delightful films that this one will be hard to beat.  Big thanks go to Melanie Miller, Cevin Cathell, and the rest of the amazing Jackson Hole team.

And wow, what a great group of new friends we made.  We spent most of the weekend with Vineet “Vinnie D” Dewan and Rob Connolly, whose powerhouse film Clear Cut, Simple won best Student Short.  We also had a lot of fun with new friends Siobhan Mahoney and Courtney Balaker, whose film Cute Couple won the Audience Choice award, as well as Alison Heather who was representing the land down under with her film Love On Track.  And you know we always get down with Jeremy Brunjes, who we met at the Phoenix Fest.  Adding to the insanity was a surprise showing by our old friend Alex Wagner, of 19 Arnold fame, whose organization Not On Our Watch was there for the Global Insight Summit.  She’s down with B.K. Moon.  No big deal.

We saw two shorts and two features that warrant special mention, as we could not stop talking about them.  The first, Pop Foul is a jarring, powerful and personal tale of the cycle of violence in urban America.  The story is beautifully told, and extremely well acted.  And the second short, I Love Sarah Jane, was just tremendous.  A sweet tale of what it’s like to be in love, when you’re twelve years old.  Oh yeah, and it’s set in a zombie post-apocolypse.  Incredible.

The first feature that stood out for us was a gorgeous, funny, sad, romantic Romanian film from Cristian Nemescu set in a small, backwater town in Romania during NATO’s time in Kosovo, called California Dreamin’ (Endless).  The second, and arguably the most affecting thing we saw all weekend, was a documentary called Very Young Girls.  This shocking film, about teen sex exploitation in America, was a real eye-opener.  Rachel Lloyd, the founder of GEMS (Girls Educational & Mentoring Services) in New York, the main subject of the film, was there to answer questions.  This is a movie everyone in America should see.

Thanks to everybody who came to see Parachute!  The weekend was nonstop, and we had an unbelievable time.  We hope to go back there in the future… Jackson Hole Film Festival knows how to do it RIGHT.

The screening takes place on the Universal Studios backlot, and we’d love for anybody in the Los Angeles area to come join us.  We’ll be screening on Thursday, June 19th at 11:45am.  Click here for tickets and info.  It should be a lot of fun!

We’ve heard great things about the festival and were delighted by Artistic Director Melanie Miller’s description of what they’re all about.  Plus we’ll get to visit what Lucas believes is “the most beautiful spot in America”, the Grand Tetons.

If you know anyone in the Jackson Hole area, please let them know about our screenings as part of the Shorts Program II series:

• THURSDAY JUNE 5, at 8pm
• SATURDAY JUNE 7, at 3:45pm

We hope to see you there!

So that’s pretty good.  It also happens to be one of the 1% of all the film festivals in the world that has been designated as a qualifying festival for the Short Films category for the Annual Academy Awards.

No big deal.

A special thanks to Greg Hall, Jason Carney, and Scott Rogers of the Phoenix Film Festival, who showed us a great time.

If you’re in the Phoenix/Scottsdale area this weekend, our film is showing on Saturday at 5:10pm and Sunday at 12:05pm at the Harkins Scottsdale/101 Theater, as part of the Live Action Shorts Program A. You can get tickets on the festival’s website here.

She invited us to join her at the 2008 Fest! Our friend Kristina Lear showed her short, Cough Drop, at the JHFF last year, and she said it’s a real blast.

It also happens to be one of the most beautiful places in the world.

And look at their crazy laurels: