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ConvergeSouth Film Festival

convergesouth

About Me

This is the first year that ConvergeSouth is holding a Film Festival. ConvergeSouth is a gathering of like-minded people that use the internet to communicate and participate with the on-line community. Open discussions about new media, social networking and ideas that will move us forward.OK, I'm in the process of putting together a sheet for the audience to rate each film. After I get the returned sheets I will grade the films and we will have awards the ole fashion way... Democratically. No prestigious panel with their noses in the air. The audience will tell the filmmakers how they liked their work. I'm leaving a message area so you can write in a message to the filmmakers too. Tell them how much you appreciate their hard work.What good is audience participation unless there is an award. Here is the hokey part, in which I hope the audience participates in. I created a donation button for anyone that wants to monetarily reward the filmmakers. You can be in attendance or admiring from afar but whoever has the best rated film from the festival will win this award. If everyone wants to be a freeloader and watch all the films for free go ahead, no need to feel guilty with each outburst of laughter or an emotion that triggers a tear. These filmmakers put a lot of time and money into these projects and it would be very cool to have the audience reward them for entertaining them.Feel free to donate as little or as much as you like. I'm sure the winning filmmaker will feel humbled. That being said, this years festival was provided pro bono baby. We did not seek an entry fee from the filmmakers for submitting their work and we are not charging an admission fee at the door. This may change in the future. I have this week to find some fun items to handout to the audience as well as more gifts for the filmmakers.

My Interests

I'd like to meet:

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ConvergeSouth Film Festival will be held at 2 Art Chicks Gallery on 609 S. Elm Street in Downtown Greensboro on Saturday October 20th, 2007. Doors open at 7:00 PM and the Festival will begin at 7:30.

We will have a fifteen minute intermission in which I will introduce Brian Conley from AliveInBaghdad.org and Farrah Hoffmire and Mitchell Davis from " Falling Together in New Orleans ". This will allow time for the audience to ask any questions to the present filmmakers. If it runs more than fifteen minuets so be it as long as it doesn't run over 30 minutes.

ConvergeSouth Film Festival Schedule

TITLE: Deadly Finger

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: Jose Montesinos

RUNNING TIME: 4:01

Synopsis: The World-wide Master of the Deadly Finger technique challenges a martial arts instructor and his students.

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TITLE: Game Over

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: PES

RUNNING TIME: 1:35

Synopsis: 80's arcade games come to life with objects.

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TITLE: Broken

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: David Wendelman

RUNNING TIME: 15:22

Synopsis: Whether it's been just to survive or to empower himself, every day has been a fight for small-time boxer Luis Morales. Now after years of boxing, Luis' promoter Marcel and his trainer Gerecke are pressuring him to leave the ring. But for Luis, the choice is not that simple. He is haunted by the memory of his father who, having once been a proud Mexican wrestler of the Lucha Libre, had died a broken man, struggling as a day laborer to support his family and to live the American dream. For Luis, to stop fighting is to fail, something he is more terrified of than of death. To fight is to exist.

FILM CREW:
Filmmaker - David Wendelman
Written by - David Wendelman

Producer - David Wendelman

Creative Producer - Michael Bentt
Executive Producers - John Riggi, David Wendelman

Original Music - Bobby Tahouri

Editor - Alex Ward
Sound Design - Jeffery Alan Jones, Daniel Pagan

Production Designer - Laura Paddock
Special Effects Make-Up Artist - Jacque Carroll
Fight Coordinator - Michael Bentt

FILM CAST:
Luis Morales - Jose Yenque
Gerecke - Gene Borkan
Marcel - Felix 'Ryghin' Pimentel
Francisco Morales - Paul Renteria
Juanita Morales - Doralicia
Julio - Ruben Bansie-Snellman
Pepe - Tommy Montoya

Augie - Joe Chacon

Javier - Brian Miller

Manuel - Will Morales

Young Luis Morales - Richard Garza

El Volcan (the masked wrestler) - Francisco Morales

Los Chivos - Enigma de Oro

Previous Festivals: Urbanworld VIBE Film Festival 2006, NY International Latino Film Festival 2006. Nosotros American Latino Film Festival 2006, Cinesol Film Festival 2006, Salento International Film Festival Italy 2006, 2nd International Short Film Festival La Nocha De Los Cortos 2006 Peru, Harlem International Film Festival 2006, Boston Latino International Film Festival 2006, 6 Festival International de Cine Hispano Mexico 2006, International Latino Film Festival San Francisco Bay Area 2006, CineMas Albuquerque Latino Film Festival 2007, 6ta Muestra Nacional de Nuevo Realizadores Havana, Cuba 2007, 14th San Diego Latino Film Festival 2007.

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TITLE: My Urban Report: Jena

CATEGORY: Citizen Journalism

DIRECTOR: Amani Channel

RUNNING TIME: 4:32

Synopsis:

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TITLE: Banana Bus
DIRECTOR NAME: Ajit Anthony Prem
CATEGORY: Vlog
RUNNING TIME: 2:12

Synopsis: JaCynthia Shepherd recalls her experiences on the Public School Bus system. It seems she received much of her education while riding to and from school.

FILM CAST & CREW:
Filmmaker - Ajit Anthony Prem
Voice over - JaCynthia Shepherd
Song - “She Was a Girl, She Was in Love” by Matt Baldwin

Previous Festivals: Ava Gardner Film Festival.

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TITLE: Blue Angel
CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR NAME: Andrew Michael Warnecke
RUNNING TIME: 13:10

Synopsis: A disturbing, yet intimate and moving portrait of a girl (Jenafer Brown) confronted with her classmate's (Aika Shima) confession of sexual abuse in the home. Based upon a short story by Christine Bollerud.

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TITLE: Honey I’m Home
DIRECTOR NAME: David Branin

CATEGORY: Short Film

RUNNING TIME: 5:40

Synopsis: This film tackles the topic of being unfaithful and having to confess the truth to one's companion. Never before has infidelity been explored in the way that Branin does in this five minute masterpiece.

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TITLE: 80’s Man
DIRECTOR NAME: DC Douglas
CATEGORY: Music Video
RUNNING TIME: 3:28

Synopsis: This video was born out of lethargy and nurtured through an obsessive compulsive disorder.

8:15 p.m. on Saturday, July 31st, Lilia Popova calls up Robin Meyers and D.C. Douglas (who happen to live upstairs) and invites them down for pizza with her boyfriend, Abraham Peraza. D.C. Douglas, determined to break their vegetative demeanor, insists they also write a song. They all agree. 3 hours later, "Eighties Man" is born.

Over the next week, he is refined. It becomes apparent that a video must be made. The following Friday, several friends converge at a green screen studio in the aptly named Studio City. They have 2 hours to film. After one week of intensive editing and compositing, on August 20th, 2005, "Eighties Man - The Video" goes live on the web. Total cost: $600 and 100+ hours of creativity. The video is 3 minutes. Life is cruel.

What you are about to see is, indeed, one of the most important music videos of all time... (Yeah, bigger than "Let's get Physical")

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TITLE: Roof Sex

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: PES

RUNNING TIME: 1:10

Two comfortable chairs on top of the roof... watch where you sit.

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TITLE: Winds of Time: The Proposition

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: Jose Montesinos

RUNNING TIME: 4:57

Synopsis: Jorge Valenzuela must hire the Karate Boys to convince Carmen Dawn, Jiu-Jitsu Nurse, to go out with him. Comedy & action ensue...

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TITLE: F2

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: Jesse Knight

RUNNING TIME: 6:33

Synopsis: The decay of man coincides the decay of religion in a post apocalyptic world. A priest of the post apocalypse touches paintings and receives visions ultimately revealing his own sacrificial death at the hands of the high priestess.

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TITLE: Falling Together in New Orleans Vignette 17

CATEGORY: Citizen Journalism

DIRECTOR: Organic Process Productions

RUNNING TIME: 18:28

Synopsis: Emergency Communities is a non-profit organization that employs compassion and creativity to provide community-based disaster relief. Since Katrina, they have operated four relief sites, served over 300,000 meals and 25,000 residents of the Gulf.

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TITLE: Exit Strategy
DIRECTOR NAME: Valient Thorr
CATEGORY: Music Video
RUNNING TIME: 3:55

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TITLE: Alive In Baghdad: An In-Depth Look at the Wall in Adhamiya

CATEGORY: Citizen Journalism

DIRECTOR: Brian Conley

RUNNING TIME: 8:07

Synopsis: When they began erecting a wall in Adhamiya the public response was varied, in Iraq, in the US, indeed around the world. Some responded with shock, others with outrage, others wondered why it hadn’t been tried before. Most importantly, there was a reaction, it was widespread, and strong. The press covered the issue of the wall repeatedly, with many papers writing multiple stories on the subject, extending over a period of months, some more. Unfortunately the images of the wall are few and far between. A Google image search reveals only 1,020 results for adhamiya wall, many of which are repeat images and many more are irrelevant to the search. Why has such an important event of the war and most recently the Surge, received so little visual coverage?

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INTERMISSION

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TITLE: Duck Duck Goose!

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: DC Douglas

RUNNING TIME: 20:52

Synopsis: Duck, Duck, GOOSE!” has no explosions or boobies. Well, wait a minute... It does feature one boob named Jacob who longs to keep his ex-wife close-by for masochistic pleasure. There's also C.B., a nervous romantic with a hapless crush on an exotic burping beauty named Lizzie, who only wants to find a man with a mind like a woman, fall in love, and fly away to Paris. It's an intoxicating blend of early sixties European romp and post-modern cynicism in glorious technicolor!

FILM CREW

Director - D.C. Douglas
Writer - D.C. Douglas
Producers - Rose Bertolero, D.C. Douglas, Josephine Gompertz
Original Music - Abraham Peraza, Lilia Popova

D.O.P. - Tom Robotham
Editor - D.C. Douglas

FILM CAST
Lizzie - Robin Meyers
Jacob - D.C. Douglas
C.B. - Bryan Cuprill
La Penis Woman - Courtenay Taylor
Le French Waiter - Christopher Carroll
Le Creepy Guy - Dan Butler
Le Romantic Guy - Michael Cade
La Crying Girl - Gina Marie Gian
La Matchmaker - Lisa Long
La Giggly Girl - Bess Meyer
La Religious Girl - Diane Mizota
Le Opera Singer - Abraham Peraza
La Pianis - Lilia Popova

Film Festivals: Tiburon International Film Festival, San Fernando International Film Festival, Palm Beach International Film Festival, Seattle SOS Film Festival, RiverRun International Film Festival, Newport Beach International Film Festival, Trenton Film Festival, Santa Cruz Film Festival, Empire Film Festival, The O.C. Short Film Festival, Seattle True Independent Film Festival, New York Gen Art Ignite, Sacramento Film and Music Festival, Los Angeles International Short Film Festival, Rome International Film Festival, DC Shorts Film Festival, Quittapahilla Film Festival, FAIF Film Festival, Ohio Independent Film Festival, Annapolis Film Festival, Cleveland International Film Festival

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TITLE: Booger Boy

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: PES

RUNNING TIME: :27

Synopsis: Tasty

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TITLE: Deadly Finger Returns

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: Jose Montesinos

RUNNING TIME: 4:59

Synopsis: The Master of the Deadly Finger technique is back! Only this time he faces many more opponents!

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TITLE: My Urban Report: Twins

CATEGORY: Citizen Journalism

DIRECTOR: Amani Channel

RUNNING TIME: 10:51

Synopsis:

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TITLE: Tuning Out Roadkill
DIRECTOR NAME: Ajit Anthony Prem
CATEGORY: Short Film

RUNNING TIME: 4:22

Synopsis: We have a tendency to look away from all forms of death. Is it instinct? Is it to keep one's insanity? Or does it just become meaningless when it happens so much?

FILM CAST & CREW:
Filmmaking & Music - Ajit Anthony Prem
Voice over - Scott Wallace

Previous Festivals: Ava Gardner Film Festival.

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TITLE: Alive In Baghdad: Iraq Journalist Killed in Heavy Traffic

CATEGORY: Citizen Journalism

DIRECTOR: Brian Conley

RUNNING TIME: 7:37

Synopsis: Iraqi police said that Suhad Shakir, an announcer in Al-Iraqiyah channel, was wounded when US forces opened fire on her car near the Foreign Ministry in central Baghdad. The US army said that it is verifying the truthfulness of the claim.

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TITLE: Thoughts on the Road
DIRECTOR NAME: Ajit Anthony Prem
CATEGORY: Vlog
SHOOTING FORMAT: DSLR Stills
RUNNING TIME: 1:39

Synopsis: Sometimes, the best place to think is on the road.

FILM CAST & CREW:
Filmmaker - Ajit Anthony Prem
Song by Hisato Higuchi

Previous Festivals: Ava Gardner Film Festival.

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TITLE: FAIT AC•COM•PLI
DIRECTOR NAME: Jason Marc Pierce
CATEGORY: Short Film

RUNNING TIME: 4:31

Synopsis: A Science Fiction piece that asks the question: "What would you do if you knew exactly when someone is going to die?"

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TITLE: Catastrophe
DIRECTOR NAME: Steven van Vuuren

CATEGORY: Short Film

RUNNING TIME: 6:48

Synopsis: Catastrophe is a black comedy about disturbed household that is changed forever by a surprising
member of the family. Told from a unique perspective, Catastrophe uses imaginative camera work,
sound design and stark colors to create an atmospheric tale.


FILM CREW:
Filmmaker/Editor - Stephen van Vuuren
Writers - Teresa Prevatte, Stephen van Vuuren
Producers - Sheila Duell, Marie van Vuuren

Script Supervisor/Edit - Andrew Johnson
Boom - Kelly Wall
Sound - Andrew Johnson, Marie van Vuuren
Grips - Alex Prevatte, Cameron Prevatte
PA - Diana Keyes-Johnson, Su Welikonich

FILM CAST

Husband - Reed Prevatte

Wife - Peggy Droz

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TITLE: Dear Stranger
DIRECTOR NAME: Ajit Anthony Prem
CATEGORY: Short Film

RUNNING TIME: 14:57

Synopsis: Dear Stranger follows the musings of a young woman's erotic fantasies that develop harmlessly until they suffocate her mind and her real life relationships.

FILM CREW:
Filmmaker - Ajit Anthony Prem
Producer - Rachel Connolly
Executive Producers - Kelly Cook, Violette Harris
Still Photographer - Carl Gunhouse
Music Composer - Hunter M. McDermott
Additional Music - Bill Donovan

FILM CAST:
Rosie - Nikki Alikakos
Gordon - Steven Lock
Stranger - Michael Teh
Voice-Over - Kelly Cook
Rosie's Friend - Maryse Karunaratne
Stranger's Friend - George Rivas
Girls in Park - Lindsey Glass & Mandy

Previous Festivals: Annapolis Film Festival, Ava Gardner Film Festival.

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TITLE: Deathmatch Tournament 3

CATEGORY: Short Film Episodic

DIRECTOR: Matthew Sumner

RUNNING TIME: 4:59

Synopsis: Deathmatchtournament.com is a site where humans, cyborgs, and robots battle in a video game type world.

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TITLE: Housewifery

CATEGORY: Vlog

DIRECTOR: Jill Foster

RUNNING TIME: 3:18

Synopsis: In the last year Jill observed the life with her husband: they were emotionally awesome yet the remainder of their partnership looked imbalanced e.g. clutter at home, no living will, neither of them knew how to cook or invested the time in learning, and why did that retirement account still look empty despite their philosophically supporting savings, retirement plans, etc? These question demanded resolve ... & a little humor too.

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TITLE: Gi Ho Lo: The Legacy of Richard Long

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: Jason Marc Pierce

RUNNING TIME: 8:01

Synopsis: Mockumentary about the youngest Gi Ho Lo master in America

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TITLE: Marriage Is For...

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: PES

RUNNING TIME: :15

Synopsis: What happens when two nuts wed?

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TITLE: Been You All Along
DIRECTOR NAME: Ajit Anthony Prem
CATEGORY: Vlog

RUNNING TIME: 2:31

Synopsis: Two people that were always meant to be together.

FILM CAST & CREW:
Filmmaker - Ajit Anthony Prem
Song by Buckethead

Previous Festivals: Ava Gardner Film Festival.

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TITLE: Winds of Time: Querida

CATEGORY: Short Film

DIRECTOR: Jose Montesinos

RUNNING TIME: 4:59

Synopsis: Jorge Valenzuela continues to long for Carmen Dawn. The Karate Boys, on their way to face Carmen again, are intercepted by their long-time rivals: The Throw-Down Team!

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My Blog

ConvergeSouth Film Festival Sponsorship Idea

Great thing about having a blog is I can air out some of my ideas. Hopefully my peeps can add their view to help me flush this idea out.On my personal blog I had some ideas for companies to sponsor th...
Posted by ConvergeSouth Film Festival on Sun, 06 May 2007 06:01:00 PST