BEST FILM FESTIVAL
Tampa International Film Festival
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FOR
AS LONG AS WE CAN REMEMBER, everybody and their sister's been clamoring
for the Bay area to have its own high profile international film festival,
just like the ones organized these days by virtually every city with a
population over 3,000. After all, if even sleepy little Sarasota can manage
to pull off two of these suckers every year, what's the problem with Tampa?
Well, a lot of prayers were answered last year with the appearance of
the first annual Tampa International Film Festival, a 10-day event featuring
more than 20 critically acclaimed films from around the world. The movies
were a mostly wonderful lot, culled from prestigious film festivals such
as Toronto and Berlin, and many of the TIFF screenings were premieres
for Florida and even the Southeast U.S. Best of all, the festival turned
out to be as well organized as it was creatively designed, resulting in
a debut year that was successful enough to ensure repeat performances
next year and, hopefully, for a long time to come. Local cinephiles might
rightly argue that the Tampa Gay and Lesbian Film Festival's been doing
a variation of this sort of thing for years, but, good as that festival
is, the new kid on the block seems to offer even more promising prospects.
With its visionary approach, consistent quality control and overall commitment
to the art of cinema, The Tampa International Film Festival is the most
important event of its kind ever produced in the Bay area. Runner Up:
Tampa Gay and Lesbian Film Festival. Tampa International Film Festival,
813-253-3333, ext. 3425 or http://tampafilmfest.ut.edu.
--Weekly Planet
BEST MOVER AND SHAKER
ON THE LOCAL FILM SCENE
Rob
Tregenza
The Bay area film scene is a far richer place today than it was just a short time ago, and much of that improvement can be attributed to the efforts of one individual. Since moving to the Bay area a few years back, Rob Tregenza has been diligently laboring on several film fronts. He continues to press ahead with the creation of an MFA program for the cinema department at the University of Tampa (where he's an associate professor) and he also runs a little event you may have heard about, the Tampa International Film Festival. In addition, Tregenza still finds time to make his own films (the highly regarded trilogy Talking to Strangers, The ARC and Inside/Out), and even occasionally serves as cinematographer for the likes of the great Hungarian director Bela Tarr. Covering all the bases, Tregenza and wife/partner J.K. Eareckson even work the distribution end of things.