Memoirs of a Gala | Bye-bye Temecula

September 28, 2011

Heather (DP), Tanya (Director), and Kristine (Producer)

Well, the Temecula Festival is now behind us. Our second screening was fun to attend (thanks Lynn Downey, Heather Dappolonia, and Chris Stiles for joining us). We also had a good time at the Awards Gala held at the Pechanga Resort and Casino.  No awards for “Blue," but we were honored just to attend. Congratulations to all those who won!

Cybill Shepherd presents the Lifetime Achievement Award to Peter Bogdonavich

Virginia Madsen

Connie Stevens

Overall, if I could sum up our experience at the festival in one word, it would be "educational." Yep . . .we learned a lot, especially in the area of marketing.  At this festival, as well as with many others, there were other screenings taking place at the same time as ours. There were features, documentaries, animations, and other shorts showing, and it was our job to persuade people to come to our screening verses the 3 or 4 other great possibilities.  Lets just say, marketing posters are a necessity, but a friendly face along with our postcard went a lot further.  I personally was more opt to go and see a film from someone I had met, verses playing the “eenie meenie minie moe” game with the film posters.  So, note to self, spend time and money on marketing!!!   


And now for some more words of wisdom from Tanya...

Hey hey, well yeah I think Kristine summed up the educational bit.  I guess what I took away from it was mostly the realization of what people forget.  It was fun, don’t get me wrong.  But I feel like there’s so much that people choose to forget when they’re here, or when they see stars on TV.  They forget that we drove ourselves here in an ordinary car, that the red carpet is just a different colored rug…that we’re staying with grandparents or at the Motel 6, or that most of us are unemployed when we finish our films.  They choose to forget that we’re just normal people and that it feels exactly the same on either side of the red rope.  Haha, I hope I didn't shake the glitter off, but I know that personally, I can run with an idea and completely get caught up in running past the finish line before remembering why I was running in the first place.

The magic was definitely fun to experience; I mean come on, seeing Cybill Shepherd and crazy awesomes like Peter Bogdonavich, Oren Peli, Pete Anthony and Russ Regan?  (And meeting Booboo Stewart, a rising teen-star that was in the Twilight films.) Fantastic, lol.

But it was actually nice to come back and remind ourselves of what our goal was, and that's getting "Blue" to the people who have experienced cancer. The climb has been hard and floundering on our own, but quite magical indeed =)

With that, we look ahead to what's next!

We're now officially allowed to say that we've been accepted into the Heartland Film Festival in Indianapolis!!  

Come join us =)

Screening times:

10/16/2011 Sunday  16:15:00 AMC Castleton Square 14, Theater 8

10/18/2011 Tuesday 14:00:00 AMC Showplace 17, Theater 10

10/19/2011 Wednesday 18:00:00 AMC Showplace 17, Theater 11

Tickets Available at http://www.trulymovingpictures.org/heartland-film-festival/tickets/