Quick Movie Review: Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival 2009

Now in its 11th year, the Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival is an excellent way to see a variety of independent films that run the gamut from drama to comedy to documentary. This was my first foray into the Festival, and I wanted to take the opportunity to see a documentary or two, some movie shorts and a couple of feature-length films.

Opening Night featured a documentary, Best Worst Film, and ended (for me) on Sunday afternoon with The Vicious Kind. Venues visited included the Carver Theater, Alabama Power, and the Alabama Theater.

As it is with Festivals, many of the films shown are shopping for distributors and may or may not make it to the big screen for the general public. However, assuming all goes well, many do make it to DVD and will be available to rent at some point in the future.

Those of you who are friends on Facebook saw my instant analysis of each movie but here is a somewhat expanded edition of the Sidewalk summary plus trailers. ..

The Festival started with a packed house at the Alabama Theater to watch Best Worst Movie.



Best Worst Movie (2009)

Troll 2 (1990) is considered by many people to be the worst movie ever made. This documentary catches up with the cast (at least two of whom are still working) and shines a light on the cult status that this movie has attained over the years. At once funny and, in some ways, sad this is a high entertaining documentary that was directed by Michael Stephenson, who played the young boy in Troll 2, and clearly stars George Hardy of Alexander City, Alabama, who played the father in the movie. The doc moves along as a fun, quick pace until we are introduced to the Italian director, whose seriousness about Troll 2 starts out fun but then bogs down the doc's pace.



45365 (2009)

Fascinating documentary that provides a glimpse into the lives of small town people living in small town America. The small town is Sidney, Ohio, (population = 20,000). The two filmmakers are natives of Sidney and used two cameras to shoot hundreds of hours of film. The magic of this documentary is in its editing. It's beautifully shot and beautifully constructed. This is a diary of a small town.



That Evening Sun (2009)

Director Scott Teems did a very smart thing here -- he hired Hal Holbrook. Holbrook plays Abner Meecham, an 80-year-old man who gets tired of the nursing home, leaves and heads back to his family farm. Once there he finds that his son has rented it to Lonzo Choat, who Meecham believes is "white trash." Holbrook carries this whole film but he is surrounded by a terrific supporting cast led by Ray McKinnon as Choat, Carrie Preston as Choat's wife, and Mia Wasikowska as Choat's daughter. Walton Goggins plays Meecham's son and does a solid job plus you have the bonus of appearances by Barry Corbin and Dixie Carter. Of the movies I saw at the Festival -- this is the one I highly recommend you put on the "Save" list in Netflix.

The Vicious Kind (2009)

Unfortunately, I couldn't find a trailer that would embed itself here, but if you are interested, you can Google the movie and there is a trailer available for viewing. Adam Scott is terrific here as Caleb Sinclaire and he is matched by Brittany Snow, who plays Emma Gainsborough, Caleb's brother's girlfriend. It's Caleb's brother, Peter, played by Alex Frost, that is the problem. Frost just doesn't act as well and it shows. J.K. Simmons, always a favorite, makes an appearance as the boys' father. Designed to make you angry, the movie achieves that on a number of levels. At the end, you'll wonder how in the world Peter was able to sleep through what was going on in the very next room.

Movie Shorts

One of the great things about a festival like this is the opportunity (for me at least) to see movie shorts, which I love. Unless you live in L.A. or New York, you will never see shorts released on the big screen so it's a treat when that rare opportunity is made available. I saw a series of shorts that included the three you see here. . .

"Horn Dog" by Bill Plympton. If you are an animation fan, Plympton should be fairly familiar to you. He has a unique style and a unique sense of humor that I find enjoyable.

"Reach" by Luke Randall. This is the entire short -- about five minutes or so. I found it surprisingly poignant. Click, play, enjoy.




"Pigeon Impossible" by Lucas Martell. Just to show that all shorts don't have to be serious, here comes this cute little short that is just fun. Enjoy this 27 second trailer.

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