Festival > Media > Press Release 09.14.05
Art influences life at the PT Film Festival
Port Townsend Film Festival Formative Film series shows how movies change lives.
Port Townsend, WA, September 14, 2005: Art often influences life, so it should come as no surprise that cinema has made a significant impact on many people, including those in influential positions.
The relationship we develop with movies is the subject of the Port Townsend Film Festival's Formative Films series. Each year a special guest presents an anecdotal account of a film affecting their personal or professional life.
"Anybody who likes movies has a formative film," Simpson said. "We started Formative Films last year to further the idea that everybody loves movies and they have formed a lot of this culture in which we live."
Port Townsend City Council members are no exception.
Perhaps showing his age, councilman Frank Benskin admits that much of his entertainment as a child came by radio, not just from the silver screen.
He fondly recalls watching "The Little Rascals" on television, a syndicated package of the "Our Gang" movie shorts from the 1930s.
"The qualities of a lot of films and radio developed imagination and the ability to see beyond your situation into another dimension," he said. "We learned as children to live vicariously through the screen.
"You could see how other people acted and felt, and experience those emotions and situations without actually doing those things."
City Council members Laurie Medlicott and Michelle Sandoval each remember feeling appalled by "To Kill a Mockingbird."
"I grew up in Kansas City and race relations were frequently turbulent," Medlicott said. "The film impacted many viewpoints quite heavily."
Sandoval agreed, adding that the moral of the film is to always stand up for what is right.
"It was such a heavy film to see as a young child," she said. "At the time, it scared the heck out of me.
"I had always told my 14-year-old son about the film and a couple of years back we watched it together," Sandoval added. "It was special to pass that on to him."
It was "Spartacus" that lit the political fires inside council member Kees Kolff.
"The injustice in slavery, the cruelty in violence and war, and the courage of those who stand up in insurrection for their beliefs made a lasting impression on me," he said. "In later years, Gandhi was the movie that affected me the most and continued to build on those themes."
When Freida Fenn was elected to the city council, she spent a lot of time reflecting back on "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" starring Jimmy Stewart.
"It's the triumph of the power of the people," she said. "I thought it was a thrilling film as a teenager, but it was a model for me of how to be a public servant."
Council member Geoff Masci said he can't distinguish between his private and professional life.
"I believe there is no life other than personal life," he said.
And thus his two formative films, "An Affair to Remember" and "Blade Runner" have been memories lingering in everything he does.
"It's because I'm a romantic," he said.
Mayor Catharine Robinson could not be reached to share her Formative Film.
During this year's Formative Films series mountaineer Jim Whittaker will recount how the 1950s French comedy "Monsieur Hulot's Holiday" influenced him.
Whittaker, who in 1963 became the first American to climb Mount Everest, will lead a discussion on how the film changed his life 10 years before summiting the world's tallest mountain.
From afar, "Holiday" director and star Jacques Tati appears to have created a zany slapstick tale of the antics of a tourist in a beachside hotel. But a closer examination of the feature reveals that Tati has created a masterful motion picture that pays homage to the sight gags of the silent film era and explores new comedic territory that filmmakers imitate to this day.
Those curious why Whittaker chose the film will have to attend the festival on Saturday, September 24.
"We never announce why they chose the film," festival Executive Director Peter Simpson said. "We let them tell the story."
At last year's festival, Northwest author Tom Robbins enlightened audiences with his Formative Film presentations of "Shoot the Piano Player" and "Tarzan Finds a Son."
Event passes for the Sept. 23-25 festival are available online at [3]www.ptfilmfest.com or by calling the festival office at 360-379-1333. All festival passes include access to film screenings, question and answer sessions and panel discussions on a first-come, first-seated basis. Each pass includes the Friday Night Taylor Street dinner provided by the Silverwater Caf'.
Day passes are now on sale and tickets for individual movies will be available throughout the festival.
The Port Townsend Film Festival is an annual event envisioned as "a film lover's block party celebrating great films and filmmakers." The event was spearheaded by a group of volunteers in 1999 and modeled after the popular film festival in Telluride, Co. Now in its sixth year, the Port Townsend Film Festival is constantly revising and re-visioning its programming in response to the availability of films throughout the world and cinematic responses to the topical issues of the day.