Once again Andrew, James and I descend upon Pepin, WI for the lovely Flyway Film Festival. This marks my fifth year at the festival and might have been my favorite as I had the pleasure of serving on the Jury for the Narrative Feature Films, ate somewhere near an entire pie and proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that Jay Cheel cheats at competitive board games.
As with every year I had the pleasure of meeting new filmmakers and film fans and made plenty of new friends, but what maybe most enjoyable for me is recording interviews with the filmmakers who come down to Pepin (several of whom just keep coming back) to show their films and talk movies. Andrew and I sat down with quite a few people, and it is my distinct pleasure to present these interviews to you. Now granted, these aren’t quite as earnest, adorable and entertaining as James’ interviews are, but nonetheless I think these are pretty good in their own right. I hope you enjoy listening to them, and I can’t wait to do this again next year.
Rick Vaicius
First up for us is Festival Director Rick Vaicius, who has been running the Flyway Film Festival since Day 1. We try and sit down and talk with Rick every year to see what his thoughts were on that year’s festival as well as his hopes and plan for future festivals. this year’s was a particularly challenging year as the poor economy meant Flyway needed to run a successful Kickstarter campaign to keep everything going, as well as the tragic passing of Rick’s father just one week prior to the festival. But through all of that Rick pulled of yet another great festival, one I know his family, friends and everyone who visited Flyway this past weekend are deeply grateful for.
Flyway Film Festival Website
Twitter
Xan Aranda
We first met Xan four years ago when she brought a film she produced (the fascinating documentary Milking the Rhino). Now, four years later she’s dropped producing for directing, and has become a good friend who sadly I rarely get a chance to talk to for extended periods of time outside of Flyway. Even so, we still manage to discuss her career, her new role with Flyway, past and future projects and we manage to mispronounce her name at least half a dozen times. Thankfully she knows at this point we just won’t ever get it right.
Xan on Twitter | Facebook
Fever Year
Mormon Movie
Philippe Lupien & Vincent Ethier
Phillippe and Vincent are three time participants at the Flyway Film Festival, with this year being their second in which they were able to make the trip from Montreal. Last year they had my favorite film in the festival, the fantastic short Le diable en personne, and this year they won the Kickstarter Award for their terrific short Punchy and Toothpick. We talk with Philippe and Vincent about what its like to terrorize children and why their Facebook page is filled with gibberish.
Vincent on Twitter | Facebook
Philippe on Twitter | Facebook
Mark DiConzo & Joe Schremann
Mark and Joe made the trip from New York because Gary King is a traitor. That and they are nice guys who did a who amount of work (producing, choreography, scoring, acting, singing and dancing oh my!) on How Do You Write a Joe Schermann Song, which is a musical for people who don’t like musicahttp://www.indiepixfilms.com/videocontest_sv/IFP-AUDIENCE/5673ls. Who even knew those existed?
Mark Twitter | Facebook
Joe Twitter | Facebook
Roulette the Musical: Official | Twitter | Facebook
Vote for the film to win a Gotham Award!
Troy Bernier
Troy is the star of one film at Flyway (Journey to Planet X), while he is a producer and director of yet another playing at Flyway (Planet X Part 2: The Frozen Moon). Troy is someone who seems to have sort of fallen into filmmaking and the fandom that has followed the films he makes. Troy is clearly passionate about movies and I bet he could give Kurt halfyard a run for his money when it comes to stamina in this department, so I’ve chose to post his entire interview and you can listen as you hear us talk about almost everything under the Florida sun.
Troy on Facebook | Twitter | Website
Ginnungagap Filmwerks
Planeta Desconocido – Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
Kim Garland and Matt Garland
Kim and Matt and a wife and husband filmmaking team who made the short film Vivienne Again, which shared the Kickstarter Jury Award with Punchy & Toothpick. Kim and her impressively named husband Matt sit and talk with us about death, cheating death and surprise announcements that surprisingly don’t involve death, but do involve two loveable scamps we had interviewed earlier.
Kim Garland Twitter | Facebook | Website
Matt Garland Facebook
Vivienne Again Website | Facebook
Script Chat Website | Twitter
