The Tallgrass Film Festival kicks off its ninth year Oct. 20 and concludes on the WSU campus the evening of Oct. 23. As Kansas’ largest film festival, it has something for everyone …
And so starts nearly every article ever written about Tallgrass. Or something like that. But it seems that if one is going to write about a stubbornly independent film festival that has made its mark by showing nearly 1,000 independent, quirky films in nine years, one should probably present it in a quirky and independent manner.
This year, the festival will screen more than 120 films – short films and feature-length films; fiction films and documentary films; mostly brand-spanking new films and one or two retrospective films that Tallgrass thinks you should see again – in seven screening venues and even more party and event venues.
The Tallgrass Film Festival has been deeply involved with WSU and its people since the beginning. Wichita State’s public radio station kmuw 89.1-FM, has been a media sponsor of the festival from the beginning.
The Office of International Education has been helping us find volunteers for years. The Ulrich Museum of Art has sponsored our closing night gala since 2007. And, of course, our board, staff and volunteers are well represented with Shocker alumni. For example: the current Tallgrass Film Association board president, Paul Witte ’05.
He is also the youngest member of the board. Witte didn’t immediately return phone calls for this article. But that’s ok, because in the author’s head he says, “Just go ahead and quote me as saying whatever. Just don’t make me sound stupid.” This is what most people tell the author in his head. “We’re really excited to once again have our closing-night events on the WSU campus,” Witte says. “(Maybe you could make me sound a little more interesting),” he adds.
The festival’s closing night film and gala, once again sponsored by the Ulrich, features the screening of a film (usually, like this year, at the Campus Activities Center Theater) and then an after-party at the Ulrich. Tickets for the Ulrich Museum of Art Closing Night Gala, which include a film, the Tallgrass award ceremony and after party, is $25, but free for WSU students, faculty, staff and Ulrich Museum members.
The rest of the festival is in and around downtown Wichita at venues that include the Orpheum Theatre, the Scottish Rite Temple, the Garvey Center, the central branch of the Wichita Public Library and Rock Island Studios.
The festival strives to serve as a venue and a voice for independent films and filmmakers, spotlighting films that might otherwise not have a proper theatrical screening in the region. Those independent films have included Tallgrass Audience Award winners “The Infidel,” “Sweet Crude,” “The Wrecking Crew,” “Girls Rock,” “The Big Bad Swim” and “39 Pounds of Love.” Notable 2010 selections included “Last Train Home,” “Cell 211,” “Night Catches Us,” “The Tillman Story,” “Waste Land,” “A Film Unfinished” and “Louder Than A Bomb.” Past selections have included the 2006 Independent Spirit Award winner “Conventioneers,” the 2007 Independent Spirit Award nominee “Trials of Darryl Hunt,” as well as “Bomb The System,” “Manhattan, Kansas,” “Dreamland,” “The Real Dirt on Farmer John,” “Fat Girls,” – and the 2007 Oscar-nominated “Iraq in Fragments.”
The festival also features collections of themed films. The popular Grasscendo selections are musically themed films – documentaries about musicians and features surrounding music. The Greengrass films look at the environment. And the short films are packaged together by mood – though what those packages are is something figured out after all the shorts are picked, and they aren’t completely picked until just before the festival. The shorts programs usually include selections of animated shorts, funny shorts, dramatic shorts and documentary shorts. And, of course, there is the High School Shorts Program and the Timothy Gruver Spotlight on Kansas Filmmakers.
Every year, the festival brings in dozens of filmmakers who are both proud to show their films and eager to interact with the public to get feedback on their projects. To date, more than 400 filmmakers and special guests have come to the festival from all around the world including such places as Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Denver, Chicago, Boston, Phoenix, Salt Lake City, Nashville, Canada, Israel and Norway.
One of this year’s visiting filmmakers will be Elliott Gould. The Academy Award-nominated actor will receive the Ad Astra Lifetime Achievement Award at a special gala on Friday, Oct. 21 at the Scottish Rite Theater. Gould began acting in Hollywood films during the 1960s and during the next decade went on to star in some of his most notable film roles, including Ted Henderson in “Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice” (1969), which earned him a Best Supporting Actor nomination; Trapper John in Robert Altman’s “M*A*S*H” (1970); and detective Philip Marlowe in Altman’s “The Long Goodbye” (1973).
Gould quickly became an icon of the anti-Vietnam protest and free-love era. He was catapulted to national celebrity and solidified his status as an icon of the youth counterculture. He continued acting steadily in film and television throughout the next three decades.
“Isn’t that the guy who played the father of Monica and Ross on ‘Friends’?” Witte asks in a conversation that he later insists was off the record.
But – yes. In 1994, Gould landed a fan base in a whole new generation as Jack Geller, the father of Monica and Ross, on the long-running NBC sitcom “Friends.” This led to roles in many independent films – such as Tony Kaye’s “American History X” (1998) – and studio blockbusters, including Steven Soderbergh’s “Ocean’s Eleven” (2001), “Ocean’s Twelve” (2004) and “Ocean’s Thirteen” (2007).
“Oh, yeah, the ‘Ocean’s’ films,” Witte exclaims, showing his extreme youth. “(That’s probably enough with the age jokes, old man.)”
Gould remains one of the busiest actors in Hollywood, currently appearing in more than eight films, both studio and independent, slated for release or production in the coming year, and serves on the National Board of Directors for the Screen Actors Guild. The Ad Astra Gala will include a hosted Q&A with Gould as well as a retrospective screening of “Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice.”
Tickets for both the film and the presentation are $20. The festival will also have a separate screening of Gould’s most recent film, “The Encore Of Tony Duran.”
Tickets for the Tallgrass Film Festival will go on sale at the beginning of October. All access TallPasses are $175; day passes for Friday are $70; day passes for Saturday and Sunday are $80. Tickets to the Tallgrass Centerpiece Gala are $20, and the Fidelity Bank Opening night gala is $25; both galas include a film.
General admission tickets to individual, non-gala films are $10, or $8 for students, teachers, seniors and military. Friday’s matinee films (from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.) are $5 or, for high school students and teachers, free. Films screening at the Wichita Public Library are free. One can find tickets and more details at tallgrassfilmfest.com.
About the author: Mike Marlett is the technical director for the Tallgrass Film Association. He has a degree in journalism from Kansas State, where apparently this passes for journalism.
