Next Week: Full Frame Film Festival

Next week is the Full Frame Film Festival!  Thanks to so many of you, I am able to attend the festival next week and I couldn't be happier about it.  For years I have been trying to go as a volunteer, but things just didn't work out for various reasons.  This year was a bit of a mess, too, since the volunteer opportunities were filled by the time I found out that the grant didn't come through as I had hoped.  But thanks to the generosity of my friends and a few people I don't even know, next week I will be Full Frame bound!

You'd be so proud of me, too.  I have already studied the list of movies and events, to make sure I see what is most helpful for Abandoned Allies.  There are a few can't-miss documentaries, some specifically about wars (past and present), policy, and government corruption.  Enemies of the People looks especially interesting because it is about Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge, something that's fairly close to our story although completely different at the same time. 

I'm interested to see how these filmmakers tell the stories, and what techniques are used to give the backstory/history and details that help audiences fully understand it.  I feel a lot of clarity in how to tell our own story recently.  There are a lot of side stories that are interesting and worthwhile, but they don't add much to this particular focuse of the story to they end up getting tossed out of the main film.  It's sad because they're so great, but you don't want the audience to get distracted or miss the main points you're sharing with them.  You want them to make up their own minds, do their own research, and find their own way to help, but you can't force any of that or they will want to walk out.  So...it'll be interesting to see how other filmmakers have approached similar subjects.

During the festival, I plan to do a lot to help you feel like you're there with me, since you've supported me and are the reason I'm able to attend.  Using Twitter, Facebook, this blog, Flickr and all sorts of other methods, I will keep you posted on the experience.  If you're tuned in to some of those social media channels and watch/observe regularly, please forgive the rapid increase in noise coming from me during the festival.  There are ways to tune out some of that if it gets to be too much.

Facebook has a means by which you can hide someone's status updates.  I'll be connecting my Twitter account to Facebook for those few days, so that you can follow along.  If the updates get to be too much, just click on the hide button next to my latest update and you won't see anything else from me until you decide to unhide. 

Facebook has directions on how to unhide, which is really easy once you figure it out.  All you have to do is scroll to the bottom of your news feed page and click on edit options.  You'll see a list of people that you've chosen to hide and you can then click on uhide to start getting their updates sent to your news feed again.

Next week is going to be so much fun, and I am really looking forward to it.  Thank you all for helping me attend the festival.  You're so generous and I'll be forever grateful for your help in making Abandoned Allies a great film!