Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival

Thursday, October 26----As the Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival (FLIFF) moves into its second consecutive weekend, the schedule for Friday is a full and varied one. Listed in the Guiness Book of World Records as "the world's longest film festival", this year's edition runs for 30 days, with an extra week of programming and special events to be held in the resort town of Key West when the Festival comes to an end in its Fort Lauderdale home on Sunday, November 12. When do these Festival organizers sleep?

Expect a barking good time on Friday evening, when FLIFF presents the fifth annual Sundawg Film Festival, sponsored and hosted by local pet care company Central Bark. The pedigreed program will feature three "dog shorts" (GUARD DOG, BARNEY THE TERRIER and GUIDE DOG), as well as the short films ROAD RAGE, LOSE YOURSELF and A LITTLE LIGHT.

The furry festival takes place on Friday evening at 8:00pm at Central Bark, 3699 North Dixie Highway in Oakland Park. Tickets are $10.00, including snacks and drinks. There will a silent auction and a raffle. All proceeds benefit the Get-A-Life Pet Rescue animal protection agency. Bow wow, or be square.

For those interested in things other than canine cinema, the Cinema Paradiso presents a schedule of intriguing documentaries (and one docu-drama) this evening, further evidence of a renaissance in non-fiction film that is sweeping the industry.

Veteran character actor Charles Nelson Reilly, he of the "hissy fit" histrionics of THE HOLLYWOOD SQUARES and other television game shows, shows us a more serious side amidst the hilarious one-liners and shameless celebrity name-dropping, in the final screening of the film adaptation of his hit one-man show THE LIFE OF REILLY. The film has its final screening on Friday evening at 6:30pm, at the Cinema Paradiso.

Charles Nelson Reilly

Audiences are encouraged to ride the killer wave in the exhilirating surfing film SHARK PARK, directed by Greg Huglin. Boasting amazing cinematography, the film follows an international team of big wave surfers, who ride a newly discovered psycho wave on a remote offshore reef at the Santa Barbara Channel Islands. Surf's up at the Cinema Paradiso at 10:00pm tomorrow evening.

Riding the Wave in SHARK PARK

Documentary films are at their most dynamic when they explore the multiple dimensions of a social issue and invite the audience to make up their own mind about a pressing social concern or historical event. Two films (one a pure documentary, the other a docu-drama) showing on Friday night do just this in an expert manner that will both delight and challenge audiences.

Director Jeremy Dean examines a little remembered incident from the Civil Rights struggle which took place in the central Florida city of St. Augustine, not inconsequently the oldest urban center in the United States. In the engrossing documentary DARE NOT WALK ALONE, the director juxtaposes the St. Augustine civil rights movement which led to the passage of the Civil Rights Act, against the story of St. Augustine's African Americans still living below the poverty line. The film asks the provocative question of how far have we come since 1964. At a
time when most Americans feel that the issues of race and equality were solved in the 1960's, DARE NOT WALK ALONE reminds us that the war of poverty, education and justice, is still ours to win. This daring film screens on Friday afternoon at 5:00pm, at the Cinema Paradiso.

Canadian director Tim Southam mixes dramatic and documentary technique to tell the story of one of Canada's most incendiary events of the recent past. The compelling docu-drama ONE DEAD INDIAN recounts the events of September 4, 1995, when Stoney Point Natives entered Ipperwash Provincial Park, near Sarnia, Ontario and began a peaceful protest aimed at reclaiming a traditional burial ground. Within 72 hours, one of the protestors, Dudley George, was dead. Based on the extensive research by journalist Peter Edwards, ONE DEAD INDIAN is Canada's own BLOODY SUNDAY (Paul Greengrass' acclaimed film on a Northern Ireland massacre) an explosive political thriller that relives the events of those days and the judicial and political aftermath.

ONE DEAD INDIAN

The film was shot for Canadian television and was broadcast to great acclaim and continued controversy. The film has been nominated for two awards by the Directors Guild of Canada, as Best Television Movie and for Best Director for Tim Southam. After more than two years of inquiry, an official governmental report is due out any day now, making this film not only incendiary but very timely. The film screens on Friday evening at 8:15pm, followed by an "after film" reception at Las Olas By The River, a condominium complex located directly behind the Cinema Paradiso.

Sandy Mandelberger
Festivals Editor