Bill Sorvino – A Dream of a Film Festival

by Sally Deering

 Ideas sometimes come to us in dreams and that’s exactly how Bill Sorvino conceived the Golden Door International Film Festival to be held in Jersey City in October. What started as images flickering in his sleeping mind will now be images flickering on the silver screen.

 “I had a dream last year about having a film festival in Jersey City,” Sorvino says,” and it was like lightning in a bottle. Jersey City is close to my heart. I grew up here and my family has a 100-year history here. I want Jersey City to have something in its own right.”

 

Dreaming of a film festival is not much of a stretch for Sorvino. He’s a screenwriter and actor who studied at the William Esper Studios in New York City and has appeared in several indie films. He also hails from a theatrical family – his uncle is celebrated actor Paul Sorvino and he’s cousin to Academy Award winner Mira Sorvino – and throughout the years Bill Sorvino shared conversations with his Uncle Paul and cousin Mira about film, theater and acting held during family gatherings at the dinner table.  

“My uncle had a farm in Pennsylvania and I would go and hang out and we would eat and talk,” Bill Sorvino says. “One weekend, Mira, my Uncle Paul and Mira’s husband were at his house down the shore and my uncle was holding an (impromptu) class on acting. We were sitting there mesmerized by his depth of knowledge.”

 Not everyone who comes from Jersey City wants to come back and shine a light on the talent here. Usually star-struck wannabees head to Los Angeles and carve their niche there. But Sorvino’s different – his passion for Jersey City and the place where he grew up and his love for film and theater and his uncle Paul and cousin Mira are key factors to his dream. Sorvino and his Uncle Paul are very close – and it’s quite likely festival-goers in October will get a chance to see Paul Sorvino at the festival’s closing night gala at Loew’s Jersey City, the restored movie palace in Journal Square and one of the venues for the festival’s screenings.

The Golden Door International Film Festival will take Jersey City by storm from Oct 13^th through October 16^th – where four local venues will unroll the red carpet to film stars, celebrities and film-goers screening films by local and international filmmakers. It’s a juried competition with awards given out in ten categories including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor/Actress and Best Cinematographer. Still in the preliminary stages – the venues have been chosen and film submissions are pouring in and Sorvino, who grew up in downtown Jersey City and attended Hudson Catholic high school and St. Peter’s College, wants to encourage local filmmakers to submit their films. Comedies, dramas, documentaries, animations and short films are welcome as are student films.

Filmmakers can submit their films to the Golden Door International Film Festival by going to the website www.withoutabox.com an online submission system for film festival and screenplay competitions. Film Festival directors like Sorvino use the website to manage their festivals and for filmmakers it’s the go-to-place to enter the festival, upload their films and PayPal their entry fee. (Deadline for submissions to the Golden Door International Film Festival is July 1, 2011; entry fee is $50.)

“Everyone goes to withoutabox.com if you are going to put on a festival or submit to a festival,” Sorvino says. “They do the money transactions and post the checklist of submission requirements. It makes it easier to screen the films, too.”

 Festival Highlights

The Golden Door International Film Festival will screen film submissions in Jersey City at the beautifully restored Loew’s Jersey City movie palace in Journal Square; Michael Anthony’s restaurant on the waterfront; LITM restaurant, a hip bistro on Newark Avenue; and Bar Majestic, a cozy gathering place across the street from City Hall on Grove Street.

“Another thing I’ve really come to love about planning the film festival is getting to meet the owners of these places,” Sorvino says. “These owners want to create a better sense of community and have an artistic insight.”

So far, Sorvino has received submissions from all over the globe including South Africa, India, Austria and England and several from local filmmakers. Although the roster of films that will be screened hasn’t been chosen yet (filmmakers will be notified Aug 1^st) several submissions have caught Sorvino’s eye including “Street Corner Harmony” a documentary by Abraham Santiago and Steven Dunham about Doo-Wop groups of the 1950s narrated by record producer Wayne Stierle; and “Night Club” a film by San Borowski starring Ernest Borgnine, Mickey Rooney, Lance Howard and Clint Howard (Ron Howard’s father and brother,) Sally Kellerman (‘Hot Lips’ in the film “M.A.S.H”) and Bill Sorvino’s uncle Paul Sorvino.

Members of Jersey City’s arts community are also joining in to support the festival. At the closing night gala at Loew’s Jersey City a panel of judges, including John Dapolito of Jersey City, who teaches acting and script analysis in New York, will give out awards. Members of the Golden Door International Film Festival’s Board of Advisors will also be on hand including Christine Goodman, Founder/Director of Art House Productions in Jersey City; Eileen Gaughan, administrative aide for the Hudson County Office of Cultural & Heritage Affairs; and Joseph Calamito, publisher of the Riverview Observer newspaper and website.

 “I’m holding it in Jersey City, because for me, when I was growing up here downtown was terrible,” Sorvino says, “and in 2007, I came back and saw the changes. It’s amazing what can happen when there’s group effort, community pride and positive energy moving forward. You have a vibrant artist community in Jersey City, great bars and restaurants. It’s like a little Manhattan. I want to make movies here. I tell everybody I know in the business, we have to look at Jersey City as a location to make films.”

To Sorvino, Jersey City could easily become the new go-to destination for filmmakers on the East Coast. All it takes is a festival and a dream.

Submit your Film

Golden Door Film Festival

Film Submissions:  Go to www.withoutabox.com  or  www.goldendoorfilmfestival.com

Deadline:  July 1, 2011

Fee for Submission:  $50

Notification:  Filmmakers will be notified Aug 1, 2011 if their films have been accepted to the competition

The post Golden Door International Film Festival Director Invites Filmmakers to Screen Their Dreams in Jersey City first appeared on River View Observer.

Fans have waited a long time to buy a boxed set of Clint Eastwood’s early spaghetti westerns by Sergio Leone. featuring Clint as the iconic loner with no name. The wait is over. The boxed set, officially titled Clint, available June 1, 2010, Eastwood in The Man With No Name Trilogy hits a bullseye.

This collection belongs in every home film library. Leone’s trilogy of lowbudget, high-impact films, set in the American West (but filmed in Spain and directed by an Italian), made Eastwood a major movie star with a following that forced Hollywood to sit up and take notice. Up until that time he was known only for his roles on TV, most notably as Rowdy Yates in the series, Rawhide.

I interviewed Eastwood before the Academy Awards in 2005 when he had been nominated for Best Director and Best Picture for Million Dollar.  I asked how important to his films was the music in each. “Very Baby important,” he told me, holding me with that famous Eastwood gaze that says, “Nothing matters right now except our conversation.” He went on to explain that he wrote the music himself. “I was very careful not to allow the music to overwhelm the visuals but to support them,” he said, adding, “I learned that from Ennio Morricone.”

When I recalled that Eastwood had made a name for himself with the Sergio Leone films, Eastwood brightened. “It was Morricone who wrote the music for the three spaghetti westerns,” Eastwood said. “If you’ve seen them you know the music.”

The first in the series, A Fistful of Dollars, hit U.S. movie houses in 1964. The stage was set for the former television actor to become an international sensation as the rough-hewn, silent Man with No Name.

The footloose renegade with a wacky sense of humor, a cheroot clenched in his teeth, and a squint that made villains squirm, caught the fancy of moviegoers and they became his fans for life. Those fans are now graybeards, and they’re still loyal. They, and anybody else who likes movies with Clint Eastwood, are in for a treat.

writer/director Akiro Kurosawa’s film, Yojimbo.” That cynical samurai tale, in the hands of Sergio Leone, gets a different setting, the American West. The tale, which maintains the inner stuff of legend and iconic characters, works on a visceral level.

The follow-up film, For a Few Dollars More, teams Eastwood with Lee, who played the villain opposite Gary Cooper in High Noon.

In Dollars, Leone’s classic tale of revenge, Van Cleef again plays the villain to perfection.

The third film, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, is set in the American Civil War where violence is a given. Added to that conflict is buried gold, and classic criminals in a conspiracy that involves double-crosses and trayals that play out in a tension-filled finale with enough gun fights to satisfy any action fan.

(Catalog # M121526)

● The Christopher Frayling Archives: A Fistful of Dollars

● Commentary by Film Historian Christopher Frayling

● A New Kind of Hero

● A Few Weeks in Spain: Clint Eastwood on the Experience of Making the Film ● Tre Voci: A Fistful of Dollars

● Not Ready for Primetime: Renowned Filmmaker Monte Hellman discusses the Television Broadcast ● The Network Prologue with Actor Harry Dean Stanton

● Location Comparisons: Then to Now ● 10 Radio Spots ● Double Bill Trailer ● Theatrical Trailer

(Catalog # M121528)

● The Christopher Frayling Archives: For A Few Dollars More

● Commentary by Film Historian Christopher Frayling

● A New Standard: Frayling on For A Few Dollars More

● Back for More: Clint Eastwood Remembers For A Few Dollars More

● Tre Voci: For A Few Dollars More

● For A Few Dollars More: The Original American Release Version

● Location Comparisons

● 12 Radio Spots

● Theatrical Trailer 1

● Theatrical Trailer 2

(Catalog # M121527)

● Commentary by Film Historian Richard Schickel

● Commentary by Film Historian Christopher Frayling

● Leone’s West

● The Leone Style

● The Man Who Lost the Civil War

● Reconstructing The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

● IL Maestro: Ennio Morricone and The Good, The Bad and the Ugly – Part One

● IL Maestro: Part Two

● Deleted Scenes

â—‹ Extended Tuco Torture Scene

â—‹ The Socorro Sequence: A Reconstruction

● Easter Egg #1 Uno, Due, Tre

● Easter Egg #2 Italian Lunch

● Easter Egg #3 New York Actor

● Easter Egg #4 Gun in Holster

● Theatrical Trailer

● French Trailer

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc., through its operating subsidiaries, is actively

engaged in the worldwide production and distribution of motion pictures,

television programming, home video, interactive media, music and

licensed merchandise. The company owns the world’s largest library of

modern films, comprising around 4,100 titles. Operating units include

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc.,

United Artists Films Inc., MGM Television Entertainment Inc., MGM

Networks Inc., MGM Domestic Networks LLC, MGM Distribution Co, MGM

International Television Distribution Inc., Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Home

Entertainment LLC, MGM ON STAGE, MGM Music, MGM Worldwide Digital

Media, MGM Consumer Products and MGM Interactive. In addition, MGM

has ownership interests in international TV channels reaching nearly 120

countries. MGM ownership is as follows: Providence Equity Partners (29%),

TPG (21%), Sony Corporation of America (20%), Comcast (20%), DLJ

Merchant Banking Partners (7%) and Quadrangle Group (3%). For more

information, visit www.mgm.com.

Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment, LLC (TCFHE) is a recognized global industry leader and a subsidiary of Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation, a News Corporation company. Representing 75 years of innovative and award-winning filmmaking from Twentieth Century Fox, TCFHE is the worldwide marketing, sales and distribution company for all Fox film and television programming, acquisitions and original productions on DVD, Blu-ray Disc Digital Copy, Video On Demand and Digital Download. The company also releases all products globaly for MGM Home Entertainment. Each year TCFHE introduces hundreds of new and newly enhanced products, which it services to retail outlets from mass merchants and warehouse clubs to specialty stores and ecommerce throughout the world.

Van Cleef

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All attended the showing of La Villa’s feature film “Oak Hill” , starring Academy -award winner and Golden Globe winning actress Sally Kirkland, at the La Femme Film Festival in Los Angeles in November

The post Peter La Villa’s “Oak Hill” Film Shown at The La Femme Film Festival in Los Angeles first appeared on River View Observer.