Swarms of low riders flow like ooze into Downtown San Jose’s streets. The feeling in the air is not a joyous celebration. It is more of a chance for ghetto thugs and losers to tromp around making the area even less attractive to anyone looking to enjoy the night, visiting restaurants and local bars meanwhile contributing to our local economy.
To top if off Read the rest of this entry »
Check out this awesome video recap on Cinequest 19:
I spent some time with Inside Cinequest during the film festival and had the honor to see, first hand, interviews with producers, directors, and everyone in between.
So far I have had the privilege of meeting with Jeff Lam (Producer) and Timo Chen (Music Producer) from the film Why Am I Doing This, Mary Haverstick (Director/Producer/Writer) and Michele Mercur (Executive Producer) from the film Home, as well as Wayne Lachman (Director) and Scott Macgregor (Executive Producer) from the documentary film Life For A Child. One thing each of these people shared was a personal passion of the art of film making and conveying a message.
Cinequest is a great launching point for many films. While speaking with the Director of Corps Run (John Michael Thomas), he mentioned that just by being a part of Cinequest, his movie was going to gain traction it wouldn’t achieve by any other method. The recognition and prestige of having a film at Cinequest is something in and of itself.
On average there are 3000 independent films made each year – of those, only about 1000 find their way into a festival. Beyond the 1000 in festivals only a 100 get any sort of recognition. Only a few, maybe 1-5 of the top films get distributed to the rest of us once passing the rigorous battery of judging sessions and peer reviews.
Films like Slumdog Millionaire are an example of the top percentile that truly makes headway into the big time blockbusters. However, can we really call films with huge 10+ million dollar budgets, Indies? It’s a tough concept to lock down but some have characterized it by the amount invested to create a film, others have defined it by a film, which isn’t supported by a major studio. The definition isn’t as clear as one might think but one thing we can agree on is that Indie films are becoming more the rave than anything before as the big studios and actors are taking on Indie film roles to gain popularity and grab a piece of the growing audience.
One thing we can be sure of is that Cinequest 19 has been one of the best we’ve seen. To top it off, it was just a few steps from out backyards – or balconies for those of us in high-rises.
Keep in touch, as I’ll be writing more about the experience and the films I’ve seen along with my experience hanging out with the crew of Inside Cinequest.
Santa Clara street during Mardi Gras - busy but not too bad.
It’s true, San Jose’s Downtown Mardi Gras was absolutely boring. Sure it was a Tuesday night but come on!
Not only did the police OVER populate and ruin any chance of a good time, most of the stores closed early, and there really wasn’t anything exciting going on.
I spent about an hour scoping the scene with some friends trying to find the fun stuff to do. Unfortunately for us, we aren’t really the “thug money” types that head into Tunes and get plaster faced while getting man-squished by “Man Jose’s” residents and visitors.
To add to the boringness, SJ Bar and Grill, Gordon Biersch, and other regular fun spots were either closed or just not exciting. In the whole night I could probably count only 30 beaded necklaces. San Jose definitely doesn’t hold a torch to… I won’t even say New Orleans because it’s obvious we don’t come close. Modesto probably had a better time!
I do have to say though, I am excited at the small fact that the place didn’t get torn up. Sure some police horse poo on the ground, dumbass flyers of stuff we could care less about littered on the ground, but that’s a given on just about any night.
All that seemed to walk the streets tonight was the police, the gangster wanabes, and the drunk girls with short skirts that couldn’t entice a goat.
That’s my opinion. What’s your’s? And here’s some photos of downtown as we saw it:
