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NEWSDAY, AUGUST 01, 2008
At Homegrown Fest, Some Flicks To Die For
By Steve Parks
steve.parks@newsday.comThey're rolling out green carpet tonight for Long Island's newest film festival. Green carpet? Maybe it's because the festival is in Greenlawn. Or maybe because green is ecologically correct. Certainly it's not for the greenbacks. Tickets are only $5, tops. And the filmmakers are unlikely to earn megabucks for their art. (No studio moguls are expected to show up as they did for the recent Stony Brook Film Festival.)
Host Cherie Via says the green carpet perfectly accents the first-ever Homegrown Film Festival, a hyper-local event at her funky Ripe Art Gallery. Not only are all the filmmakers from Long Island, they're all from the Huntington area. But Via wants to make her guests feel like superstars. “We're inviting high school kids to be paparazzi,” she says. “Flashbulbs popping.” When reminded that flashbulbs are photographic dinosaurs, Via laughed. “OK – flash-thingies.”
'Salome' and 'Vampira,'Aug. 8
A silent film short based on the Oscar Wilde play of the same name, “Salome” stars filmmaker Alexia Anastasio in the title role, leading an all-female cast.
In 1954 – 40 years before Elvira – actress Maila Nurmi played the glamour ghoul, Vampira, TV's first “horror host.” She went on to appear in “Plan 9 From Outer Space” and “Ed Wood.” Nurmi, who died this year at age 85, is the subject of this documentary by Kevin Sean Michaels.
