Airplane Bloggin’: The Midnight Special

Sitting in the Phoenix Airport, waiting for a flight home. It’s a midnighter, Jet Blue, red-eye and the airport is mostly empty. Most of the gates are unoccupied, and unfortunately, I got here a bit early but all of the restaurants are closed. Had I know everything would be closed, I would have grabbed something before returning the car to the rental place. So now, hungry, already having passed through security, I am long-boning it for the next hour and change until I can get on the airplane, swallow the Xanax that’s in my pocket, and say hi to the Sandman.

As least this airport has wireless, and I managed to snag a seat next to an outlet so that I can blog for y’all without losing battery.

This just in. Sedona is gorgeous. You can drive through the town, make a turn, and see something that will totally take your breath away. These mountains of red clay, striated by hundreds of thousands of years of rivers that carved beautiful, cactus-speckled canyons, are breathtaking (as I just said, duh). Really a beautiful place, and I’d like to go there when life is a little less chaotic, and I can enjoy the environment a little more. To boot, things are pretty cheap, drinks, hotels, etc., and its nice and cool at nite, good sleeping weather.

The festival was pretty cool too. Not that it was overflowing with the type of contacts I enjoy making at festivals- wasn’t very industry heavy though I did pick up a few biz cards and maybe made one contact that will be worth the trip. What I like about the festival really had to do with the audiences. Sedona is 70 percent occupied by retirees. Which means they don’t work. Which means they have free time. And during this festival, they go to the movies. A lot.

I didn’t see any screening less than half full except for the first day. We were a little light with My Brother day one, but by the Friday screening, with very minimal promotion (I did invite a few ppl), we were easily 2/3 full, over a hundred people, lotsa grey hair. And they really seemed to love it, asking questions until the moderator told us we had to wrap it up. And then asking more in the hallway.

They have already announced the Festival Director’s picks, and though he was very gracious and described us as a top breakout pick in press for the festival, we weren’t included as the feature (one I missed, Canvas, with Joey Pants, was his selection for feature narrative). Audience awards are to be announced tomorrow, AM, at the brunch. He told me that there were a bunch of films in contention, including My Brother, so David Basch is sticking around to see whats what, which he wanted to do anyway, because he fell in love with Sedona. He’ll attend the brunch. If we win, he’ll be accepting on my behalf for the second weekend in a row, having accepted by Best Producer Award at the Santa Barbara African Heritage Film Series. Haha, talk about carving out a niche.

Anyway, Val is coming to town for a week, and things are gonna get busy. Got the NY premiere at the Magic Johnson theater on 124th St. Tuesday nite, with the incredible moving afterparty to follow (we’ve gone through three venues, and my fingers are crossed). On Sunday, I have to fly to Houston, for the Houston premiere, and then back to NY on Tuesday. On Thursday, we may or may not have a Chicago premiere, pending finding a place to show the friggin thing, and then on Friday, we’ll be opening in our 19 or so cities (I recently found out that it could be a few less, or a few more, depending on AMC holdovers and spots available, we’re only confirmed on 25 screens as of this past week, of the 35 for which we were aiming).

But we’ve gained momentum, as least in parts of the country, and there are a whole lot of people who are just looking to stomp for the movie because they think it’s the right thing to do, all over the country. They just admire the messages of the movie, whether its about family in the black community, or opportunities for people with Intellectual disabilities, or whatever. We’ll take all the help we can get.

I’m nervous, not because I expect to make a bunch of money if we do well, but because so many people have put so much into this movie, getting it out, getting it into theaters, spreading the word. Its been guts and no glory for months, and hopefully, it will have been worth it. This is totally a word of mouth movie, and if we get good reviews (we have critics screenings in LA (2) and NY (1) this week), maybe we can even cross over to a broader audience. I think Santa Barbara and Sedona have proven to me that white audiences like this movie almost as much as black audiences, even if they have no particular experience with people with intellectual disabilities. In a best case scenario, if we can get those folks to come out to see the movie that only come out for a rare thing, to see something special and different, well, then, I wont be talking to any of you little people any more. Except Dawn, my most ardent supporter. ☺.

But seriously, Im fucking tired, and I don’t have a whole lot left in the tank, or in the bank, for that matter. I’ve spent a lot of my own money doing these roadtrips to promote the movie, to try to make things happen. And now, thirteen days and diminishing from the release of the movie, the final push is on.

I don’t have any predictions, anymore. I don’t know how we’ll do, whether we’ll go out with a whisper. Every time I google the movie, I find new stuff, more stuff. Good stuff. But Im not sure it ever seems like enough stuff. Like too little jelly over too many markets, I mean, bread.

Talk to you soon. If I don’t blog this week, forgive me, its hard to find the time unless Im waiting for, or am on, a plane. I should have the blog sponsored by Jet Blue.

Later.