OCTOBER 15, 2008 --

Independent films from Denmark, Romania, Australia, Japan, Spain, France, Italy, Canada, Puerto Rico, Macedonia, Greece New Zealand, Ireland, Northern Ireland, the United Kingdom, Wales, Scotland, Israel and China and Russia, as well as the U.S., were among the 270 films at last month's New York International Independent Film and Video Festival. The festival held an opening party and art show at Mansion, September 18, and ran screenings at Cinema Village East cinemas from September 19 to 25.

Dick Van Dyke was on hand for the September 19 screening of "The Wonder Kids," a dance documentary that includes him, with Debbie Allen, Savion Glover and Victorial Rowell. Michael Madsen made a personal appearance September 21 in connection with the showing of "Strength and Honour," a Mark Mahon film starring Mr. Madsen.

The festival had screenings of full-length films of various genres, including drama, horror,comedy sci-fi, documentary. There were animated short films, experimental short films, misic videos and films of moderate length, including William Anderson's "Give to Receive," a 45 minute documentary on battling rabies on a Sioux reservation in South Sakota, and "Behind the Darkness," a 30 minute psychological drama from Macedonia, directed by Arben Thaci. A Russian entry, "Sweet Death, directed by Joseph Goldman," offered explanations for the motivations of suicide bombers -- and support from their families. "House in the Country," directed by Noam Bacharach,from Israel gave us two Israeli couples, in a 21-minute film that could have been about two couples just about anywhere.
LPR caught a few minutes of Joe Wolf's "The Survival of the Wildebeest," a documentary about hich school teacher Start Ross who, at night,k becomes a :guerrilla artist." U LPR missed Lana Parshina's :Svetlana About Svetlana," an exclusive interview with Svetlana Alliluyeva's, Stalin's daughter, and many other screenings, including "Changing a Mind," a documentary from Sondra Martin Hicks about a mother's efforts to make a child with Down syndrome less challenged, and "Voices of Holocaust History," a documentary by producer/director Deanne S. Comer who is on Pennsylvania's Holocaust Educatron Council, and "Ragpickers, Scavengers of a Different Graveyard," a documentary directed by Tina Schmidt.

The festival included two seminars, one called 'The Truth About Distribution," offering advice on getting a "name actor" at low cost, and getting paid for the sale of a film. Festival evenings concluded with after-parties that offered networking possibilities.

Summing up this season's NYIIFVF, LPR borrows from a popular song of some years ago: so many interesting films; so little time.

Founder/Executive Director of the festival is Stuart Alson.

Thomas Randall Dickens, director of he sci-fi "Alien Grey: Zone X"

J. Kerr-Smith, director of Last Man Out, a documentary about the last man who got out of the World Trade Center on 9/11.