The Sarasota Fringe Film Festival

The Fringe is shaping up to have a great line up this year - 100 films in categories that matter to our local community such as Art buffs, Kids and Family, Ethnic and Global, and Gay and Lesbian.  Our tagline is "a Reel Festival for Real People."   

As a small arts start-up, we need your financial support to showcase the best our local film community has to offer.

Please consider being a Friend of the Fringe and donating $250 to support community filmmaking at its finest. Your support will allow you to see 100 films and attend our special events!  In addition, proceeds will benefit the Ringling College's digital film school as well as Sarasota's Teen Film Camp.

You can join “Friends of the Fringe,” attend all of the films and special events over the four day period for only $250, but if you act by February 28, the cost is only $200. 

For more information and to sign up as a friend, please email Patrick Nagle or Dolores Parker

Oh yeah!  The Fringe has made the top ten arts stories list of 2009 in the Herald Tribune!  This just continues to show the solid community appeal we have earned that will help us build momentum for an even bigger and better 2010 festival. 

The Sarasota Fringe Film Festival is alive, well, and looking forward to formally announcing its mid-April 2010 dates and plans in the next few weeks.

Everything is different about the 2010 Fringe. New venues, new board of advisors, new guests, filmmaker prizes offered by international distributor Planet Group Entertainment Ltd., and special events to be scheduled over the three day Festival. 

John Avildson speaking about rejection at FringeFest 2009

Thanks to the original group of rejected filmmakers who participated with us last year, we are now “on the map” as they say!

There will be a “withoutabox” listing in place shortly for everybody, but for those of you who come from the original group of filmmakers rejected by the regular Sarasota Film Festival, you are invited to “sign up” directly with us at the discounted rate of $35 per entry. (We have to charge something.)

Each and every entry gets a FREE T SHIRT and CERTIFICATE of SELECTION

There are no particular requirements for entry as you have all been rejected from one film festival or another. If you have a new film that has not entered any festivals that’s fine too! Let us be your very first festival.

Our goal is to screen each and every film entered!

As Jonas Mekas, friend and Founder of The New York Anthology Film Archives (and FringeFest “Advisor at Large”) once said: “All films have value. They don’t have to be masterpieces. If you just eat steak every day and no salad, you sometimes need salad. You cannot live on masterpieces alone. Each film can contain something we don’t have, something that is very special.”

GO TO THE GENERAL ENTRY INFO HERE OR CLICK ON THE SIDE BAR TITLE TO THE RIGHT!

For more information regarding the Sarasota Fringe Film Festival 2010, please contact patricknagle@yahoo.com

 

 

Click here for a great article on how it all got started in April 2009!

 

The First Annual Sarasota Fringe Film Festival has been a great success. We screened almost 100 rejected films, had an attendance of over 800 film lovers, and hosted enormously successful opening and closing parties.

Sarasota Media Personality Cliff Roles, Director John Avildsen (Oscar for "Rocky"),and Former President of the Sarasota Film Festival Ian Black share a "rejection moment".

Listen to the Interview with Cliff Roles

http://radiosrq.com/?tag=sarasota-fringe-film-festival

Herald Tribune First Nite PRESS

http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20090403/ARTICLE/904031070?Title=Films-focus-on-realism-at-Fringe-Festival-debut

Great FREE support!

Just so that you all know, we received the FREE support of:

Facilities providor, The Rustic Grill, Graphic Design and Banner production of Czarnowski Display Service, Live Bands, Sheri and the Vision, and Matt Facciolla and the Ranch Dawgs, Web Support from Planet Group Entertainment, On-Site Support from about 25 dedicated volunteers, and a personal appearance by Director John Avildsen. John of course knows a thing or two about rejection, he directed and won the OSCAR for "Rocky".

One of our three screening salons at the Rustic Grill.

The actual "cost".

Our only major out of pocket expense was Audio Visual support (theater equiptment rental, set-up, and on-site technical supervision) for the creation of the three screening rooms produced by Ryan Kirby's Corporate Connection AudioVisual Services company. His original estimate of $24,000 was graciously reduced to $10,000.

So with receipts of close to $4000, we are "in the hole" for $6000. Naturally the first time you do anything you have to consider it an "investment" in future activities, and the Sarasota Fringe will rise again and take place mid-April of 2010.

Send your support donation, get a FREE T-shirt!

In order to help close the gap in our current deficit, I am asking all of the filmmakers who had their films screened (and those that wish to support us) to send us a minimum donation of $25. You will receive in return a FREE FringeFest T Shirt (sold at the Festival for $10) and a Certificate of Participation for your film. Make you check out to "Patrick Nagle" or send cash, which ever is easier. Please add $5 for return postage. (Don't forget to specify size: we have men's "medium" which fit the ladies nicely and men's xl sizes). The address is 6907 Midnight Pass Road, Sarasota, Florida 34242.

Tammy, Susan, Patrick, and Catherine...your Fringe core team, happy it's over!

Community support is certain to come!

Because we pulled the thing together in 30 days there was little time to solicit financial support from the community, but based on the good press, good vibes and other good things, that support is certain to come in.

The future of the Sarasota Fringe...

In about two weeks we will post a preliminary plan for next year's event. More than likely, the theme will remain "rejection" but a bona-fide rejection from ANY film festival world-wide will qualify.

Again, thanx to all of our volunteers and support folks, and thanx to members of the "Sarasota 350" for letting us screen their films and make some noise here in Sarasota!

Cheers-Patrick

PS: More pictures will be posted later in the week. Heres a link to one of the TV press thingies we got!

http://www.mysuncoast.com/Global/story.asp?S=10129213

The Sarasota Fringe Film Festival

April 2-5 The Rustic Grill Facilities, 400 North Lemon, Sarasota, Florida 34236

Sarasota Fringe Film Festival...How It All Happened

On Monday March 2, 350 filmmakers were notified that their film entry to the Sarasota Film Festival, March 27-April 5, 2009 was rejected. Now for most “independent” filmmakers, rejection is part of the game…rejection from executive producers who finance films, rejection from distributors, rejection from broadcasters, and rejection from film festivals.

But what made this particular rejection “interesting” was the fact that it was sent en masse to all of the filmmakers copied on the same e-mail notice, so that each and every rejectee was privy to each other’s e-mail address.

An instant bond was formed. An instant community of rejectees came to life, and the filmmakers started contacting each other. By Tuesday, all of the 350 started hearing from each other. The mutual frustration of losing out was shared by all. Then the fun began. One of the filmmakers created an “official rejection T shirt” and they started selling on the internet. Like hotcakes.

On that same day I had scheduled a lunch with a friend who had been close to the official Festival in Sarasota, and I gained interesting information about the changing complexion of the Festival…managers, personnel, and board members that had resigned or been sacked over the past year. That evening I contacted the Sarasota Herald Tribune, they found the story intriguing, and on Thursday March 5, the “Sarasota 350” were front page news. A groundswell began to create an alternative festival for the rejected films, and volunteers came forward to put it together.

On Tuesday March 10, another front page article announced the formation of “The Sarasota Fringe Film Festival’….where rejection was the only admission requirement.

http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20090310/ARTICLE/903101068

The Sarasota Fringe Film Festival is happening April 2-5. Over 100 rejected filmmakers have offered viewings of their films over this three day period. The main location for screenings is the fabulous Rustic Grill with three round-the-clock screening salons. Additional screening locations will be announced.

There will be no awards. Everybody wins! The City of Sarasota gets some fringe.

-Patrick Nagle