Los Angeles Independent Film Festival

The sophomore run of the Los Angeles Independent Film Festival (April 18-22) was subject to what its founder/director Robert Faust characterized as "growing pains." Faust's concept for the festival is one of community, intimacy, and accessibility, hence what are now staples of the LAIFF: a brief five-day schedule in a centralized location and non-competitive screenings. But sifting through some 700 submissions (more than double the number received last year), was rather taxing for the seven-person programming team (which saw the addition of Thomas Ethan Harris, curator of the American Cinematheque's Alternative Screen series, to its ranks). The program itself was only a bit bigger this year, but nevertheless the organizers at times felt overwhelmed.

"It wasn't a negative thing at all," says the 29-year-old Faust. "I'm very grateful we were experiencing growing pains. We just didn't have the staff to make things run as icy smooth as I would've liked. That takes staff and it takes money. I structured this year's Festival very similar to last year's, but it really couldn't be that way because it was a much bigger animal."

In addition to the Sundance Channel coming aboard as a founding sponsor, the most significant change for the 1996 Festival was the addition of a second screening venue. Screenings for the 16 narrative features, three feature-length documentaries, and 22 shorts were divvied up between Raleigh Studio's 150-seat Chaplin Theater (the site of last year's festival) and the 290-seat Studio Theater on the Paramount Pictures lot. There were only two exceptions: the "Actors Direct" program of shorts, which was shown in the larger Paramount Theater due to a scheduling conflict, and the opening and closing galas - Dead Man, Jim Jarmusch's revisionist black- and-white western, which opened the Festival, and Things I Never Told You, the debut feature by Isabel Coixet, which closed the Festival. Both of these were screened at the Directors Guild to sold-out crowds.

Other additions included the expanded seminar schedule. One new arrival was Kodak's Close-Up series on preservation techniques and cinematography, and a welcome return was Mark Litwak's two-part seminar, "Legal Aspects of Producing." The Festival also featured a script library housing scripts for most of the films screened over the four days, and a soundstage on the Raleigh lot housed a slew of vendors in the New Media/New Technologies Forum.

The slightly expanded schedule allowed programmers to include a broader range of films. Entries included Alchemy, an esoteric pastoral piece by Suzanne Myers, which uses mystery and symbols in place of typical plot structure. Photographer and music video director Matt Mahurin's Mugshot was well received, al-though some audience members (including actress Rosie Perez) took issue with its racial politics. Much of this year's fare - in both narrative and documentary categories - focused on adolescent angst: Robert Patton-Spruill's hard-hitting Squeeze, about kids in Boston; Dog Run, a relentless film on the post-Kids tip; Ripe, Mo Ogrodnik's coming of age tale about two female adolescents dealing with their budding sexuality; Eve Annenberg's Dogs, a low-budget, female-slacker flick; Kids of Survival, a touching documentary on the lives of Latino kids in the South Bronx whose only hope lies in their dedicated art teacher; and Paradise Lost, a grim portrait by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinfosky of the events surrounding the brutal slaying of three young boys in Arkansas. All of these films deal with kids in rather extreme circumstances, and the best ones avoid either exploiting or patronizing their subjects.

With the greater presence of distributors at this year's festival, a few films followed in the footsteps of Eric Bross' Nothing to Lose and George Hickenlooper's The Low Life, two world premieres from last year's LAIFF that were picked up for distribution and are now set for summer release. Scoring the greatest coup was Squeeze, which was acquired by Miramax for worldwide release for an undisclosed seven-figure sum mere hours before its Saturday night screening. Miramax also gave Spruill a deal for his next project. Squeeze will be the debut feature to be released through Miramax's new black film division, Flavor. And a few weeks after the Festival, Alliance snagged the foreign rights for Ogrodnik's Ripe.

Adding to the LAIFF's independent spirit was the presence of John Pierson, on hand to receive the first Indie Supporter Award. The presentation was made by actor Matthew Modine, a former New York City apartment-mate who shot a short video piece featuring interviews with some of Pierson's friends and acquaintances.

Looking back at this year's successful yet strenuous event, Faust has come to the realization that intimacy might not always be a feasible and realistic goal. "I hope to have more people working with me throughout the year," he says. "I have a lot of good people during the festival itself, but most go back to their regular lives once it's over. You've got to keep the festival alive, you've got to have reps in different places, and you've got to keep a presence throughout the year."

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