Festival Updates!

Yea, I know, it's been forever since I've updated this blog... But I've been busy, I swear.  Here's what's been going on since we last chatted:

Dawn has been accepted into three festivals since the last time we talked:

• Montgomery Film Festival
• Central Florida Film Festival
• Tacoma Film Festival

It has already screened at the Montgomery Film Festival, where we were given awards for BEST DRAMA and the ALABAMA AWARD!  It's pretty cool to win at this festival.  My first short film, Vent, was selected at the first Montgomery Film Festival in 2009, where it won the DIRECTOR'S AWARD.  It was cool to revisit the festival with my last short film I made at SCAD.

We were also awarded a GOLDEN ACE AWARD at the Las Vegas International Film Festival this year!

We will be screening at the Central Florida Film Festival on Friday August 31st at 12:15pm, and again on Saturday September 1st at 5:15pm!  If you are close to Ocoee, Florida, go check out Dawn on the big screen!

The Tacoma Film Festival is playing from October 4th- 11th!  Screening times have not been announced yet, so I'll update you when they are... promise

Again, check out our website and Facebook page for more news!

That's about it.  Have a good day!

Big News!

I promised big news a couple of weeks ago, and here it is:

This is HUGE for Michael, as well as the rest of the cast and crew, as the awards were chosen by industry professionals. A lot of hard work is paying off. Congratulations, Mike! Very proud!

Overflow of "Dawn" Updates!

Hey, everyone!

Quick post tonight, because I have an early morning flight to catch.  So, here are the bullet points.  Sorry, no pictures this time.

• Dawn was accepted into the Manhattan Film Festival this year!  This is pretty cool because (a) it's in New York, and (b) it's an Oscar qualifying film festival.  So, fingers crossed, okay?  We are screening June 28th at 2:00pm at The Producers' Club.  You can purchase your tickets here, if you want to go.  And you should want to go... because (a) it's New York, and (b) you helped make the film!

• Screening times for the Foursite Film Festival in Ogden, Utah have been announced.  We are screening on  June 16th at 1:00pm at the Peery's Egyptian Theater. You can purchase your tickets here.

•  Every year the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) host an awards ceremony for the best in Film and Television.  They call it the SCADemy Awards (cute, right?).  Dawn was lucky enough to have been nominated for eight awards including Best Narrative Film, Best Director, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Production Design, Best Sound Editing, Best Original Score, and Best Actor for Boogie Dabney (The Carpenter)!  We are all very exited and humbled by these nominations.  If you would like to attend the award ceremony, it will be this Thursday (probably today, by the time this is posted) at 6:30pm at the Trustees Theater in downtown Savannah, Georgia.

• Dawn was a finalist in this years USA Film Festival's National Short Film and Video Competition.  We were one of 50 finalists out of over 500-600 films.  That's pretty cool!

• Dawn will be given an Honorable Mention at this year's Los Angeles New Wave International Film Festival!  Also a cool honor.  We will not be screening at this festival, but it is still pretty cool to be recognized.  Still looking for that West Coast premiere!

• I have mailed off all the Kickstarter Backers' DVDs and Posters!  If you have a Production Book coming to you, then it'll be a little bit longer.  But keep a lookout in the mail for the DVDs!  And let us know what you think of the film!

• Got some really awesome news tonight about Dawn!  Can't wait to share it with you all!  Keep a look out!

• Speaking of keeping a look out... "Like" our Facebook page.  It's a very easy way to keep up to date on all the Dawn news.  Hopefully, the good news will keep pouring in.

 That's it!  Thanks for checking in.

-- Joshua Matthews

Greenville Film Festival debriefing... and Utah?

Greetings!

Just got back from Greenville, and I am exhausted!  We had the incredible opportunity to screen Dawn at the first Greenville International Film Festival, and I couldn't have been more pleased with the event.  For their first year, Greenville put on a spectacular show, and I cannot wait to see what they have in store for future festivals.

Greenville, South Carolina

Dawn was screened twice at this festival, and both venues were unique and charming in their own ways.  First, we screened at the Coffee Underground.  This is a local (popular) coffee house in downtown Greenville, which had a screening room in the back of the building.  Very cool venue!

Our next screening was at Zen Greenville!  This is an elegant "space for hire" building that had a very cool vibe going on throughout the festival.  Stellar HD projection on 2 screens at once, and some nice chairs to lounge in while watching the film, I was grateful to have had the film screened at this venue.

Dawn screening at Zen Greenville

At both venues, we had a great screening, great audience, and great questions after the film! We also received a short, but very cool, review from Paul Hyde at The Greenville News about the film!  Check it out here!  In case you can't read it from the site, here you go:

“Dawn.” Joshua Matthews’ superb short film is about a young carpenter who hides a fugitive from justice at his isolated farmhouse in 19th century Kentucky. 

Filmed in sepia tones, this beautifully photographed movie has the lyrical texture and unexpected violence of an early Cormac McCarthy novel.

Matthews, who graduated recently from the Savannah [College] of Art and Design, is a filmmaker to follow in the future. No surprise, Matthews’ “Dawn” recently was accepted by the prestigious Cannes Film Festival.

As always, I was able to spend time with some awesome people in Greenville!  Pikey Holderedge (a local filmmaker who attended SCAD with me) had his film Madly Unto Eternity screened at the festival as well, so he was able to show me around town throughout the event.  I was also able to meet fellow filmmaker Andrew Disney, whose film Searching for Sonny opened the festival.  He is also a Fort Worth native, and just so happens to know the guys from Shut up and Prance.  If you've been following these blogs, then you know I met them at the Macon Film Festival this past February!  I also ran into some people I met at the Charleston International Film Festival as well, including Tina McCard (CIFF) and Barret Burlage, whose film Wrench played at GVIFF.  His film My Sister Sam played at CIFF earlier this month.  Great meeting back up with both of them.

Tina, Alfonso, Joshua, Holley, & Pikey at GVIFF

Then there was Alfonso!  Alfonso is from Italy, and not only was GVIFF his first American film festival, but Greenville was his first visit to America!  His film Eros e Thanatos won the Best Short Film award this year, and I can't be mad.  It was terrific film!  I had the pleasure of spending a good bit of time with Alfonso, and was entertained not only by his film, but by his magic tricks and musical abilities as well.  I was also witness to his first ever Waffle House experience.  So proud...

Alfonso wins Best Short Film

So overall, the Greenville International Film Festival was a great experience.  Thank you, Miguel Berg, for putting on a great festival!

Joshua, Miguel, Alfonso, & Pikey hanging with the Owner of Ray's

And I received more good news while staying up in Greenville!

 

Dawn has been accepted into the Foursite Film Festival in Layton, Utah!  The festival screens June 13th - 16th!  Very excited about this!  I'll pass more information along once I receive it.

Thanks for the continued support!  Till next time.

-- Joshua

Charleston, Greenville, and Cannes!

Hello!

It's been awhile since I've updated, and I'm sorry for that.  It's been a busy time for for the film and myself.  But I'm back now, so let's get you all updated on what's happening with Dawn!

I just got back from the Charleston International Film Festival the other day, and man was it a blast!  Great films, great friends, and great parties!   Dawn wasn't scheduled to play until the final day of the festival, so I had all week to promote the film.  With the help of some good friends (both old and new), we handed out tons of our festival postcards all around downtown Charleston!

Look for these at a festival near you!

The hard work paid off, because we had a packed house at the Cinebarre Theater!  It was about as good as a screening as you can get.  We were able to show the audience our BluRay copy, and it was beautiful!  Michael Lloyd's cinematography was shown true justice to the crowd, and they seemed to love it.  Afterwards, the festival offered a Q&A session.  I was joined by many members from the Dawn crew who were in attendance, including Boogie Dabney, Daniel Jones, Frank Ponce, David Walton Smith, and Crystal Ann Ghanem.  This was a great experience for me, because not only were 90% of the questions geared towards the Dawn crew, but the questions asked were well thought out, asking me to interpret my insight and thoughts about the story's themes and character's motivations.  This was, with out a doubt, my favorite part of the festival.  I loved seeing a crowd enjoy the film we all put so much work into!

Crowd during Q&A!

I already miss Charleston, and the great people I met!  So thank you, John Barnhardt (Director of ABC's "Born to Explore"), Tripp Adams (Tout Talent Agency), Tina McCard & Gabrielle Schecker (CIFF), and many more.  Meeting people like you all is what makes going to festivals a necessity.

Dawn crew after amazing screening at the Cinebarre!

But the fun doesn't stop now.  Next week I'll be driving down to the Greenville International Film Festival!  This is the first festival for Greenville International, and they are already doing a great job.  Very excited to see what they have in store for everyone, and what films they selected for their first year. 

I know that two great films will be playing along side Dawn.  That is Pikey Holdredge's Madly Unto Eternity and Colin Levy's The Secret Number, which just so happen to have won Best Short Film at the CIFF this past Sunday.  I'm looking forward to catching these films again next week, and hanging out with both Pikey and Madly's co-star Adam Bailey (also Dawn's First Assistant Director), who will also be attending the festival.


Please go to GVIFF's official website and check out the films they have lined up!  You can also purchase tickets to Dawn and other films through their site, or you can just click here.  Hope to see you there!

Watch Dawn Thursday, April 26th & Friday, April 27th!

I have one more thing to tell you all before I let you go.  Dawn has been accepted into the Short Film Corner at the Cannes Film Festival!  We are all extremely happy about having this opportunity to showcase Dawn at the worlds largest film festival!  

Festival de Cannes -- May 16th-27th

So let me give you a little information on the Short Film Corner.  This part of the Cannes Film Festival is set up to help the filmmakers of shorts network with other filmmakers and showcase their work.  Dawn will be placed in Cannes' Digital Film Library, and will be available for screening at any time during the festival by distributors, industry professionals, and festival pass holders.  And although this part of the festival is not in competition, there are a few grants that will be awarded by both companies and filmmakers who are in support of the short film industry.  Now if only we can find the money to fly to France!


So there you go!  You are now all updated on Dawn.  Hopefully, we will continue to receive good news about the film, so we can share even more with you down the road.


Thank you for your continued support,


Joshua Matthews

Festival Updates!

Hey guys!

I've been meaning to update you all after "Dawn" had it's premiere at the Macon Film Festival, but I haven't had a chance to sit down and write it all up. And then more cool stuff happened. Like this:


And then before I could write you about how awesome that was... Bam!


So, yeah, I decided I should sit down and write this out before too much more happened, and I lost track of what to tell you. So here's an overdue update for you all...

The Charleston International Film Festival (held in Charleston, SC) runs from April 11th-15th. "Dawn" will be screened on the last day of the festival, April 15th at 1:00pm at the Cinebarre Theater in Mt. Pleasant. This is one of the festivals I was really hoping to be accepted to, because both Boogie Dabney (The Carpenter) and Daniel Jones (Skinner) are from Charleston. David Walton Smith, our Line Producer, lives in Charleston as well. And Frank Ponce, Producer, worked a stint at the Cinebarre when he lived there. So, yeah, I'm pretty stoked about playing in Charleston! In a way, "Dawn" has always felt like a Charleston production. If you want to go (and you should want to go), you can order your tickets here.

And then being accepted into the Greenville International Film Festival (located in, you got it, Greenville, SC) was one giant cherry on top. This will be GVIFF's inaugural year, and I love the thought of playing at the beginning of, what I'm sure will be, a successful festival program. Their dates are April 25th-28th, so my April is looking pretty booked; which I love! Screening times haven't been posted for "Dawn" yet, but I'll let you know when they are.

And then there's Macon. The Macon Film Festival was great. The people who run the festival are incredibly cool, and the locals are so fantastic that I really hated to leave. It was as if their happiness was determined upon the filmmakers' happiness... and believe me, they wanted to be happy. We were shown great films, and and even better times out on town. If you ever find yourself in Macon, do yourself a favor and go to The Rookery. Fantastic burgers (or so I hear, I had a fantastic Veggie Burger). And ask for Rhi. She's great!

Riley with the "Jimmy Carter." Yes that's peanut butter.

So "Dawn" didn't bring home any awards, but we had two very successful screenings! We had nice audiences for both screenings, and everyone that came up to me after the film told me how much they loved it. It was very rewarding to hear positive feedback from people who had no expectations going in, and had only heard about the film from the program or by word of mouth. Very cool experience, and because of this experience, I cannot wait till we screen "Dawn" again!

During the festival, I met some talented filmmakers, who also turned out to be pretty great people. The first group I met were down from Fort Worth, Texas. Their film was the talk of the town, and if you had one of their buttons, it was as if you were in the Cool Club. Riley, Beetle, and Naaman are Shut up and Prance, and they make funny films. Do yourself a favor and check out their website, watch the videos, and laugh. Be sure to check out the trailer to "The Legend of Pimp Jacket." It killed in Macon!

"Shut up and Prance"

The next group of guys I met brought with them a slick drama, filmed in LA, called "Cab 57." You should check out their site immediately, and look for it to be playing in a festival near. These guys are doing cool some cool things. Can't wait to see what they do next.

And on the other end of the spectrum... "A Sister's Call" is one emotional roller coaster ride of a documentary. This film was excellent! I don't won't to spoil one thing about the film. Click here, and order a DVD. You won't be disappointed.

OH, and how can I forget about JuBee and The Captain! These guys pretty much ran the town, and showed us all a great time down in Macon. Check out their band "JuBee and the Morning After" and watch their new video. Also, go vote for them here, so they can have a chance to play at this year's SXSW!

JuBee and The Captain from "JuBee and the Morning After"

Well, that about wraps it up. Tomorrow I'll be in the studio with Wesley Grant Fleming recording the commentary for the DVD of "Dawn." Maybe I'll get some video and put together another little vlog. Been a long time coming.

Hanging with the Shut up and Prance & "Cab 57" guys on my last night in Macon!

Thanks for the continued support! Couldn't do any of this without you all!

-- Joshua

Behind the Scenes

As promised, the Behind the Scenes video for "Dawn." This will also be on the DVD we will be sending to all the backers.

Hope you like it. Kevin cut together something really special, and it makes me miss shooting with all these people in the beautiful state of Kentucky.

Kickstarter Backers, stay tuned tomorrow for something really special!

Till then...

Macon Film Festival Showtimes

Hey guys!

I wanted to pass along to you our showtimes for the Macon Film Festival this February. I'm not familiar with the Macon area, but all these venues should be downtown and easy to locate with your fancy smartphone (or Google if fancy smartphones are not a part of your daily life). Anyways, here are the times and locations:

• Friday 17th, 1:40 p.m. -- 567 Center for Renewal
• Saturday 18th, 12:20 p.m. -- Cox Capitol Theatre
  

If you are around the area, we would really love to have you come down and watch the film with us. If you're not.... Maybe plan a trip?

Also, here is the updated trailer. Well it's really the same trailer, but it has the color corrected images in place of the raw image you've been watching.

Enjoy!

Updates!!!

Once again...

It has been far too long since I have updated you all on "Dawn". But to be honest, there hasn't been too much to update you on. Until now.

First, let me start by saying that the screening in Savannah this past November went well. It was nice to see the film blown up on the big screen, and though there were a few technical problems near the end, I believe it was a very good screening. Thank you again to all of you that could make it out.

And for those of you who were unable to attend, maybe this will be good news for you! "Dawn" is now an Official Selection of the Macon Film Festival!




This is our first film festival, and we couldn't be more excited then to screen it here in Georgia. The Macon Film Festival has been running for seven years now, and word on the street is, it's a great festival to attend. So if you are around the area, or just want to make the trip over, come on downtown to watch "Dawn" on one of their two historic theaters. The festival runs February 16th - 19th.

Next, I wanted to let you know that we have not forgotten the rewards for our Kickstarter Backers. The major reason they have not been shipped off yet is, well, I didn't feel like the movie was ready to be screened. After watching the film on the big screen, I had a few more issues I wanted to work out. It took awhile, but as of now, these issues should be wrapped up by this weekend. Another reason they are not ready is Wesley Fleming, our Executive Producer, and I want to record a commentary track for the DVD. The recording session has had to wait due to SCAD being closed for the holidays. We are trying to get studio time next week, and I'll update you on that once we are in the recording studio. The posters have been ordered, and we are waiting for the proofs to come in so we can check the quality. Should get that in the morning.

As for the DVD, here's what we were thinking of including for you all:

Commentary track with Director and Executive Producer,
The original Kickstarter video,
A special message to our backers,
A collection of some of our Volgs,
Behind the Scenes Video

If any of you guys want to see anything special on the DVD, let us know. We'll see what we can do. And as a apology, I think I'll upload the Behind the Scenes video for you guys, so you can see it a bit early. Our editor, Kevin Ray, has done an excellent job putting it together. It's short, but I think you will get a sense of how special a shoot it was.

Anyways, that's where we are at. We thank you for your patience, and once more, We thank you for your support. Please, try and see this film in the theaters if you can. It's your film as much as it is ours.

-- Joshua Matthews