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Local Filmmakers' Efforts Hit The Big Screen

There’s a city event that gives young filmmakers a theatrical outlet for their efforts.  Department of Culture and Creative Development's Film Commission Director Drew Mayer-Oakes talked about the July 22 event with TPR's Jack Morgan.

“The City Block Cinema event this year is happening at the historic Guadalupe Theater, which we really love to show films there, because the staff is so wonderful and it’s a great movie-viewing experience.  We start at 6 o’clock with networking, and we get the show rolling at 7:30.”

This Guadalupe event is the first in a series of young filmmaker events that will be held all around town.

“They’re going to be highlighting local films and local filmmakers throughout the year in different venues.  There is a growing group of filmmakers and they really need their work to be seen.”

The City Block Cinema got some horsepower behind it when it aligned with online magazine The Rivard Report.

“And they’ve also done a wonderful job of profiling a lot of the filmmakers who have won awards this year.”

The spawning pools for City Block was the Neighborhood Film Project of years past, which has a presence in this event too.  

“We’re also going to screen the best of the last five years of the Neighborhood Film Project.”

The Neighborhood project established the guideline that all films had to be shot in the near downtown areas on the south, east, north and west.

“We found it very interesting to set filmmakers out into the city to see what types of films they can create simply by directing them to a particular part of the city.”

City Block Cinema kicks off Wednesday, July 22 at the Guadalupe Theater.

For more on the on the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center event, go here

Jack Morgan can be reached at jack@tpr.org and on Twitter at @JackMorganii