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Added: September 4, 2008, 12:13 pm	Share    Print    Email

A scene from Saturday's program, "Parting Words", at the Long Island Film Festival.

It started as a novel experiment. A quarter-century later, the Long Island Film Festival has reached a significant landmark as Long Island's original and longest-running competitive film festival - its 25th edition.

The concept of a film festival on Long Island reaches back to the late spring of 1983. At that time Christopher Cooke was a recent hire as a civil servant in the Suffolk County Motion Picture/TV Bureau. One responsibility in the new position was to attract and increase film and television production activities on Long Island. When he started his daily 9 to 5 routine with the county, there were no film festivals on Long Island. Within a few months, Cooke got restless and creative. He approached his boss with the idea of starting a film and video competition.

He recalled with a laugh, "I had perfect credentials to take on the role of implementing a film festival - I had an abundance of enthusiasm and was completely naïve to the particulars of such a colossal endeavor."

One goal of the festival would be to provide a public forum to screen independently produced films and videos, in addition to giving out achievement awards, including media attention to the region's student and professional talent pool. Another was to further promote Long Island as a location for the production of feature films, documentaries, commercials, and industrial films and videos.

Cooke got recharged with his new job when his superiors gave him the green light. He jumped full swing into making it happen. Paid ads were placed in film and video magazines and notice was given to area college and university film and video departments. Submissions streamed into his office.

During the initial planning stage, the idea had been to focus on and cultivate filmmakers from Suffolk County. But the entries started coming in from folks all across Long Island. The criteria to be considered for a screening slot quickly changed. An entrant would only need to have someone working on the production to have "roots" on Long Island. "They must have lived, worked, studied, or had some connection to the Island," Cooke said.

On Tuesday evening, May 8, 1984, the humble beginnings of Long Island's very first island-wide film festival took in its first breath. The festival had been scheduled as a one-night-only event at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington. Five student and five professional short films were programmed, just to see how this venture would take. It took well, and proved to be an instant success with the filmmakers and audience. A handful of other host venues that first season presented the balance of the festival's screening program and special events including the Parrish Art Museum in Southampton. Within a few years, the venues would include Guild Hall/John Drew Theater in East Hampton, a community meeting house on Shelter Island, and the Vail-Levitt Music Hall in Riverhead.

Cooke retired from his county job in 2003. At that point, the Long Island Film Festival became a truly "independent" film festival, as it was no longer associated with the county government or universities since Cooke's departure. For one more season, he stayed on as the iconic director of the festival he had created and nurtured for over two decades. After a 21-year reign as the founder and director of the festival, he stepped aside. The torch of leadership in 2005 had been passed to current executive director, Francis J. Leik, who has had a lengthy relationship with the LIFF.

Leik's latest initiative is an ambitious move to take the 25th edition program and events to Los Angeles, and then overseas with a program titled "Best of Long Island Film Fest." This year's special road show, dubbed "Montauk to Manhattan to Hollywood," is a first for the festival in staging a program on the West Coast.

Leik stated that "many of the festival's participants from over the past 25 years are living and working in L.A. It would be a great tribute, a tip of the hat to all our West Coast alumni to present a program in Hollywood."

It all begins this Saturday with three separate programs at the Montauk Movie Theater. Additional locations for the historic 10-week festival include other venues in Suffolk, Nassau, Queens, Brooklyn, and Manhattan as well as Los Angeles. At the conclusion of the Long Island Film Festival in November, a reception and awards presentation will be staged back on Long Island. For additional info and a complete schedule, go to www.Lifilm.org.

A highlight of Saturday's programs is the feature film "Parting Words." It is described as "a timely blue-collar comedy with an unusual storyline, a lot of laughs and a lot of heart. Everyday folk who are "just trying to get by" form the cast and neighborhood setting for this film to which everyone can all too quickly relate."

This story follows the dysfunctional relationship of Vince, Nick, and Eddie, three 30-year old men and their childhood best friend, Laura. A little too good-looking and a lot too wild, an intoxicated Laura gets the pot boiling with a shocking toast at her friends' wedding. The resulting emotional disaster takes the guys, their wives, and their small town on a laughter-and-tears journey that dismantles, then reassembles each couple and takes them to a place far better than where they began.

"Parting Words" is one of the pioneering digital-era features. Produced on location in Hoboken, New Jersey and the surrounding areas, the cast and crew were assembled from the local New York City talent pool. The director is Stan Schofield, who has been a director for over 20 years and has successfully been able to maintain and grow his company despite the competitive and crowded world of film production. He has directed two feature films as well as documentaries for the Special Olympics, PBS, and the American Medical Association, and music videos and many commercials throughout the years.

Schofield produced and directed "Cost of Living" starring Edie Falco, Andrew Lowery, and Bill Sage. Falco is best known in the role of Carmella Soprano on the HBO series "The Sopranos," for which she has won an Emmy, a Golden Globe, and the Screen Actor's Guild award. "Cost of Living" was purchased by Showtime and first aired in the fall of 2002.

The screenwriter of "Parting Words" is Ned Crowley, a Chicago-based screenwriter, playwright, and author. He has been involved with "Parting Words" from its initial story development through many re-writes, through final production. He and Schofield first began working together years ago in the world of advertising. "Parting Words" is his first independent feature.

 • The first program at the Montauk Theater on Saturday is at 1 p.m., and the other programs begin at 4 p.m. and 6.15 p.m. Tickets to each program, which offer films of varying lengths ("Parting Words" is part of the third program), are $10. The festival runs from Sept. 6 to Nov. 21. For showtimes and details go to www.Lifilm.org.

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Tom Clavin, whose most recent book is “Halsey’s Typhoon,” a World War II story published by the Atlantic Monthly Press, writes regularly about movies and other entertainment topics for Hamptons.com. Comments and suggestions can be sent to Hondo7@optonline.net.