Where turquoise skies and the Silver Screen converge



By Wolf Schneider

 

Filmmakers outside the Fechin Inn Photographer: Dori Hagler.

As visiting filmmakers cruised up a mountain road, New Mexico Route 68, on the April afternoon that launched the 5th Annual Taos Talking Picture Festival, shadows fell across the deeply carved canyon thoroughfare. The serenity of the greening cottonwoods began casting a spell. Finally, cresting the 8,000-foot plateau from which the town of Taos radiates its rustic charm, and, as legend goes, heightened spirit energy, they entered an atmosphere of rarefied collaboration. Here, movie lovers, filmmakers, Southwestern cultural cognoscente, and entertainment industry professionals convened for an annual gathering that's become one of the most surprising successes of the Nineties.

There are hundreds of film festivals across the country; each vying for an audience. But amazingly in all this cinematic crush, the Taos Talking Picture Festival has emerged as one of the top 10, at least according to Chris Gore's recently published "The Ultimate Film Festival Survival Guide." He described Taos as the "wild card entry" where "attending is like visiting an old friend once a year."

Probably the most compelling reason for the festival's success is its top jury prize: the Taos Land Grant Award. This old West-style endowment finds one singular director being awarded five acres of land on Taos Mesa. This year, that prize went to David Riker, the writer/director/editor/co-producer of "La Ciudad," a gritty, neorealistic black-and-white docudrama about Latino immigrants struggling to find a existence for themselves in isolated pockets in New York City. With its strong Hispanic bent, "La Ciudad" seemed particularly fitting for the New Mexico audience, just as last year's winner, the engagingly ironic Native American-themed "Smoke Signals," was ideally apropos for this Southwest gathering.

"We've developed a national reputation over the last five years, but we've always been primarily concerned with our region, especially Taos County and northern New Mexico," says the festival's artistic director, Jason Silverman. "The idea of programming for our region means addressing concerns like multiculturalism and the environment and land rights issues. So we've always felt we were a socially committed festival." Although the festival's mission isn't specifically focused on Western themes, Silverman says, "If we see something that deals with the West we're more than likely to jump on it."

Lourdes Portillo Portillo receives the Cineaste Award, designed by artist Maye Torres Photographer: David Alan Rosen.

Western lifestyle was certainly the subject of Ben Daitz' documentary "Who's Home on the Range?," about the struggles between ranchers and environmentalists in rural Catron County, New Mexico, a stretch of terrain that's been described as "the toughest country in the West," where homeowners are actually required by law to possess a firearm. Says Daitz, "I didn't know how it would play. The response was gratifying and from all sides of the aisle-- from environmentalists, from ranchers, from rural people and urban people. They all seemed to recognize the concept here: that if you sit down and talk, sometimes it works better than going to court and shouting."

After three sold-out screenings at Taos, the documentary is hopefully headed for a distribution deal on cable TV or PBS, says Daitz. Meanwhile it's under consideration for the Telluride Film Festival. Whatever happens, Daitz says he will remember Taos fondly. "It's laid-back. If you're a director or producer, you get a chance to talk with the audience. You can answer questions. It's not stamped-out like a lot of festivals are, and there's not a lot of heavy politicking and pressure to feel like you have to be somebody you're not."

On the lighter end of the spectrum, audiences lined up for quirky yet Western "Dill Scallion," a "mockumentary," reminiscent of Rob Reiner's wildly popular "This is Spinal Tap," in which we follow one Country star's comical ascent and fall from fame.

Pueblo Governer Carl Concha giving an opening prayer at the 1999 Taos Talking Picture Festival Photographer: Coco Pugh

Other films that garnered appreciative buzz at the festival, which ran from April 15th-18th, 1999, and drew a gathering of about 10,000, included the "Silence of the Lambs"-like thriller "Oxygen;" the British musical romp "Swing" with the E Street Band's Clarence Clemons (it had its world premiere at Taos, then went on to Cannes); the multi-century saga "The Red Violin" with Samuel L. Jackson and Greta Scacchi; and "On The Ropes," a "Hoop Dreams"-wannabe documentary for the boxing bunch.

The festival has a 60-seat venue on Native American land at Taos Pueblo and, points out Silverman, "A lot of Native American filmmakers come each year and show their work."

Highlights from the Native arena included a new documentary on "Allen Houser Haozous," one of this century's leading sculptors, by Phil Lucas, who received the festival's Taos Mountain Award. This tribute recognizes outstanding achievements by a Native filmmaker each festival. Lucas, who New Native short videos examined the life of Navajo physicist who works at Los Alamos National Laboratory in "Dances with Photons; Mohawk ironworkers building New York skyscrapers in "Skywalkers;" and a Vancouver surrealist painter in "Yuxweluptun: Man of Masks." Other Native films included "Super Chief," "Visualizing Nunavut' and "Hidden Medicine."

This year, "Smoke Signals" director Chris Eyre, a Cheyenne-Arapaho, was a pivotal force on the jury for the Land Grant.

Bill Forsyth receives the Storyteller Award, designed by artist Bernadette Track Photographer: David Alan Rosen

Commitment to the Western milieu is less evident at surrounding fests, such as Utah's ultra-popular Sundance Film Festival ("The talk around Sundance is more about commodity than it is about art, which is not to say there isn't a lot of great art there," observes Silverman) and Colorado's film-buff oriented Telluride Film Festival ("Telluride's audience is very film-savvy, very film history-savvy," says Silverman).

While Taos shares an atmospheric allure with those other Rocky Mountain festivals, it declines to compete in their industry-oriented rivalry. Explains Silverman, "We try and stay out of that 'We need X amount of world premieres hype' although it's tempting to get into that because you're more likely to draw industry people. But we try to just pick the best 40 or so films we can find, and show those and not be discouraged if they've been shown at Toronto or Sundance or even Telluride."

By weekend's end, the crowds checking out of the posh Fechin Inn (where famed Taoseno writer John Nichols could be seen socializing at the lounge), and the funkier, charmingly authentic Sagebrush Inn, were anything but discouraged. Filled with ideas, stirred by conversations, and invigorated by a late-spring snowfall, they drove away contented.

Copyright ©1999 Cowboys & Indians

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