Dates & Times For Rocky Mt. Women's & Bolzano Shorts

Happily has been given its screening time at the Rocky Mountain Women's Film Festival and were playing on Saturday, November 8th at the Fine Arts Center [SaGaJi Theater] at 1:45pm before the feature film Begging Naked (an interesting/provocative film to say the least).

At the Bolzano Shorts Film Festival, we have been given two time slots... November 12th at Capitol 2 at 10pm, and November 15th at Club 3 at 4:30pm both participating in the ShortFilm Experiment 3.

Back In Canada

Sorry for the late notice, but Happily is going to be in what is probably the most eastern part of North America later this week. The 19th Annual St. John's International Women's Film Festival has selected us to screen on Friday, October 17th from 7-10pm at The Rooms Mezzanine.

Just some trivia about the area: St. John's is the oldest English-founded settlement in North America. And of all major cities in Canada, St John's is the cloudiest (only 1,497 hours of sunshine a year), snowiest (359 cm; 11.8 ft), and has the most wet days per year. It seems like the perfect place to see our cheerful film!

Viva Italia! "Happily" Heads To Bolzano

Alora, Happily is having its European premiere in the Italian city of Bolzano. The 40th annual Bolzano Short Film Festival is taking place November 12-15 and we are participating in the "Short Film Experiment" section. Bellissima!

"Happily" is now a Film Threat

Today Happily was reviewed by Film Threat. They gave us a better than average review of 3.5 stars. The reviewer was a bit dismayed by our use of split screen, but in the end thought that we earned the right to use it. It's quite a treat that we were reviewed by FT and glad they enjoyed watching it.

'Happily' Reviewed On Emulsion Compulsion

Scott Marks' Emulsion Compulsion recently gave Happily a five star review! But spoiler note... he does give away the ending.

Now Playing At Indie-Fest

For a limited time, Happily is playing on the Indie-Fest website. From September 19th - 29th, you have the opportunity to bypass the theaters and festival crowds and see it on demand! You will need to register and download a small player to your machine, but it only takes a few minutes (that is, less time than it takes to watch our 5 minute masterpiece) and it's really easy to do.

Just click here to watch it, and remember to rock the vote! Thanks!

Rocky Mountain Women's Film Festival

Happily has been selected to screen at the 21st Rocky Mountain Women's Film Festival in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The Rocky Mountain Women's Festival is the longest continuously run women's film festival in the world. This year the festival runs from November 7th - 9th. And having only selected 28 films for this year's festival, we're very proud to take part in such a prestigious event.

WOW, We're Going To Sydney!

All I can say is WOW... Australia! Happily has been selected to participate in the 15th Annual World of Women's Film Festival held in Sydney, Australia. The festival runs October 1st - 5th and we're screening on Friday, October 3rd at 5pm at the Chauvel Cinema.

San Diego Women's Film Festival

Happily has been selected to participate in the 6th Annual San Diego Women's Film Festival, running October 2nd - 5th. Our short is part of a collection of "Super Shorts" which runs at 5pm on Saturday, October 4th at the Pacific Theatres Gaslamp. We hope to see you there.

DC Done Right

I just got back from the DC Shorts Film Fest and had an amazing time. It was the perfect mix of everything: packed houses (yep, we screened on three screens simultaneously in front of a sold out crowd), great parties, free food, free transportation, free housing. Oh my!

A big props goes to Jonathan Gann, festival creator/organizer. This festival was so well organized. Every detail was thought out. Truly amazing.

But my favorite part of this festival (and really all festivals) is seeing what other filmmakers have done. Four films stood out for me during this festival.

1. Bloom - watch for this one at the Oscars. Holy crap. I loved everything about it.
2. The Aviatrix - we've screened with this gem before and I still love it.
3. Path - a cute romantic comedy that gets the balance right.
4. Zombie Jesus! - who would have thought that this one would be that good? But it was.

Although the festival is over for me, it's still playing until September 19th and we screen once more (Showcase 1) on Wednesday, Sept 17th @ 9:30pm.

Back In The USSR

Happily returns back to St. Petersburg, Russia to participate in the 4th annual International Short and Animation Film Festival Open Cinema. We are screening on Monday, August 11th at 3:30pm at the famous House of Cinema (ДОМ КИНО) in the big hall. Our group is a selection of video-art, experimental, and music videos.

Both Obama and McCain Endorse 'Happily'

While that headline is not exactly true, it is true that we will be screening at the 5th Annual DC Shorts Film Fest happening in the Nation's capitol. The festival runs from September 11-18, 2008.

Happily is screening three times: on opening night (Thursday, Sept 11th) at 7pm, Sunday, Sept 14th at 4:30pm, and Wednesday, Sept 17th at 9:30pm all at the Landmark E Street Cinema.

California Next Gen Film Fest

Happily has been invited to participate in the First Annual California Next Gen Film Festival, being held in the California capitol, Sacramento. The festival runs from August 28-31, 2008 and is being presented at the Sacramento Memorial Auditorium.

Happily is being shown twice, once at 5:45pm on August 30th, and again at 4:45pm on August 31st.

The Festival Of Festivals

Happily has been invited to participate in the 16th annual Festival of Festivals in Saint Petersburg, Russia. We're screening at the Дом Кино, пятница, 27 июня, 22.30 (House of Cinema, Friday, June 27th at 10:30pm). Ochen horosho and yellow blue bus!

Okie Dokie

Well, we just got back from the deadCenter Film Festival which takes place dead center in Oklahoma (Oklahoma City for you geography majors) and these were the highlights:

1. People there are waaaay to nice. Not in the scary sense, but coming from the west coast, it's strange to have conversations with random people on the street.
2. OK is a wonderful place for carnivores. That being said, the food was quite tasty.
   
3. There's a really cool Chihuly exhibit in the OKC Museum of Art. In case you don't know who that is, he's the master glass-smith (is that how you refer to them?) that did the entry way to the Bellagio Casino in Las Vegas. It's kinda funny to think that a collection of glass sculptures are stationed in Tornado Alley, but that's how they roll there.
4. We learned how Okies use their noodle in the movie Okie Noodling II.
5. Lidia had her hair touched by director Bradley Beesley. And now she will never wash her hair again. Gee thanks Bradley.

All in all, it was a great excuse to go to OK.

Our First STIFFY!

You could file this post under "inappropriate goodness," but as the title says it's true. Happily received it's first STIFFy. The STIFFy is none other than an award given by STIFF (Seattle True Independent Film Festival). What made us STIFF you ask? According to them we were the most original concept. Thanks guys!

Winnipeg International

The great city of Winnipeg has asked Happily to participate in their fourth annual Winnipeg International Film Festival. We will be part of their Experidrama group and will be screening twice: once on Sunday, June 1, 2008 at 3pm and again on Friday, June 6th, 2008 at 6:30pm at the PTE SAAN Theatre (Portage Place Shopping Mall, 393 Portage Avenue Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada).

deadCenter OK

Midnight Madness is the name of the game for Happily at Oklahoma City's deadCenter Film Festival. On Friday the 13th this June, we will be screened at the midnight hour at the IAO Gallery along with a handful of other edgy and alternative films.

STIFF Competition

Seattle's answer to Slamdance, the Seattle True Independent Film Festival, has selected Happily to participate in their 4th annual festival this June. While this news is exciting, the coolest part is finding out the special guest who will not only be attending STIFF 2008, but also judging their weekend competition... none other than Moby! Happily will be screening at the Rendezvous Jewel Box Theater on Thursday, June 12th at 6:15pm.

Trenton Film Festival Screening

Happily has been selected to participate in the 5th annual Trenton Film Festival which is taking place from May 2 - 4, 2008. Specifically, we will be screening on May 4th at 4pm at the Broad Street Bank (Trenton's first skyscraper). Although we would like to attend, it may prove difficult this time. But we hope people in the region are able to show their support and see some nice films.

Finding Gold In Houston

Today we found out that Happily won a Gold Remi Award at Houston's Worldfest in a new category for them, Visual/Special EFX. We're delighted with this win and thank all those on their board for the recognition.

Rogue Cinema Review

Today we got our first review, and we couldn't be more excited! Be sure and take a look, but be forewarned... they do spoil the plot.

Additionally, we have now setup a press area for Happily on the main site.

We Can Dance If We Want To

... just not at Sundance nor Slamdance. The competition was fierce! Sundance got 8500 submissions and had to narrow it down to 200. Slamdance had less but only had spots for 70 shorts. But not to worry. We'll try again next year with the next film! Sigh.

Short Short, Win Win!

This past Saturday, Happily returned to Rhode Island to participate in the 1st Annual Short Short Story Film Festival and although we couldn't make it we heard it was a very successful event. 34 shorts all under 5 minutes were played to a full house. The best news... we picked up our second award; this time we received the Imagination Award for excellence in artistic vision! All in all, a very successful Saturday!

Radio Spoiled

That strange buzz North Easterner's heard today was none other than our voices on Spoiler Alert Radio. But don't fret... it only lasted 29 minutes. In honesty, though, it was fun to be interviewed. The show was podcast so you folks in the ether can also hear it. If the connection is a little slow you can hear a mirror of the show here.

Optimism

Sometimes even I am surprised by my undying optimism. So, it's November 3rd and the AFI Film Festival is already underway. We submitted to them as soon as the call for entries was announced a while back. Now here's the sad part. We were never told, Nah or Sorry or Haha. Nothing. So here I am sitting by the phone... just waiting to receive that good news. Sure, I've seen the published line-up that we were mistakenly left off of. But what does that really mean anyway. Sigh.

In any event, there are a few shorts playing at AFI that I have previously seen and would recommend: Everything Will Be OK, I Met The Walrus, and Yours Truly.

San Diego Film Fest Screening

At what is the most glamorous festival we have attended to date, on September 29th and 30th we screened at the state-of-the-art Pacific Theatres in the heart of downtown San Diego. What was most amazing was not the fact that they had (super cool) parties every night, nor free food and drink almost all of the time, nor the complementary massages. What then? How about a packed house for every screening? It was amazing to see your film with every seat taken. The icing on the cake, though, were the nice folks running the show.

LA Shorts Fest Screening

On September 7, 2007 we participated in what is probably the largest collection of shorts in the world; around 700 of them. We had a nice time there and enjoyed seeing some old friends we met previously in Rhode Island.

Film In Alaska? Yep!

We got a surprise message from the nice folks at DancesWithFilms. They're taking some of their favorite shorts on the road with them to Anchorage, Alaska to participate in a show run by a progressive multi-arts organization named Out North. They're running the program for four nights, September 13 - 16, most times at 7pm.

San Diego Film Festival: Mark your calendar...

We got our date and time for the screening of Happily Ever After. It is going to be screened twice: Saturday, September 29th at 2:30 PM, and again on Sunday, September 30th also at 2:30pm. As with all of the films at San Diego Film Festival, it will be held at the Pacific Theatres Gaslamp 15.

Invitation to Short Short Story

Happily Ever After has been invited to participate in the first annual Short Short Story Film Festival taking place in Rhode Island. So what did we say? Yes, of course! As mentioned on their website:

If brevity is the soul of wit, then join us as we celebrate wit in writing, directing, and editing - films that put it all together in five minutes or less. RIIFF's first annual Short Short Story Film Festival features filmmakers from across the globe telling their unique stories in under five minutes. From documentaries to comedies to animation to dramatic shorts, you will see succinct presentations of all kinds of short stories. One night, dozens of short short stories. Short short attention spans welcome! Saturday November 17th 2007 at the Perishable Theater, 95 Empire Street, Providence RI. I.

What can be better than a day of 5 minute shorts? As far as we can tell, a day of 4 minute shorts. :)

Rhode Island Awards Ceremony Podcast

Spolier Alert Radio has just posted an edited podcast of the 11th Annual Rhode Island Int'l Film Festival awards ceremony. You can read about it here (and you can listen to the podcast by clicking a link at the end of the article).

Sunny San Diego

We were just notified that we have been selected to screen at the San Diego Film Festival!

According the SDFF website: [SDFF is being] held blocks from the ocean in the Gaslamp Quarter San Diego's premier downtown entertainment district. SDFF celebrates its sixth anniversary Sept. 27-30, 2007.

We'll post more information as we get closer to the festival date.

LA Shorts Fest: Mark your calendar...

We got our date and time for the screening of Happily Ever After. It is going to be on Friday, September 7th at 5:30 PM. As with all of the shorts at LA Shorts, it will be held at the AMC Burbank 16. We are grouped with what seems to be a strong bunch of shorts (one of which was listed as top 5 at Tribeca). We hope to see you there.

Rhode Island Recap

RIIFF: Columbus Theater
Originally uploaded by • g l u b •

Our trip to the Rhode Island International Film Festival was great. We met a lot of really good filmmakers and saw some amazing films, two of which have very good Oscar chances.

Happily Happily did well in our category of Experimental. We took home first place. It was quite unexpected, so much so as we showed up to the awards ceremony in less-than-appropriate attire. But we were thrilled nonetheless.

Not to let a vacation opportunity pass, we also did a little sightseeing around Providence and Newport.

We just wanted to say thanks to everyone who put on the festival. It was world class and we were treated incredibly well. Even if we do not submit to next year's festival there is a good possibility we will return just to enjoy the atmosphere and film selection.

I Love LA (Shorts)

The largest shorts festival in the world, LA Shorts Fest, just let us know that we've been selected to screen with them. We are very honored, and to be honest, real excited! So after Rhode Island we're back in LA (actually Burbank). The end may be near, but hopefully not for our streak of good luck!

On The Rhode Again

We are happy to announce that our short Happily Ever After will be heading to the east coast to show at the 11th Annual Rhode Island International Film Festival. The festival itself runs from August 7 - 12 but our screening is being held on Friday at 2:00 PM in the Cinematheque theater (on the campus of Brown University). We hope to see you there!

Happily Ever After Premieres At DWF

On July 8, 2007 Scared Mouse Production's first short Happily Ever After found its way into the public via the DancesWithFilms festival in Hollywood, CA. It was quite a thrill to see our work on the big screen. We got a lot of good feedback and thank those of you who made it for showing up. It was a lot of fun!