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ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT SILVER JUBILEE
Indigo Girls’ Amy Ray and Emily Saliers and ‘Angel’ star Roma Downey will be honored at the Sarasota Film Festival.
MONICA ROMAN GAGNIER A+E EDITOR
“The more things change, the more they remain the same.” That’s the tagline for the 25th Sarasota Film Festival that graces its silver anniversary poster designed by Maria Elena Diaz.
Things have changed a lot since the festival’s 1998 debut. Back then, President Bill Clinton was blessed with a booming economy, driven by the spread of the internet.
On TV, Roma Downey was starring as Monica in “Touched by an Angel,” dispensing heavenly advice to troubled Earthlings.
On the big screen, “Titanic” was a monster hit, sweeping the Oscars with 11 awards before ultimately raking in a staggering $2.25 billion at the box office worldwide.
Fast forward to the present: Not even seven Oscars will propel “Everything Everywhere All at Once!” anywhere close to that, thanks to couch potatoes who got used to streaming movies during COVID.
Even though attendance at other arts events in Sarasota is down as much as 30% from the “Before Days,” Sarasota Film Festival Chairman and Board President Mark Famiglio thinks this year’s festival is going to be a blockbuster.
Lifting Famiglio’s hopes is a compelling mix of premieres, features, documentaries and shorts programmed by festival vets Tom Hall and Holly Herrick. He’s also banking on the star power of Downey, who will receive SFF’s Lifetime Achievement Award, and Indigo Girls band members Amy Ray and Emily Saliers, who will pick up the Sarasota Maestro Award.
“I’m ready to be surprised (by the numbers,” Famiglio said in a telephone interview. “We’ve printed 45,000 programs. We’re being inundated.”
Virtual programming rolled out for an exclusively online festival in 2020 accompanies this year’s live event, which opens Saturday, March 25, with a screening of Dawn Porter’s “Cirque du Soleil: Without a Net.” The film, which takes viewers behind the scenes to see how Cirque rebounded from the pandemic, will fittingly unspool at The Circus Arts Conservatory.
The festival will close Sunday, April 2, with a screening of Sean McNamara’s “On a Wing and a Prayer.” The true-life story of a passenger who unexpectedly is forced to land a plane stars Dennis Quaid, Heather Graham and Jesse Metcalfe.
TV’s long-running angel Downey is the film’s producer and will attend the screening and accept her award.
The day before, she will host a conversation and sign copies of her latest book, “Be An Angel,” at Bookstore1, 117 S. Pineapple Ave.
In addition to angels, the SFF shines a spotlight on a saint. Cinephiles will appreciate the newly restored version of Danish director Carl Theodor Dreyer’s 1928 classic, “Passion of Joan of Arc,” about the French heroine who was burned at the stake.
Along with death-defying acts and spirituality, music is a thread that runs through the 25th edition of the SFF, which includes a sidebar dedicated to the topic, as well as programs focused on African Americans, female directors, LGBTQ issues and Judaism.
In some cases, films span categories, as in the case of the East Coast premiere of “It’s Only Life After All.”
If You Go
Tickets and passes for the 25th annual SFF can be purchased online at SarasotaFilmFestival.com and the box offices of the festival’s screening locations.
The box office will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Sarasota Municipal Auditorium from March 14-27 and from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. from March 28 through April 2.
The box office at CMX CineBistro Siesta
Key will be open from 5-8 p.m. from March 25 to April 2. Ticket sales will take place from noon to 7 p.m. at the Burns Court Cinema from March 25 to April 2.
