Santa Cruz Film Festival 2008

The Benshi was a film-teller in Japan and Korea during the silent film era whose popularity exceeded that of actors or directors. Neo-Benshi is a new art form started in the Bay Area by Konrad Steiner, Roxi Power Hamilton, and others that is sweeping the country. In Neo-Benshi, the writer composes an alternative film script and performs it live in synch with the film. Tonight's benshis--Amanda Davidson, Roxi Power Hamilton, and Wayne Smith--comedically reinterpret three Hollywood films whose young protagonists fight fire with fire.
James Byron Dean always wanted to be known by his middle name. Desperately needing to be the hero in his own Romantic epic poem, he engages in a war of words with his indecisively-gendered father who wants his icon-son to signify the Rebel Beat, and with Plato, who disallows any poetry in his Republic. Poetry inspires irrational thought. Plato insists that Jim Stark be reasonable, be Socrates, and be his. Identity is up for grabs in the "Gay 50s" and everybody needs a "Daddy" to tell him what to do.
Darling (1965) is the story of a young London actress quickly climbing the social ladder. She is a reckless seeker of self caught up in a frenzied excursion of jet-set Europe, in search of new experiences and ultimately finding emptiness at every level. A powerful and bold motion picture...made by adults...with adults...for adults.
In Amanda Davidson's re-telling of the 1984 thriller, Firestarter, Drew Barrymore goes to graduate school while everything around her goes up in flames. Perhaps Drew's pyrokinetic powers derive from her parents? Reckless, youthful experiments with narrative form. Or maybe the celluloid firestorm arises from the resistance of this female subject to forfeit the powers of androgyny as she teeters at the borderline of puberty.