Grip Truck 101
Wed, 10:00 AM - 1:00 PM
What's the difference between a gaffer and a grip? Between daylight and artificial illumination? How does a cinematographer manipulate light and shadow, and who helps him do it? Come learn the fundamentals of film lighting and support as we take a guided tour of a truck full of lighting, production and electrical gear. An introduction to the basic hardware of the film trade.
Jim Andre owns the Chicago production rental and services company, Film Branch. Jim has worked on hundreds of shoots, big and small, as gaffer, grip, best boy, and cinematographer.

Feature Filmmaking: The Making of Pearl Diver
Thur-Sat, 1:00 PM
A good DVD "Director's Commentary" offers a privilaged look at the filmmaking process from the inside perspective of those who made the film. Here's your chance for a "live" and interactive director's commentary, as filmmaker Sidney King discusses his first feature film, from script and fundraising through production and post-production to the festival circuit. "Pearl Diver is an amazingly moving drama that deserves to be seen on the big screen." (IndependentFilm.com)
Sidney King will also take part in a Q & A session following a screening of Pearl Diver. Also participating in this series will be Flickerings regular, Winnipeg filmmaker Bevan Klassen, who is working on his own feature project.

Deep Focus: Filmmakers Only
Wed, Thur, Fri, 9:00 PM, in the Speaker Hospitality Trailer
Key to maintaining the conversation and community that is Flickerings is the participation of filmmakers at many levels. We've been encouraged to see a growing number of regular attendees and submitters to the Film Showcase carry on the conversation year to year. Each evening during the event, an informal filmmakers' forum convenes to share with peers works-in-progress and feedback on these, along with the common struggles of making films.
Wednesday night at 9:00 PM will be a reception for filmmaker participants in the 2006 Film Showcase. Other filmmakers are welcome to join us this and each night of Deep Focus, hosted by Bevan Klassen.

The Postwar Journey of Roberto Rossellini
Seminars, Wed., 2:00 PM; Screenings, see schedule
The way forward for postwar Europe led to opposing materialisms. Italian director Roberto Rossellini sought an alternative path, charting a spiritual journey out the ruins. In his postwar films, the father of "neorealism" reclaimed the sources of Western virtue, in the life of St. Francis and his contemporary disciples. With wife Ingrid Bergman, Rossellini brought the broken, secularized world of Northern Europe into confrontation with the spirit and soil of the South. Flickerings 2006 follows Rossellini's journey, with a pair of seminars and series of film screenings.
Mike Hertenstein oversees programming for Flickerings and the Imaginarium at Cornerstone Festival.

The Films of the Brothers Dardennes
Seminar, Thur, 2:00 PM; Screenings, see schedule
The Dardennes remain relatively unknown to American audiences, but they are increasingly well known to international moviegoers and Cannes juries, who awarded them top prizes in 1999 and 2005. Their films are a variety of rubble films, the ruins here being family disasters or the crumbling certitudes of the once-confident West. The brothers document the survivors' progress in their raw and improvisational style, one that belies a firm sense of control and moral purpose. Following up our 2003 screening of The Son, Flickerings presents three more films by the Dardennes, with an intro seminar led by series host, Doug Cummings.
Doug Cummings is an online film writer who is working on a book about the Dardennes. He founded the websites MastersofCinema.org, filmjourney.org, and robert-bresson.com. His writing has also appeared in SensesofCinema.com