The Dayton Embrace

I can't tell you what a relief it was to see how the Dayton audience matched the enthusiastic response we enjoyed at last months' Sarasota Film Festival World Premiere of Beautiful Noise. I mean, you just never know how your film is gonna play from one region of the country to the next. In Sarasota, I'm a relative unknown - so the audience response came from a place that had no preconceived notions. The Dayton crowd, on the other hand, walked in with a hint of skepticism due primarily to the fact that the last time anyone in town saw a Steve Tatone production it either featured General Motors products or appeals to support the local food banks through a series of TV specials and documentaries I produced over 20 years ago. I was a known commodity back in the day in southwest Ohio and the notoriety had nothing to do with feature filmmaking. Fortunately, it appears our indie musical-drama instantly created a brand new picture in the hearts and minds of the sizable crowd that screened our movie at this past weekends' FilmDayton Festival. The 'Prodigal Son' came home and conquered - as the audience responded with an enthusiasm that made me incredibly proud of my Cast & Crew. They laughed, they cried and they bought the Soundtrack CD in the same ratio of audience # to CD sales as the Sarasota screenings. In short - Beautiful Noise was a big hit in Dayton, Ohio! Nice to see the old hometown embrace the movie in such a passionate way.

Now it's on to Utah this week and the next big test at the Park City Film Music Festival. I hope we hit the trifecta in this, our 3rd Film Festival experience.

And just so you don't start thinking that all I'm gonna write about are the good things that happen along this indie filmmaking trail, I'm still a bit confounded by the technical challenges I suspect all filmmakers experience from one film fest to another...as every screening of the movie so far, from the Sarasota to Dayton showcases, has looked and sounded different from the final cut product we delivered. One screening looks better from a color-correction standpoint than another...and the sound quality - which I know is fantastic in the first place thanks to the time and money we spent on the overall sound mix in post production - continues to be less than perfect. I know that each theatre has different sound and projector settings and it's driving me crazy to watch the movie and see/hear the glitches...most of which have nothing to do with anything my Team did to the film. Amazingly, when I mention my disappointment of these technical flaws, people look at me like I'm nuts. They just don't notice the things I'm wincing about and think I'm overreacting. But I'm not. We worked hard to get it right...and yes, I still have just a coupla more minor tweaks to make in the film. But at some point soon I hope I can see the movie projected in a theatre that dials in just the right settings so the audience can see and hear the movie the way we've produced it.

Is it possible I doth protest too much? Yeah...probably so. But if the film is causing such an emotional stir as-is, I can't wait to see what the full effect of seeing and hearing the movie in all its technically pristine production glory will have on an audience. Don't get me wrong, the film fest tech folks in Sarasota & Dayton did great work overall...but damn...I just feel like we haven't quite hit the sweet spot yet. Maybe Park City can dial up that perfect technical screening I crave...

ST