It’s bittersweet for me to say that last night was Downward’s last festival screening for the foreseeable future. It’s been a blast and the response has been fantastic, and I’m not saying I won’t try to put it out there a little bit more if I have the opportunity, but it’s been almost a year since it premiered and I feel like it’s time to move it into the next stage of it’s life.

   After leaving my promotional materials and talking to people for a while I spent some time in the streets of Cape May taking photos and enjoying the environment. I took almost 200 pictures, and the best of them will be on jonreinophotography.tumblr.com soon. It’s a beautiful town with a lot of character, and this time of year it’s quiet yet still active which was perfect. Once my parents came down we grabbed dinner at a place called the Ugly Mug and had the best burger of my life. Whoever thought of a cheeseburger with a crab cake on top is a genius and I want to meet them.

    Then we went back to the Chalfonte hotel for a dolly rig presentation with some fantastic rigs and I showed of my DIY slider dolly and shoulder rig. Then we watched the screening of The Redemption of General Butt Naked which was a fantastic documentary which won best cinematography at Sundance this year, about a Liberian rebel general from the civil wars of the mid to late 90’s who is trying to redeem himself of his actions. It was unbelievable and the Executive Producer and Cinematographer were there. They were knowledgeable and fantastic filmmakers, it was great to talk to them.

    Then at about 10:30 Downward screened during the “Edgy Shorts” selection in the Henry Sawyer room. It’s a smaller room but as you can see in the picture at the top it was a pretty full room. The response was fantastic and people seemed to really enjoy the film and the freebies I brought for everyone. Four people asked me to sign the posters, that’s just awesome. I hope to be back there next year with at least one of my new projects. It was a blast and I can’t wait to start another festival run with some of my new projects, as well as Closure with Alfred Marroquin.

    This might be the shortest blog post I will ever do, but I just wanted to post that DOWNWARD has been accepted into the 2011 Cape May Film Festival. It screens on Saturday October 22nd in a series of “edgy” short films. Come check it out if you can.