You can go to Sundance in Salt Lake City this weekend or you can stay home and enjoy the film festival and the music in Clarksdale.
The 10th Annual Clarksdale Film Festival returns Friday through Sunday and – as always – kicks off the festival season in Downtown Clarksdale with a variety of new venues and new films.
Hambone Gallery on East Second Street will serve as a venue for the first time at the Clarksdale Film Festival Friday and Saturday.
Just one block away on Third Street will be the other site for the film festival Grandma’s Sports Bar for the third consecutive year. The film festival is going into its 10th year and the main venue was Delta Cinema, also on Third Street. When issues with Delta Cinema’s facility occurred, the festival began showing films at Grandma’s Sports Bar.
Films were also shown at the New Roxy on Issaquena Avenue in recent years, but Hambone Gallery is taking its place in 2020.
“The New Roxy, of course, is a fair weather venue, so it’s always a challenge this time of year since it’s not completely airtight,” said Roger Stolle, co-founder and organizer of the Clarksdale Film Festival. “The owner, Robin Colonas, is a Merchant Marine, so she’s been out of town a lot and basically we talked about it this year and she was fine with handing it off if we had another venue we wanted to use.
“Stan was super excited about using Hambone,” he added. “We’ve created a theater over there basically with a projector and big screen. I think it’s really going to be great. It’s more temperature controlled and full service.”
Stolle said he liked how Grandma’s Sports Bar and Hambone Gallery were within walking distance from one another.
“We love the fact that it’s basically two different ends of the same block really, so it’s going to be really accessible for tourists and visitors,” he said. “Also, it just happens to walk you right past many of our best restaurants and retailers downtown, so, hopefully, it will drum up a little extra business for people.”
When films can be shown at Delta Cinema once again, Stolle said it would be added to the mix and there would be three venues. He added it is also possible films could be shown at Delta Cinema, New Roxy, Grandma’s Sports Bar and Hambone Gallery during the same festival at some point.
The “evening features” will be at Grandma’s Sports Bar at 6:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday. “Walk with Me: Lucious Spiller, Called to Sing the Blues” is the film on Friday. It is a short film about Spiller, who moved to Clarksdale from Little Rock, Ark., three years ago, and follows him for a week showing what it is like to be a bluesman in Clarksdale. His family does have Mississippi roots. Lee Quinby is the filmmaker and Nolan Dean is the editor.
“The Blues Trail Revisited: A Documentary Memoir” is the evening feature on Saturday. It is the story of Ted Reed and buddy of his in college in 1970 from the east coast. They came to Mississippi in search of the blues. The footage had been sitting all these years, but Reed came to Clarksdale for the 2019 Juke Joint Festival and last summer to film again. The film will consist of 50-year-old and modern footage to show where Mississippi was music wise in 1970 and now. Stolle said the film 95 percent finished and there will still be tweaks to it after it is screened at the festival.
Sean “Bad” Apple will play with a guest before both evening features at 5 p.m. each night. Spiller will be the guest on Friday and R.L. Boyce will be the guest on Saturday. There will be an opportunity for audience comments prior to the films.
There will be two panel discussions at the Delta Blues Museum on Saturday with Clay Motley moderating both of them.
The first is “Downtown Clarksdale Revitalization” at 11 a.m. with executive director of Coahoma County tourism Bubba O’Keefe, executive director of the Clarksdale/Coahoma County Chamber of Commerce Jon Levingston, Red Paden of Red’s Blues Club and Ann Williams of Collective Seed & Supply Co. and Travelers Hotel. Williams will be representing downtown retailers and hotels and Paden will be representing owners with music at their businesses.
The second panel discussion is “The Bluesmen Speak” at 1 p.m. with Spiller, Anthony “Big A” Sherrod, Shine Turner and Adam Gussow. All four bluesmen were in a panel discussion and performance at Florida Gulf Coast University, where Motley is a professor, in February 2019. A short documentary
“Goin' Down South: Bringing Clarksdale to the Caribbean” about their trip to Florida will be at 3:15 p.m. Saturday at Grandma’s Sports Bar.
Local filmmaker Coop Cooper will have a workshop on filming for social media at 3 p.m. Saturday at Delta Blues Museum.
Quinn Thomashow, master’s student at Hampshire College in Massachusetts, will hold a private workshop for Griot students on Friday and one for the public at 2 p.m. Saturday about camera-less filmmaking with bleached out 16-milimeter film. It will be at Meraki Roasting Co. on Sunflower Avenue.
A history bus tour will be at noon and 1:30 p.m. Saturday beginning next door to Hambone Gallery.
There will be music Sunday beginning 10 a.m. at Bluesberry Café, 3:30 p.m. at Levon’s, 5 p.m. at Hooker Grocer & Eatery and 7 p.m. at Red’s Blues Club. Music will also be at Cat Head Delta Blues & Folk Art.
Admission for the festival is $5 and could be paid at Hambone Gallery or Grandma’s Sports Bar. More information could be found at clarksdalefilmfestival.com.
