New Art Film Festival Showcases Local and Midwest Filmmaking

The New Art Film Festival is underway in downtown Champaign's Art Theater. The festival --- which opened Thursday night --- showcases films by local and Midwest independent filmmakers.

Sanford Hess, the Art Theater operator, says the timing for it now was perfect, with the Boneyard Arts Festival also going on in Champaign-Urbana this weekend.

"We're looking at some of the materials that I'd been sent from Boneyard in February, and I just realized it was a great match", says Hess. I mean, here's local artists; they're doing work in a different media - film - but they're local artists."

Hess says the New Art Film Festival also will be a nice lead-in to Ebertfest next week.

The Film Festival will feature more than 20 films of many genres - from comedy to drama to documentaries..

Friday night's movies include the videogame parody "Press Start" produced by Champaign-based Dark Maze Studios. Also on the bill is Robin Christian's film "Act Your Age", featuring the late Pat Morita.