It's a Wrap! for the ReelHeART International Film Festival

Had a great time at the ReelHeART International Film Festival. It was my first time attending the festival and I must say it was like going to a fantastic summer camp, with director, Shannon Kelly as the den mother. The mid-size scale of the festival allows for an intimacy that is incomparable with any other festival I've covered in Toronto.

The festival really is international in scope. I met filmmakers from Ireland, Switzerland, and the USA, all with a variety of visions representing their homelands and their own particular styles. Canadian filmmakers held their own among this crowd, presenting films and scripts to make us proud.

I didn't get to the Closing Night Party until late in the evening, but I felt as if I was re-joining a group of friends with so many familiar faces in the crowd. It was as if it was a continuation of the Opening Night. Whoo-hoo!

Some pics from Closing Night:






ReelHeART director, Shannon Kelly (left) and actor/producer Paul J. Alessi (Knuckle Draggers)






Irish director, Louis McCullagh (Call Me Son) and she of the controversial calendar, photographer, Mary-Ellen Bertram (Courthouse Girls of Farmland); actor, Jason Riddle (Upside Brown and Dressed in a Black Flag script readings)






Actor, Jason G. Butler (The Notorious Newman Brothers) looking serious; Screenwriter, Ramona Baillie (The Sleep Clinic)





Our own ice-cream truck for dessert. Mmmm...; Louis McCullagh, Paul J. Alsessi and (I think) a Newman Brother?






"Brooklyn!" Shannon Kelly and director, Johnny "Brooklyn" Salvatore (Sodom by the Sea); a midnight screening of festival shorts upstairs at Southern Accent.


Photos by donna g