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THE UNAUTHORIZED REVIEW OF

THE TAMPA FILM REVIEW

The unauthorized review of the Tampa Film Review monthly film festival By C. A. Passinault

INTRODUCTION - PART 1 - PART 2 - FILM FESTIVAL SCORECARD

The Review Of The Tampa Film Review for 2006-2007

I’ve been attending the Tampa Film Review for about two years. During that time, I also reviewed some of the films on two different occasions.
Since this review is very important to the upcoming indie film community, and to indie film professionals who plan on organizing and becoming involved with a professional Tampa indie film community, I will use my event scorecard as a guideline, which will score the Tampa Film Review at a glance at the end of this review. I also have a lot to cover here, and if you are a professional and really do care about professional indie film in Tampa Bay, you really need to read this and consider every point which is addressed. In addition to this review, Tampa Bay Film is working on a Tampa Film Review survivors guide, which will be available soon for those of you who wish to endure the Tampa Film Review for yourself so you can see that this review was right. Hey, you were warned.
I, for one, am sick and tired of tolerating these so-called film festivals. They do have good points, but the flaws, the sloppy organization, and the poor execution are very hard to ignore.
I am hoping the Paul Guzzo and Pete Guzzo read this, take any criticism constructively, and use this review as a blueprint for improvement. I can say that if they do not fix what is wrong with the Tampa Film Review, then what is coming will put it out of business. Paul Guzzo, who doesn’t bother doing his homework on people and makes assumptions, is about to find out the price of misjudging real professionals who try to help the indie film scene get on it’s feet. Paul Guzzo likes to point out that certain people are not filmmakers, but he only demonstrates that he has no clue what he is talking about, and proves month after month that he is not an event planner. Case in point: The Tampa Film Review.

The Tampa Film Review Concept

As a concept, the Tampa Film Review isn't all that bad. Event organizer Paul Guzzo has always stated that the event is kind of like a group of friends getting together at a friend's apartment and watching movies. Conceptually, this is a admirable concept and is actually a good idea. Professionally, the idea has an inherent flaw, however, and there are a number of other issues which has kept this event from getting off of the ground. In many ways, these issues have driven the Tampa Film Review through the mud, and a certain small indie film clique which masquerades as the "official" professional indie film community seems to enjoy wallowing in that stagnant mud.
The friends hanging in the home of their friend ambience lends itself to poor organization. Paul Guzzo usually steps up in front of the Tampa Film Review audience and loads a DVD player next to a tired video projector, introducing each film. If the filmmaker is in the audience, Guzzo will allow them to address the audience, but this become tedious since the filmmaker will stand up wherever they happen to be and speak to everyone. This makes introductions and speaking very hard to follow. The audience members have to crane their necks to follow what is going on throughout the room, and the lack of microphones makes it hard to hear much of anything.
On the subject of sound, this has been a major issue during the entire four year run of the Tampa Film Review. I am going to speculate that many of the technical issue that the film festival has is due to weak cash flow, but regardless of the reason the bad sound seems to constantly haunt each and every event. Sometime, during the viewing of an indie film, the sound will completely cut out. While there are also issues with the old video projector, which seems to project images poorly, and a rickety DVD player, which refuses to play some DVD's, the sound, by far, is an issue which tends to annoy the audience the most at the Tampa Film Review film festivals.
Ironically, it didn't have to be that way. I own an event planning company with professional sound equipment. When the Tampa Film Review moved to the International Bazaar in early 2006, the Guzzo's made a public request for sound equipment, asking everyone if they knew anyone with sound equipment that they could use for the Tampa Film Review. When I offered the use of my sound equipment at no charge, Paul Guzzo told me that they no longer needed it and that they had it covered. It seemed that the Guzzo's decided that they didn't need the logistics of making a trip to Brandon to pick up my sound equipment every time they had to do a Tampa Film Review, and that the would settle for the sound system that the new venue had. This is the reason that each Tampa Film Review has been cursed with bad sound and other technical difficulties. My Eventi Events sound equipment could easily do a larger Tampa Film Review-type event with professional results. Typical of the Guzzo way, they decided to take short cuts and refused professional assistance, which hurt the image and the production quality of the film festivals. Could this also be because Paul Guzzo seems to only do the Tampa Film Review because he finds it fun, and not because it has any real professional direction?
Technical issues aside, the main professional flaw of the Tampa Film Review, and another things which tends to undermine the progress of the film festival series, is simply the lack of a professional tone. The loose organization and laid back atmosphere does not support a professional experience. The Guzzo's have decided that they won't screen film submissions for quality, and the result is that the audience has to sit through many bad, and often unwatchable, films to see anything good. While there have been some good films shown at the Tampa Film Review (Gunn Highway and the Guzzo's The End Is Blossoming some to mind), the majority of the films are largely amateurish efforts and make sitting through the Tampa Film Review film festivals an unpleasant exercise in patience.
The "friends gathering together" theme of the Tampa Film Review is misleading, too. While everyone is invited, you really do have to be a member of a small core clique to get anything out of the Tampa Film Review. False modesty, self-serving ego's, pretension, insecurities, and outright discrimination take center stage for each and every Tampa Film Review. It is very hard to become an accepted member of the group here, and this is something which has crippled the ability of the Tampa Film Review to grow and to make a difference. God help you if you are a professional who tries to get involved and the core clique perceives you to be competition. They will find out as much as they can about you so they can find things to use against you, and if they cannot find anything wrong, they will still bad-mouth you.
Now, imagine that this happens to you. Put yourself in the place of the professional who is discriminated against. You have not done anything wrong. You are a professional who sincerely tries to help the indie film community grow and become professionally respected in Tampa Bay. They feel threatened and insecure around you, because they see you as competition, and also because they don’t think that you can be useful to their agenda. You later find out that these people have been all over your web sites and have researched your businesses, and that they have taken (stolen) some of your ideas and have plagiarized some of your copyrighted material. They look for things wrong with you and set you up to fail, and when this doesn’t work they make up rumors about you and slander you. When you dare to question them for their activities or try to stick up for yourself, they claim that you are crazy and try to portray you as a bad, unprofessional person. The act of you questioning them, defending yourself, and addressing their accusations becomes a hostile action, and is wrong in their eyes. In the process, some of their followers and other misguided people don’t bother to try to understand the entire scenario and blindly jump on their bandwagon.
How would you feel about this?
Many professionals have been put off by this behavior, and have simply quit going to the Tampa Film Review. More than one professional has experienced discrimination and slander because of people who they have met through this so-called indie film festival.
The subject of professionalism does not define any aspect of the Tampa Film Review, at any rate. Paul Guzzo himself has stated on many occasions that he only does this for fun. While that is fine, as we all should extract some satisfaction from our professions and our professional endeavors, "fun" should never be the primary motivation for any endeavor in a professional setting. To do so is unprofessional, irresponsible, and ultimately cheats anyone who tries to invest time and energy into the endeavor. Such has happened with the Tampa Film Review.
Trying to network with indie filmmakers after the close of the Tampa Film Review is a frustrating exercise in futility, also. There is no organization, and everyone goes their own way. Trying to meet people and give them your business card is very difficult. Although the core group will often go out to one of Ybors bars afterward, networking in such an environment with people who are in a biased clique is not easy, either.
Recently, an indie film networking group from a business which does indie film workshops started to meet before each Tampa Film Review. This has largely been unsuccessful, as the meeting time is spent listening to keynote speakers and the meetings end as the Tampa Film Review begins, making actual networking very tough to pull off. The last time that I tried to do this, I exchanged a handful of cards and did not have the time for even the briefest of conversations. For me, it was a waste of time. The Tampa Film Network, which is competing with this workshop group and recently began doing projects with the Tampa Film Review, has also been largely ineffective, and will be the subject of an upcoming Tampa Bay Film review. Do we really need more indie film workshops for beginners and "collaborative professional" production disasters like The Quiet Place where self-serving filmmakers work against each other?
I have taken many professional actors, actresses, and models to the Tampa Film Review over the years. Introducing them to the Guzzo's, or anyone else for that matter, has never been easy. Each and every one of them has complained. They told me that they had no desire to become involved with anyone responsible for the amateur indie films screened at the Tampa Film Review. None of them liked the film festivals. They all thought that they were poorly organized and were lacking a point. Additionally, many asked me a question which was tough for me to answer. I was often asked why I was wasting my time attending the Tampa Film Review. One prominent actress and model even compared the local indie filmmakers represented by the Tampa Film Review as a disorganized group of unprofessional, no-talent, mentally deficient morons (I recall that she summarized this by stating that they were "slow" and not going anywhere in the industry). Although I tried to defend some of the filmmakers, I found it to be impossible. Although, at the time, I had faith that there was hope, I knew that she was right.
Professionals finding fault with the Tampa Film Review and the so-called indie filmmakers who are involved is nothing new, and I don't see it ending anytime soon. With this kind of rift between the participants and the professionals, I don't see the Tampa Film Review doing much more, and in my opinion I do not see the film festival surviving much longer as any kind of event.



NEXT: PART 2

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UPDATED 01/15/08

 
   

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