A couple of weeks ago at a series of local premiere screenings for
$5 Cover and its ancillary documentaries, filmmaker Craig Brewer
sounded the alarm on behalf of Indie Memphis, the local organization
that has put on an annual film festival for the past 11 years in
addition to other programming.

At each screening, Brewer implored attendees to support Indie
Memphis or risk losing it. It wasn’t, at the time, an unrealistic
fear.

Indie Memphis is coming off its biggest and best festival ever last
fall, the first under full-time executive director Erik Jambor. But the
combination of an enhanced budget and a faltering economy put Indie
Memphis in precarious financial waters that the organization seems to
have navigated, at least in the short-term.

“We had some funding lined up that fell through, and it was a bit of
a surprise to us,” says Les Edwards, the longtime Indie Memphis
director and current board chairman.

Indie Memphis had made the Jambor hire and expanded its operations
based on funding from a private source, but when the economy tanked,
that funding was no longer available. For a brief time, this made
Brewer’s fears for the festival going away an actual possibility.

“There was a real danger in the festival not happening this year,
and what makes it worse is we had such a great year,” Brewer says of
his concerns. “Erik is the real deal. I really like what he’s
doing.”

Since Brewer’s public warning, Indie Memphis has found the footing
to secure this year’s festival, scheduled for October 8th-15th. For
starters, the $5 Cover premieres raised more than $12,000 for
the festival, according to Jambor, through a combination of ticket
sales, poster sales, on-site donations, and new memberships. The
organization’s membership drive continues, with info available at
IndieMemphis.com.

“Craig volunteered to have the world premiere as a fund-raiser,
because he knew we were in trouble,” Edwards says.

In addition, the organization has received a challenge grant from an
anonymous local donor, according to Edwards. “If we raise a certain
amount of money, the donor will match it,” says Edwards, who says
meeting the fund-raising requirement to trigger the grant won’t be a
problem.

If Brewer and the challenge grant have saved the festival for this
year, the future is still a concern.

“It’s easy to start a film festival. It’s hard to keep it going,”
Edwards says. “We’re coming up on 12 years, and we’re not going
anywhere. But, like everybody else, we’re concerned about the economic
situation.”

Brewer, who has been taking meetings on Indie Memphis’ behalf,
thinks the future lies in stronger corporate sponsorships for the
festival.

“The best way to become a metropolitan city is to start acting like
one, and that’s getting your local brands involved,” Brewer says,
citing the success of the long-running Nashville Film Festival.

“If it weren’t for Indie Memphis, we wouldn’t have a film scene
here,” Brewer says of the organization’s importance to the local arts
community. “[Indie Memphis] provides an impetus for local filmmakers. I
know most of my $5 Cover filmmakers cut their teeth [through
Indie Memphis]. If that goes away, I don’t know that we can replace
it.”

Goodbye Solo Sticks Around

The longevity of theatrical runs for non-mainstream films
— indie, foreign, docs, etc. — in Memphis is
erratic, with many films showing up in a single theater for only one
week. On many occasions, I’ve been asked about films that have already
come and gone, unnoticed. So it’s good news that Goodbye Solo,
the terrific indie drama from North Carolina director Ramin Bahrani
that features Memphian Red West in his first starring role, is hanging
around for at least one more week. The film, one of the year’s best,
opened May 15th at Ridgeway Four and will be running at that location
through at least May 28th. Memphians who care about movies should savor
this film and particularly West’s half-century-in-waiting star turn, on
the big screen while they have the chance. There’s no guarantee this
film will last a third week.