The Virginia Film Festival poster this year is a composite image of Gena Rowlands as “Gloria” and Humphrey Bogart, entitled “Rowlands/Bogart Hero Sandwich” (1981) by artist Lynn Hershman. Hershman’s “Hero Sandwich” series, inspired by Rowlands’ “Gloria” film role, will be on display in the University Art Museum Oct. 13-Dec. 16.

"Masquerades" to be uncovered at 14th annual Virginia Film Festival

Staff Report

Con artists and impostors, race and gender benders, actors and other role players — these are some of the charact ers the 14th annual Virginia Film Festival will unmask this year.

Scheduled for Oct. 25 through 28, the festival will look at how characters put on different identities in the roles they play. Based at U.Va., the film festival designs its program to resemble a comprehensive course on a cultural theme — a course so popular in appeal and so varied in scope that it attracts a large local and national audience, according to festival artistic director Richard Herskowitz.

This year, the festival will give special emphasis to the collaborative art of John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands, as well as that of maverick director Henry Jaglom and actress-screenwriter Victoria Foyt. Rowlands, Jaglom and Foyt, whose films illuminate the art of acting and its relationship to everyday role-playing, will be on hand for mini-retrospectives of their work. Additionally, renowned director-producer-actor Sydney Pollack will introduce a special screening of “Tootsie” and highlight other aspects of his career.

The festival will showcase over 60 premiere and classic films that illuminate the theme, many guest filmmakers from the worlds of Hollywood and independent cinema, plus numerous sidebar exhibitions and performances, including a special appearance by Bread and Puppet Theater.

As a sign of the multi-faceted nature of its theme, the festival kicks off with three screenings on Oct. 25, all of which lead into the Opening Night Gala at the University Art Museum: “Gloria” with actress Gena Rowlands, “Venice/Venice” with director Henry Jaglom, and the world premiere of the documentary, “Ah! The Hopeful Pageantry of Bread and Puppet” with filmmaker DeeDee Halleck and members of the so-named theater company.

Creature creator and make-up artist Stan Winston, a U.Va. alumnus, will return to the festival this year. He will host a tribute to one of his great influences, silent screen actor Lon Chaney, known as the “man of a thousand faces” because of his extraordinary skill with make-up and disguise.

With feature premieres, screenings of classics and independent films, various exhibits and the “Fringe Festival,” there’s something for everyone

In Don Siegel’s 1956 “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” actor Kevin McCarthy pokes an alien pod. This classic will be screened Oct. 28 at 4 p.m. at the Regal Theater.

• On opening night, a discussion between Rowlands and noted Cassavetes scholar, Ray Carney, will follow the screening of “Gloria.” The regional premiere of “A Constant Forge,” a 200-minute documentary on the life and art of Cassavetes by filmmaker Charles Kiselyak will also take place Oct. 28.

Carney, whose writings on Cassavetes and other film and art topics are catalogued at www.cassavetes.com, will host this year’s Regal Film Workshop. It will offer close analyses of “A Woman Under the Influence” and “Minnie and Moskowitz.”s

• Jaglom and writing partner Foyt will discuss their collaborations as Jaglom’s films about theater and film acting are screened: “Venice/Venice,” “Last Summer in the Hamptons,” “Déjà Vu ” and work-in-progress, “Festival in Cannes.”

• Pollack will be present for a special screening of the Academy Award-winning “Tootsie.” The eminent director of “They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?” and “Out of Africa,” who has also acted in some memorable roles, will participate in other festival programs as well.

(Left, top to bottom) Gena Rowlands, Sydney Pollack, and Victoria Foyt will make appearances at the festival.

• The inaugural Darden Producer’s Forum, co-sponsored by U.Va.’s Darden Business School, will feature major motion picture producer Marc Abraham, president of Beacon Pictures, and Adam Fogelsen, vice president for marketing at Universal Pictures, who will speak about the challenges of bringing the soon-to-be-released Robert Redford and Brad Pitt production, “The Spy Game,” to the screen.

• “Storming the Media: A Forum for Future Filmmakers” includes a screenwriters panel with Gregory Allen Howard, David Ward, Frank Pierson and others.

• In the panel “Masquerading as Television: The Renaissance in TV Filmmaking,” representatives of HBO (Janet Graham Borba), TNT (Scot Safon), and IFC Films (Kelley Devine), plus producer Doro Bachrach and director Frank Pierson will discuss the rise of cable television as a producer of high-quality feature films.

• Duke University professor and film scholar Jane Gaines will give a lecture, “The Vanishing Race,” on African-American character actor Noble Johnson as part of the Forum for Contemporary Thought.

• Virginia filmmakers: Oct. 27, Virginia native Gregory Allen Howard will present the film he wrote for the screen, “Remember the Titans,” based on the racial tensions of an Alexandria high school football team. Director Kevin Hershberger will present the premiere of his Civil War drama, “Wicked Spring,” and Stan Winston will present one highlight from the HBO “Creature Feature” series from Stan Winston Productions, “She-Creature.” Virginia Commonwealth University student Patrick Pfupajena’s innovative first feature “Blue Skys, White Clouds” will receive a special presentation hosted by Tim and Daphne Reid’s New Millennium Studios.

• The Fringe Festival, from Oct. 22-27, creates room for U.Va. students and others to stage theater, dance, poetry and music performances, plus a big Carnevale Dance Party, at the Frank Ix Building. Installation art will be on display from Oct. 19 to Nov. 11. Co-sponsored by the studio art program at U.Va.