Macon Film Festival fully underway; documentary on Macon conductor slated for Sunday

The Macon Film Festival began Thursday and is in full force through the weekend. For the 17th year, MFF brings more quality independent films to town than any one person can schedule to watch – this is a feast movie weekend, not famine – so take advantage of one of Macon’s premier cultural offerings and see all the student and professional, local and international films you can.

Tabitha Lynne Walker, the local filmmaker and producer who is a festival founder and key scout for potential festival films, said from the start incorporating a local element was a priority. In that regard, 2022 is a peak year. Natives, locals, and near locals are being featured in films, as filmmakers and as industry professionals with many leading festival workshops. Workshops are free this year and conducted at Visit Macon, 450 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.

Even with only the smattering of workshops and film screenings it’s possible to mention here, it’s impossible to list each’s details so get to the festival’s website for the particulars. It’s at www.maconfilmfestival.com and there’s a handy scheduling feature there. Keep in mind ticketing is available throughout the weekend.

But back to what’s on this year and a hint at some local aspects.

“The festival has always been about giving people an opportunity to see independent films here they wouldn’t get to see otherwise,” Walker said. “It’s also about giving filmmakers from all over an outlet for getting their films before audiences plus we have local filmmakers in mind and people interested in industry careers.

“We want to help them hear from directors, producers and others who bring their films and let them get in front of people working in film. I think we’ve done an excellent job of that this year and a lot of those participating are festival alumni or people from here who’ve gone on to make solid careers in the business.”

I had the pleasure of screening “Conducting Life” months ago, a documentary made by Diane Moore about Roderick Cox. It’s a special selection screening Sunday. Cox is a Macon native who grew up in a single-parent home under difficult circumstances but had a caring, hard-working mother, Brenda Cox. Further local note: as of several weeks ago, Brenda Cox said she had never seen the movie so its Macon showing will be a very special occasion for her.

Through determination and his considerable musical gifts – and with help as a kid from the Boys & Girls Clubs of Central Georgia and the Otis Redding Foundation – Cox fulfilled his dream of becoming a conductor and, at just 34, has worked full-time with U.S. orchestras. He is now based in Germany and performs as guest conductor with top-tier orchestras worldwide.

No spoilers, but it’s as heartwarming as it is illuminating and entertaining. For Macon, there’s pride knowing another native son’s name can be listed alongside any other Macon musical great.

Moore spent seven years with Cox to make the film, though it’s not a lengthy one. She met him at music festivals in Aspen where he has become an audience favorite and, as it happens, where the film is showing and he is conducting this month also.

Moore said she was drawn by Cox’s talent but convinced by his life story.

“He told me he didn’t want to be ordinary but extraordinary,” she said in phone interviews. “I said to myself, ‘He’s going to make it.’ He has immense intensity and commitment but is also very funny and laid back. He’s certainly an intellectual but also a very nice person.”

Though working in a refined atmosphere as a conductor and being one of only a minuscule number of conductors of color, Moore said she found in Cox a remarkable humility towards life, work and his past.

Cox told me as opposed to the stereotype of the crazed, egomaniacal conductor, keeping the attitude of a learner is a critical element to creating good work.

”You always have to be growing,” he said. “All the time. When you think you know a piece, there’s always something left to learn. It’s interesting to put down a score I’ve been studying for years and then go back and find new answers to questions about how it should sound. It’s part of what makes this exciting.”

Another local aspect, student musicians from Cox’s old high school, Central High, will perform two pieces prior to the film’s showing, according to Walker. In October, Cox will again be in Macon to conduct the Macon-Mercer Symphony Orchestra’s season two opening concert (www.mcduffie.mercer.edu/symphony).

Following the festival, Cox is set to speak with students at both Central and the Boys and Girls Clubs.

More notes:

• For several years, I’ve run into groups of high school film students from Jasper County at the festival and been impressed by their instructors’ commitment to making MFF a field trip. Now, in 2022, Jasper students have an actual entry in the student shorts film block called “Boxy.” Kudos – that’s the way to do it.

• Today at 5 p.m., Margaret South, who Walker said has just relocated to Houston County, will lead a free workshop called “The Art of Story.” South co-founded the film company All Girl Productions with Bette Midler and Bonnie Bruckheimer that, among other hits, produced the classic film “Beaches.”

• Speaking of classic films, “Still Working 9 to 5” will screen Saturday and afterward its makers will conduct a Q&A. The film is a documentary on the ‘80s comedy classic “9 to 5” featuring Dolly Parton, Lilly Tomlin, Jane Fonda and Dabney Coleman looking at why the movie is still relevant. Walker said she found the behind-the-scenes look and interviews with stars fascinating and expects the Q&A with its creators to be eye-opening for lovers of the movie, would-be filmmakers and anyone interested in films.

• A former Macon camera shop employee who has become an award-winning filmmaker and directed for HBO, ABC, STARZ and others will hold a free workshop Saturday. Crystle Robertson is flying from California to be at the festival and talk about “Directing Television: Maintaining Creative Vision.”

And then there are all the fulldome art, educational, travel and entertainment films showing at the Museum of Arts and Sciences. All told, there are almost 90 films showing this weekend, according to festival president Justin Andrews. Many have local connections - too many to catalog here - and some are never-seen-before-in-theaters films like “Unspoken.”

All-in-all, MFF is offering something for everyone in its various fulldome, shorts, narrative, documentary, music, student, LGTBQ, Georgia made and other film blocks.

With something as monumental as MFF going on it’s easy to overlook the many other worthy happenings in Middle Georgia, but to mention one, Macon Pops’ season opener is tonight at 7:30 p.m. at Mercer University’s Hawkins Arena. There’s still time to find out more about it at www.maconpops.com.

Contact writer Michael W. Pannell at mwpannell@gmail.com.