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A screening of the digital film "Busload of Poets" will take place at The Nightingale Theater. 1416 E. 4th Street, on Thursday, May 15th at 8:00 p.m. (Tickets $5). The filmmaker, Gary Mex Glazner will be on hand to introduce the film and answer questions on independent film making after the showing.
"Busload of Poets" won an excellence in filming award from the 2002 Memphis Digital Film Festival. The film highlights the conversion of driver Paul Cavendish from retired trucker to poetry aficionado. This wild concert footage captures the 100 poet, 32-city, in 30-day spoken word tour, from the summer of 2000. Paul began spontaneously speaking in Haiku halfway through the 8000-mile tour.
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"Busload of Poets" is chock full of crazy characters, each with their own story to tell. Each spoken word piece is complete; a three minute blast; a unique story arch; quilted together to give a look at the inside of America's brain and soul. The driver, Paul, threads together the 85-minute work, with his "every-man" comments on the sanctity of poetry. The film combines animation and cutting-edge editing to bring a Monty Python, Woody Allen, update to that most dusty and hated grade school topics: poetry.
The Santa Fe Film Festival hosted the sold out world premier of "Busload of Poets" on the opening night of their second annual festival in December of 2001. The Santa Fe Film Festival had over 12,000 people attend the weeklong event, which featured 75 films. "Busload of Poets" was also featured at the Tucson Poetry Festival and at the Knitting Factory in New York and Los Angeles. This digital film project features: Poetry Slam founder Marc Smith, Big Poppa E, the leader of the Wussy Boys, 2000 National Poetry Slam champ, Shane Koyczan, Amalia Ortiz, Cass King, Al Letson and many other hot buttered performance poets. Glazner, Minister of Fun for the nonprofit Poetry Slam Inc.(PSI), secured the funding for the tour from the distributors of "Grand Marnier."
"At times the poets featured in the film take on an aura of rock-star status, standing on a stage, yelling their hearts out into a microphone or softly whispering to an audience held spellbound by the words."
-Pasatiempo, Santa Fe New Mexican
"One highlight of the film is the Haiku competition, which features my favorite Haiku ever, "A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P." There are some fine moments, and some really well delivered pieces that gain force through the highly rehearsed and thoughtfully produced readings."
-Tucson Weekly
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