Dr. Fred Pollock with Charleston basketball legend Nemo Nearman at summer Jewish film night 2009

Dr. Fred Pollock is known for leading the WV Jewish Film Festival. He has now also made a nice YouTube about a recent trip to visit his daughter in Peru who is doing medical research. He wrote me, “I made the video on imovie on my MacBook from photos.” The two males in the film are his sons Joe and Gab. But he was glad to get home…..”I agree with you and the famous movie line, “Toto, there’s no place like home”.” Check out the video here.

  In other news from Holler Presents,  Scott McClanahan , an author/filmmaker, has a new book of short stories out from Six Gallery Press (in Pittsburgh) called STORIES II — the first one came out earlier this year.  (more…)

In “Coal Country – Rising Up Against Mountaintop Removal Mining,”(Sierra Club Books), Shirley Stewart Burns, Mari-Lynn Evans and Silas House have done an exceptional job editing many essays by the leading opponents of mountaintop removal mining.  This is the perfect companion book to the great film by Mari-Lynn Evans that I have called “the “Harlan County, USA” of the 21st century. (more…)

“Psychotronic” is a special term to me since I had the premiere of WV’s most famous psychotronic film, “Teenage Strangler” way back around 1990 at the  St. Albans Public Library under the direction of Yvonne Farley. In the current issue of my former publication, Graffiti, Tony Rutherford, who does a good job covering Huntington-related films, has posted a story listing some psychotronic films and other WV films. I wish that he had included the two films on Gray Barker – “Whispers from Space” and “Shades of Gray.”  Richard Bartram cablecast “Teenage” a while ago and is making a nice film about the making of WV’s first indie feature.

 Deep Down, a project by Sally Rubina and Jen Gilomen examines how the practice of mountain top removal in search of coal in the Appalachian mountains of eastern Kentucky is affecting a local community, and will be screening in Copenhagen at the UN Climate Change Conference and later on PBS. (more…)

Robert Gates quit his job as a computer/chemical engineer at Union Carbide and became a full-time filmmaker, photographer, stage lighter, etc. around 1976. I met him in fall 1978. He has updated his collection of movies with several major exceptions including his masterpiece, “Communication from Weber,” which won many awards and toured England. I would like to show it again myself after having the world premiere at Sunrise Museums long ago. I rank it as one of the “top ten WV films ever made.” Here is a list of DVD versions of Gates’ films you can purchase on DVD.

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 Still from B.J. Gudmundsson’s “#30 – Cal Price and the Pocahontas Times”

In 2007, WV’s public libraries owned over 200,000 videos – DVDs and VHS, as well as almost 200,000 audio items. Search the largest public library system in the state, Kanawha County Public Library, with 30,000 videos, I now find that they own 38 WV-related DVDs.

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Enock Hicks was raised in a coal camp outside of War, WV. He spent his career working in mines and mainly selling mining equipment. Living in Dayton, Ohio, he has become an author and filmmaker, making “A Flaming Rick! Coal,” now on sale at Tamarack and elsewhere. He send me a new film,”Our Good Earth,” that has several stories including several sponsored ones including one from the National Coal Association about the great job they are doing on restoring land that has been stripmined. (more…)

David Marcum has done a real service to the people of WV by producing and directing his award-winning film, “Bridging History at Blennerhassett Island.” The film is an award-winning film about a bridge that won an international competition as the best bridge of its kind in THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD. Congrats to Mr. Marcum who also worked on the great DOT film on building the WV Turnpike, “The Road to Opportunity, (available FREE at all WV public libraries) and Terry Lively’s multiple award winning film, “Crossings – Bridge Building in WV.” Together the three films are a trilogy about the importance of bridges in the Mountain State. Hopefully you will be able to see this film by borrowing a copy at your local public library. (more…)

Eamon Hardimon (“Vampire Whores from Outer Space”) is presenting his latest film – “Porkchop” at the Warner Theater in Morgantown on December 19th. Read a review in the WVU newspaper here. Congrats to Mr. Hardimon for continuing the hard work of making indie films!