Tomorrow, the Oceanside International Film Festival (OIFF) kicks off five days of films, discussions and parties.
There are some topics you can always count on finding at OIFF: music, surfing, and social activism. It’s a festival with a personality based on the passions of its managing director Lou Niles.
Niles' credits include a full-time job as a sustainability, health and wellness expert helping building designers on how to build spaces that are better for people and the planet; DJ and show producer at 91X; executive producer at Love Machine Films; and multiple connections to the surfing world.
Opening night
OIFF's opening night will offer a chance for some of these interests to intersect as the festival kicks off Tuesday at 4:30 p.m. with a red carpet reception at Oceanside Museum of Art followed by a museum-wall screening of the documentary short, "California Light," an exploration of natural light and its influence on people’s lives.
Then you can walk over to the Sunshine Brooks Theater, the festival's home base, for a discussion with TV and film composer, Jason Hill. He also happens to be a member of the band Louis XIV.
"I really enjoy the film stuff because you can reinvent yourself constantly," Hill said. "Every time there's a new score, you want to do something totally different with new instruments, new this or that. I have to learn how to play new instruments constantly because it's just like, well, I don't want to repeat myself. And so you're constantly sort of pushing yourself."
Hill’s darkness and audacity appealed to director David Fincher. Hill scored Fincher's series "Mindhunter," which got in the heads of serial killers like Ed Kemper. You can check out a little of Hill's work in the clip below.
"Because 'Mindhunter' lived in this place that was in the mind, in this mind of thoughts. So I thought the score should live in that same place," Hill explained. "It should be this intangible thing that we can't touch. It comes in and out like the thoughts in our head do. It should have that sort of warmth as well. So once I started sort of figuring that out, it just started coming together. I'd try to just every day go to the studio and turn myself on and make something radically different and try some weird combination of this or that. It was rare that I would sit on the piano and write a track. It was sort of like I'd search around for a different sonic place. I got to these different sonic places."
Hill's work for Fincher also exemplifies how the line between music and sound design can be blurred. Hill will provide insights into the creative process of scoring a film or show with clips from his work.
Film programming
Then, Wednesday through Saturday the festival focuses on its shorts and feature film programming.
Wednesday begins at 5:00 p.m. with a block of horror and thriller shorts grouped under the title "The Identity Entity," and featuring mostly work by local filmmakers. Then at 7:00 p.m. the San Diego-based romantic drama "To Fall in Love" will screen. You can listen to my interview with filmmaker Michael Foster from when the film had its west coast premiere last year at the San Diego International Film festival.
Thursday boasts two shorts blocks featuring work from New York as well as Bosnia: "Everyday Heroes" and "Imposter Syndrome." Then, the day concludes with the international feature "Those Were the Good Days" from South Korea.
Friday will showcase three shorts blocks about the environment, surfing and friendships; and Saturday brings the festival to a close with a Reel Women Shorts Program sponsored by Soroptimist International of Oceanside-Carlsbad, plus two features, "The Buildout" and "Hemet, or the Landlady Don't Drink Tea."
