The 26th Annual Dances with Films: Los Angeles is being held from June 22-July 2 at the TCL Chinese Theater in Hollywood. The film line up presents a diverse array of voices from the independent film scene. There are narrative features and shorts, documentaries, midnight series, pilots, dances with kidz, and downbeat categories.
PILOTS: TV: Saint City
Writer/Director Daniel Lafrentz (The Long Shadow feature film) will have the West Coast Premiere of his short film/pilot episode on July 1st @ 11am at this year’s Dances with Films festival. The world premiere was at the 2022 Austin Film Festival. On his website, the film is described as “SAINT CITY is a short film and proof-of-concept for an Hour-Long PILOT that turns the hard-boiled PI Genre on its head.”
Elton Jennings (Phil Biedron) is a single father to Ray (Jacob Rainer) and moonlights as a neighborhood private investigator. Dino (Kim Collins) is his over-the-hill informant (not very fit and carries alcohol to sip on) and this helps to make him blend into the street as he observes events on the streets of the city.
PI Jennings is sympathetic to those who work as sex workers and when one of his friends, Nina (Annie Gaia) is killed, he and Dino are in pursuit of the suspected killer, Brad (Brian Gilleece).
The film has a mix of family time, as well as action when the PI/informant are following the suspect and capturing him. Brad is a strangler, appears buff and not as easy to take down, but Jennings succeeds. The script has believable characters, and it does present enough information to still want to learn more about this PI – what motivates him and makes him a successful investigator.
The film was shot in the filmmaker’s hometown of New Orleans.
Producers: Kenneth Renaldo Reynolds, Daniel Lafrentz
Editor: Noel Diaz de Rivera
USA, 2022, 15.5 min.
Source: Dances with Films, Daniel Lafrentz