Rocktown Coming to a City Near You

Upcoming Screenings:

Thursday, February 5, 2009, 6:30 pm: Harrisonburg, VA, Premier Screening, Court Square Theater

Thursday, March 26, 2009, 6:00 pm: University Of Massachusetts, Amherst, Herter Hall Annex, Rm 227

trailer will be available on this site as of January 8th, 2009! Come back and take a look after the new year.

Harrisonburg, VA Premier Screening Date Set

Rocktown will screen for the first time at the Court Square Theater on Thursday, February 5, 2009. Local musicians Glick & Phillips will play before the screening. We'll keep you posted on all the details as they become available.

Production Assistant Joins the team

A few weeks ago, we were able to bring on the fantastic Sara Versluis as our production asistant, working on the ground in Harrisonburg while we are back home editing. She's our go-to person for everything happening outside of our editing studio!

Rocktown In Production

The production crew grew in the last few weeks, to include production assistant/assistant camera person Sara Versluis, working on the ground in Harrisonburg, and assistant camera person, Dan Madsen.

Leslie & Brian have been busy editing and the final interviews are being wrapped up as we speak. We are very close to setting the first screening date, and are just waiting for some final confirmations, but we know it will be in November of this year and we'll announce the date as soon as it's finalized.

For now, these are recent production stills taken at one of our last interviews.

Rocktown Receives Major Grant Funding!

Earlier this month we learned that we've been selected to receive a Creative Inspiration Grant from the Arts Council of the Valley to help us fund the post-production phase and public screening of Rocktown in Harrisonburg in Fall 2008. The screening will be held at a local theater and will feature a musical performance by local favorites Glick and Philips before the show. date and more details to be announced. For now, it's off to editing we go...

Paper City Films Interviews Stacy Mitchell, Author Of "Big Box Swindle"

We just got back from interviewing Stacy Mitchel in Portland, ME. Stacy is "a senior researcher with the New Rules Project, a program of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance that challenges the wisdom and inevitability of economic consolidation and works to advance policies that support strong local economies and vibrant communities."

Her book, Big Box Swindle, is one of the best, most comprehensive critiques out there of the colonization of our small towns by big box retailers. She was a perfect addition to Rocktown, in that she was able to contextualize many of the issues facing Harrisonburg and it's changing economy and loss of open space, within the larger, national pattern of corporatization.

Grant for Rocktown Covered in Harrisonburg's Daily News Record

Rocktown was among 12 recipients of mini-grants from the Arts Council of the Valley, which recently distributed $6900 in grants. The distribution of the grants, which went to individual artists and organizations as diverse as Thomas Harrison Middle School theater production of "Zink the Zebra," to Next Reflex Dance Collective's project "en Route," to Harrisonburg Rockingham Child Daycare Centers for a children's art exhibit. The Daily News Record reported the full list of recipients and noted that these mini grants are funded through Arts Council of the Valley The Arts Council of the Valley, through funding from the city of Harrisonburg, Rockingham County, the Virginia Commission for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, and individual and business donors.