Bentonville Film Festival

It's not exactly Cannes, or even Sundance, but the Bentonville Film Festival is going on this week, so we checked it out. Founded by actress Geena Davis and sponsored by Walmart, the Festival's purpose is to promote diverse voices in media, which means they mostly show films made by women, and a few by men as long as they aren't white.

The first movie I saw was “Stumped,” a documentary by Robin Berghaus about quadruple amputeee Will Lautzenheiser, who lost all four limbs to a strep infection. The film follows him as he rehabs, learning to function as well as he can, and then as he gets arm transplants. It's a pretty well-done documentary that does a good job presenting the science behind the transplants, and Will's sense of humor lightens what could otherwise be a dour subject.

The second movie was “Find Me,” an amateurish fictional film about an office drone (writer/director Tom Huang) whose work crush (Sara Amini) disappears. She sends him a cryptic message saying “Find Me,” and a series of clues that take him across the desert southwest to various scenic spots that help break him out of his suburban ennui. Most of the acting is pretty poor, and the scenes drag on a bit, but the footage of places like Death Valley and Zion National Park is stunning. The story and scenery were actually compelling enough to keep me interested despite the piss-poor acting. The other bright spot was Sara Amini, an American actress of Iranian and Colombian descent. Her energy level may be a bit too high for the film, but she is cute and charming enough that you can't stop watching her.

As film festivals go, the Bentonville Film Festival seems alright. I only have these two films to judge by, but their quality seems comparable to what I used to see at the Sundance Film Festival. The focus on diversity can get to be a bit much. The little tent city where sponsors give away schwag like free makeup and tampons (apparently un-ironically) is called, I kid you not, “Inclusion Town.” Despite all this, the festival isn't as obnoxious as I expected. Everyone seemed pretty nice, and a bit less full of themselves than some of the people at Sundance.

“Stumped” - 3 stars out of 5

“Find Me” - 2 stars out of 5