(Published in FF2 Media, June 12, 2017)

Now in its 20th year, the Los Angeles-based film festival, Dances With Films (DWF), lives up to its words of conception: a festival where ‘who you know’ doesn’t matter, but the quality of your work does. First-time writer and director of a narrative short film, German-born Monika Petrillo jumps into the filmmaking waters with Wink. Her film’s topic sounds a bit unusual—a frustrated and lonely suburban housewife and a goldfish—but Petrillo laughingly said, “How can you go wrong with a beautiful woman and a goldfish?”

The inspiration behind not only this film, but Petrillo’s decision to become a filmmaker was her godmother, Li Erben.  Erben’s late husband, Russian-born French film director Victor Vicas had written a story about a blonde, a winking goldfish and a bath.  After hearing that description, Petrillo could see the whole film. “I came home…and before I knew it, I had written the whole 12-page script.”

READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE HERE IN FF2 MEDIA

(As published in the June 12th edition of FF2 Media)

Now in its 20th year, the Los Angeles-based film festival, Dances With Films (DWF), lives up to its words of conception: a festival where ‘who you know’ doesn’t matter, but the quality of your work does. To the Moon and Back by Susan Morgan Cooper is a heartbreaking look at two intersecting narratives about the Russian Adoption Ban leaving approximately 259 children, 75% disabled, stuck in limbo in their adoption process to American parents.  The reason?  Politics.

It’s a “chess game between Obama and Putin,” Cooper explained.  Cooper hopes that her film can help make changes in the lives of these children and in Miles and Carol Harrington’s lives, the blame upon which Putin placed this ban.

Cooper didn’t start out directing impactful and life-changing documentaries.  She began as an actress and had a small role in a Clint Eastwood film.  However, she says, “I just never had the passion for acting and one day someone took me into an editing room and all of a sudden, the lights turned on! You can manipulate an actor’s performance with timing and a reaction shot.  So I started being involved in editing.”

To read the interview in its entirety, go to FF2 Media

Listen to the entire Audio interview