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Back in January at Sundance, Robert Redford told a group of directors assembled at his lodge for the film festival that the first year of Sundance he was out on the streets personally trying to get people to come in and see the movies. What a difference 25 years makes. Even though this past year's attendance was down there were more theater tickets sold than the previous year - more people are actually going to Sundance to see movies, rather than the stars. Now it seems every town has a film festival judging by what comes through our email. Even in a down market, the first annual Naples International Film Festival in Florida was a testament to how hungry the average theater going public is for non-Hollywood films.

The Cove was the gala event for the first day of the festival, a black tie affair and in Naples you can be assured all those rocks adorning the beautiful ladies were indeed real. It looked like Cannes or what you see on television at the Academy Awards. I didn't bring a black tie, it being the first day of the snowbird's return I was advised that nobody would be in black tie. Boy was I wrong. Nearly every gent there was in a black tuxedo. And there were the “papillon noir” or black butterflies at their throats. I was wearing an all-white linen suit that my buddy Jim Clark had given to the groomsmen at his wedding party a few months ago. I was the only white albino at a penguin colony.

The venue was huge, scary huge, more than a 1000 seats in an auditorium that I knew would feel empty even if it was half full. The ticket price was $29 for the cheapest tickets, and those near the front we're paying rock concert prices. I thought of Redford trying to get people in the seats and my mouth went dry. I had a case of the jitters to say the least. Needlessly so. The theater ended up being packed front to back.

It was as receptive of a crowd and as big and response as any filmmaker allows themselves to dream. Joe Chisholm and I received two standing ovations at the end of the film but the real kudos goes to the three creators of the Naples Film Festival: Rowan Samuel, Dan Lineman and Eric Raddatz. They managed to pull off a major coup in a down market.

Who would have thought? All the films were well attended and most of the other 40 films show screening there were sold out. My friend from Boulder, Jill Wheeler, now living in Naples also worked on community outreach for the festival and did a stellar job promoting the event and making it a success for the community and the filmmakers. In fact it took a whole community of like minded people to pull off the event. But I am reminded again of Margaret Mead's quote, "A small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." That simple but elegantly beautiful maxim was in evidence all over Naples this past weekend. And it's important to remember the lineage of how radical notions gain mainstream acceptance. It starts with one person or a small group of people daring to take the steps to achieve what once only resided in a dream.

Redford said he felt like a lunatic trying to get people to see movies in the middle of the winter in Utah but now there are small town film festivals of independent films all over the world modeled on his dream. He set off a chain reaction of small town festivals around the world and in the process, created legions of filmmakers working outside the Hollywood mainstream that now have a voice. It's a beautiful thing to see humanity achieving the best of what we're all capable of when we share a dream of a better world.

For the Wild,

Louie