Get a Sneak Peek of Three Short Films Chosen for CIFF

A worldly young man, two mismatched would-be thieves and a pair of curious little sisters star in three shorts selected by Get Shorty attendees to screen at the Cleveland International Film Festival March 18-29.

Film fanatics packed the Capitol Theatre in the Gordon Square Arts District for the Film Feast last night to spend an evening as a CIFF programmer watching 10 shorts and ranking each. The winning  23-minute short, The Hyperglot, is a charming tale that follows a young man who has a unique verbal talent but struggles to communicate with the ladies. 

In second place, the 9-minute Sequestered zooms in on two would-be robbers who wear opposing presidential masks and debate policy matters and cross-the-isle issues. Stars Seamus Dever and Jon Huertas' funny on-screen chemistry will be familiar to fans of ABC's Castle — where they play partners enforcing the law instead of trying to break it.

The third pick is the French 6-minute Dad in Mum, about young sisters who hilariously try to figure out what that thumping noise coming from mommy and daddy's bedroom is. 

Some other standouts that I personally enjoyed were Yearbook, a poignant animated flick about an oh-so-average man charged with chronicling the history of humans, and the quirky French People of Mylonesse, Mourn Thy Queen Naphus about a bumbling actor who just wants to see his bit part through. 

So how do the CIFF staff program the mammoth cinematic fest? Each of the 2,065 feature films and 1,600-plus shorts submitted are rated by at least three viewers. To get an idea of how many make it into the Oscar-nominating festival, 10.9 percent of submitted features were programmed last year as well as 11.6 percent of the shorts.

If you want to feed your appetite for films once more before opening night in March, get in on the Oscar conversation at the final Film Feast Feb. 19 at the Bop Stop with Plain Dealer film critic Clint O'Connor and Cleveland Cinemas marketing director Dave Huffman. 

Debt of Gratitude

Photo courtesy This Is Cleveland

This was the headline and subhead of a recent piece posted on citylab.com: "Restaurants Really Can Determine the Fate of Cities and Neighborhoods — A new survey shows how much food influences the vibrance of urban centers." We've experienced this firsthand in Cleveland. Just think about what's happened over the past few years in Ohio City, Tremont, Gordon Square, Flats East Bank, East Fourth Street, and Shaker Square and Lee Road in Cleveland Heights. And I think it would be appropriate to offer a loud, energetic communal thanks to all the visionary chefs, entrepreneurs and investors who made commitments to these areas that helped bring about their revival and resurgence.

 
Turns out, this is just the right moment to show appreciation. Cleveland Independents, an association of locally owned and operated non-chain, non-franchise restaurants — the true drivers of the culinary renaissance that has brought so much energy to both our food scene and and our communities — is celebrating its 10th anniversary. Now 90 members strong and spanning a geography that goes from Sandusky to Mentor and Canton, the organization sponsors year round efforts to get people's attention. There's Restaurant Week, the deck of discount cards for food purchases, and gift cards redeemable at any member restaurant. Promotions such as these are good for business and good for the neighborhood.

Almost half of those urban residents questioned for the above mentioned study revealed that new restaurants are a top reason for exploring different parts of their city. A whopping 82 percent included restaurants among the main things they appreciate about where they live and a majority cited food and restaurants when talking about the cities they love to visit. These numbers confirm what we've been learning here ever since Carl Quagliata brought dining to the Warehouse District and Michael Symon made it trendy to go to Professor Street to eat.

Cleveland's on the upswing and I believe a large portion of credit should go to our culinary community. A round of social media applause would be nice. Showing support by going out to their restaurants — even better.

Taste of the Past

photo by Barney Taxel

Cleveland has become quite the ice cream town. There's Honey Hut, Mitchells and a few new players on the frozen scene I've blogged about — among them Sweetie Fry in Cleveland Heights and Mason's Creamery. But only a handful of shops offer places to sit and savor the sweets indoors. One of my favorite such places is Sweet Moses on Detroit Road in the Gordon Square Arts District.

The shop recreates ice cream parlors of the past. The double storefront space contains a candy case; marble counter lined with tall, round stools; wood polished to a high shine; gleaming silver spigots; round tables surrounded by vintage wrought iron chairs; and a restored work-of-art cash register. The behind-the-counter servers wear white shirts and aprons, and the menu includes classic sundaes made with house-churned flavors and real whipped cream, milk shakes, malts, pies and popcorn. It's hot fudge heaven with a cherry on top.

There used to be more places like this across town, typically inside a pharmacy. Why? That's an interesting tidbit of food history. Allow me to indulge my culinary geekiness for a few sentences. In late 1800s and early 1900s, mixing carbonated mineral water with sweetened flavored syrups was a common way to mask the taste of liquid medicines and render them palatable. By 1911, there were more than 100,000 such "soda fountains" around the country. The fizzy drinks, sans quinine, iron and other "drugs," were incredibly popular with young and old alike, offering an alternative hang out to the corner saloon. Soda jerk became a job title.

photo by Barney Taxel

You can't buy liniment or tooth powder at Sweet Moses, but you can get a traditional phosphate. I was in there recently with my family and had one of the chilled bubbly drinks with a slightly tart, acidic tang. There are 18 syrups to chose from (mostly fruit flavored, but the shop also offers others such as ginger and cinnamon). I went with peach and it was wonderful and refreshing — all the things I like about soda without any of the cloying sweetness that I hate. Just the thing to clear the palate after consuming a tall glass of Salted French Caramel ice cream, an outstanding new addition to the shop's line-up, topped with salted pistachios and pecans. It was a grand way to get out of the heat, while away an hour and slip back in time. The long line snaking past our table suggested others feel the same.

The Cleveland Orchestra at Home in Gordon Square

Cleveland Orchestra Musicians Miho Hashizume and Shachar Israel at Sweet Moses in Gordon Square. Photo by Roger Mastroianni.

For two years, Cleveland Orchestra musicians have been stepping out of Severance Hall and into the Happy Dog for intimate, informal concerts — and audiences love it. Now, the Cleveland Orchestra is settling into the Gordon Square Arts District for a week packed with free events, the orchestra's first neighborhood residency in Northeast Ohio.

From May 11 to 17, audiences can attend pop-up concerts, educational programs for students and chamber ensemble performances in locations where you never thought you’d see a violin.

“It’s an exciting time for artistic revival in Cleveland,” says Ana Papakhian, communications director for the Cleveland Orchestra. Musical entertainment is not the only benefit, though. “Events like this increase foot traffic,” she says.

The At Home series kicks off Saturday with an oboe duet at Gypsy Beans & Baking Co. It culminates Thursday, May 16, when the Cleveland Orchestra performs at St. Colman Catholic Church. The full orchestra concert marks the first time in more than 30 years that the Orchestra has performed on Cleveland's West Side. Tickets are available now at multiple locations.

The events encourage untraditional interactions between orchestra musicians and the public. The musicians, who are consistently eager to get involved in neighborhood benefits, offered an overwhelming number of suggestions for the Gordon Square events.

“They are very passionate about growing their art form,” says Papahkian. 

Other events include numerous appearances by the Cleveland Orchestra chamber ensemble, a musical collaboration with Cleveland Public Theatre, a screening at the Capitol Theater of the "Orchestra’s Bruckner Symphony No. 4" performance in Austria, and a panel discussion held by the City Club of Cleveland on the impact of arts and culture on neighborhood development.

Papakhian hopes people will make plans to go, and that others will be surprised.

“Some people will walk in to get coffee or shop and encounter the musicians by accident,” she says. “That’s the magic of it.”

For a full schedule of events, visit clevelandorchestra.com/athome.

Raise a glass to Toast

The place hasn't even opened yet and I'm already a bit smitten. I was instantly charmed the moment I walked in the door. Toast, a new wine bar in the Gordon Square arts district, on West 65th Street, revives a 1913 building, formerly a bakery and home, that has been empty for the past 30 years.

You enter into what was once the baker's living room. One dining area has a window seat and built-in, glass-fronted china cabinets. The original kitchen is a private tasting room complete with the old wooden cupboards. The former storefront on the lower level is now filled with long tables for communal seating and cool light fixtures have been formed by coiling metal bands from wine barrels. The bar, positioned where bread was once kneaded and cakes frosted, is made from salvaged wood topped with acid-stressed zinc. The wall behind it features wine bottles set in cement and bricks emblazoned with names of various locations throughout the city: Buckeye, Collinwood, Cleveland.

Owner Jillian Davis — an attorney, food and wine enthusiast, and now building rescuer — contacted the last baker that worked here and brought him in for a look around. The elderly man revealed that the 12-foot troughs she found on-site had been his flour bins. Now they'll become tables, filled with corks and topped with glass.

My tour guides were chefs Jennifer Plank and Joe Horvath. Partners in life, they'll run the food side of Toast together.  Energy and enthusiasm for this project was written all over their smiling faces and apparent in the description of this grand adventure they are about to undertake. The couple had left their jobs with Jonathon Sawyer at The Greenhouse Tavern and Noodlecat intending to move to the country and farm. But an introduction and a few conversations with Jillian put them on a different path. They will still be fulfilling their desire to live the aggie life. The couple plan to raise chickens and grow vegetables in a double lot across the street from the restaurant. Talk about fresh and local.

The look and the scale of the place, and stories such as these just stole my heart. I also like the the trio's intent to create an unpretentious neighborhood hangout where people can enjoy unusual wines, well made cocktails and small plates. Plank and Horvath plan to source locally and feature the best of whatever's available seasonally; do their own pickling, smoking and curing; and combine their formal, classical training with a world's worth of flavors and styles. Everything will be sized for sampling and plated to encourage swapping and sharing. Wines will be from the new world and the old and food-friendly with at least 10 available by the glass nightly. Tonic and bitters will be made in house. Expect a mix of classic cocktails, some pre-Prohibition drinks, and a few new twists on old favorites

Toast is scheduled to open next Wednesday, April 17, and I look forward to enjoying all it has to offer very soon. This venture is full of promise. Here's wishing them well.

Holiday Shopping Pops Up in Gordon Square

A new gallery has popped up on the Cleveland art scene, but it may not be there for long. Double Feature, an eclectic pop-up gallery, is set to open today in the Gordon Square Arts District on the city's West Side.

Double Feature’s two-room space will play host to an array of fine art, a unique shop and various events throughout the holiday season.

The gallery is run by four friends, who came together through involvement with other artistic ventures around Cleveland, namely Ctownartparty. The group wanted to create a space that showcased local and national artists in a fun and casual environment, according to founder Rachel Hunt.

“We saw that there was this gap where we felt there weren’t a lot of emerging national artists being exhibited in Cleveland,” she says. “So we really wanted to start integrating national and local art, and to frame it on the same wall.”

With its attractive layout, foot traffic and established arts organizations, the newly renovated Gordon Square is a good fit for the small gallery. The four partners hope to return the favor by attracting new people and young talent to the up-and-coming area.

Double Feature already has a number of events planned for its two-month residency, including participation in Gordon Square’s “Bright Night,” children’s art workshops with local artists, and a holiday sweater show.

Despite an inclination to bring in outside artists, the founders emphasize that the gallery is “quintessentially Cleveland,” from its prices (the most expensive piece being $2,000) to its feeling of community.

“It doesn’t matter who you are,” says Hunt. “You can buy art and be a part of the art scene. You’ll feel like you’re welcome to just kind of hang out with us on Friday nights like you would at somebody’s house.”

Join the friends of Double Feature in celebrating the gallery’s opening tonight from 8 p.m. to midnight.

1392 W 65th St, 440-263-2254

Salvaging Art

All of the items in Collective Upcycle were intended for a recycling center or, worse, a landfill. But thanks to crafty local artists, materials such as plastic bags, bicycle gears and seat belts have been salvaged and transformed into trendy purses, wind chimes and belts.

The shop, located at 6710 Detroit Avenue in the Gordon Square Arts District, is open for a limited time, from June 11 to July 3. Late last year, to promote “reuse artists,” local artist Nicole McGee launched a pilot store, The Pop-up Gift Shop, in Trinity Commons for the holidays. It proved popular, so she’s back at it with the new name Collective Upcycle and 30 artists. Although the store is new, the name has been on her mind for 2 1/2 years. It represents the idea of coming together, she says, and “taking something else and giving it a new, creative life.”

McGee, who markets her own art under the name Plenty Underfoot, says the store represents Cleveland’s up-and-coming reuse economy.

“There’s this creative force of people who are not buying something new at the craft store,” she says. “For me, and I know for other people, there is something inherently creative about taking something leftover and saying ‘What do you want to be?’ and ‘I’m going to turn you into it.’”

One artist featured in the store converts wedding dresses into christening gowns. Another makes furniture out of wood from deconstructed Cleveland buildings. Anita Tucker of Wine2Wick repurposes wine, beer and liquor bottles into candleholders.

“It's extraordinary how many bottles go into a landfill that aren't recycled,” Tucker says.

She says the store has provided her with a community of artists. They help each other out by saving items others use for art. Friends say her art gives them a motive to drink wine so they can give her the bottle. She even sees customers bring in items for artists to use.

McGee doesn’t plan to operate the shop full time, but she assures customers that Collective Upcycle will pop up again somewhere in the city in time for the holidays. Stay tuned.

Photo courtesy of Collective Upcycle