Time to give some love to our incredible short films! This year we have 12, count ‘em, 12 astonishing shorts programs for you to choose from. ¡Ay, carumba! So what should you see? Why, everything, of course! Seriously, we have so many amazing and wonderful short films even I hardly know where to start. So I’m going to dig in with one chosen by our illustrious programmer Magida as one of her favorites. Patch Town is part of our Shorts 3: Misleading Appearances collection. It was an official selection at the Toronto International Film Festival and [...]

Just one block north of Five Points, across from the Selby Library and tucked in around the corner from Starbucks is a quiet, understated, Japanese restaurant named Tsunami. Its opening less than six months behind it, Tsunami’s décor is dark, rich and casually elegant with a well-sized sushi bar and comfortable dining room. The menu itself is a tsunami of options ranging from sushi, sashimi, traditional rolls, hand rolls, special rolls, hibachi specials, traditional entrees, appetizers, soups and salads. There are daily lunch specials including Bento Boxes. For our meals [...]

Ashley Bell is a phenomenal actress who rocked the world with her shattering performance in the intense The Last Exorcism. SFF is proud to welcome her to this year’s festival for her latest film The Day. That’s right, she’ll be walking down our red carpet. How cool is that? Well, it gets better because The Day is amazing and she, natch, is incredible in the film as Mary, a weapons-wielding survivor in a post-apocalyptic world.  Fans of The Walking Dead won’t want to miss this one! (Nope, this isn’t zombies… its way scarier!) The Day screens Friday, April 20 at 8:30 [...]

I am perpetually stuck in the planning stage of existence. The actual living part seems to elude me. I moved to Sarasota intent on changing that habit. The opportunity to write for This Week in Sarasota aligned perfectly with my goal—a yearlong commitment to write about the town from a newcomer’s standpoint meant that I’d have to actually get out and do things. I’d find the best restaurants, sip the best coffee, bike the best trails. I’d find all the hidden gems and share them with the community, gaining fame, [...]

The paparazzi were swarming at Ringling College of Art + Design during this year’s red carpet-themed An Evening at the Avant-Garde fundraising event, attended by approximately 350 people. Each spring, An Evening at the Avant-Garde features a different theme that gives party-goers an excuse to dress to the nines in their classiest or wackiest costumes for a social evening of glitz, glamor and fun. All of the proceeds for the event, which costs $200 per ticket, go directly toward supporting the college’s scholarship fund—a tremendous value to the students who [...]

If you’ve never been to one of our In Conversation presentations then you have been missing out in a major way. Ever watch Inside the Actors Studio? It’s like that, only… wait for it… You. Are. There! You’re sitting in that audience. You’re seeing these extraordinary presentations unfold before you. You are a part of history in the making as the some of the film wolrd’s greatest luminaries discuss their lives, their work, their place in the pantheon of enduring cinematic wonder. This is a feast for film lovers. Don’t miss it! And this year we are proud to present… [...]