Film

Rocky Costanzo expected to see vampires and all sorts of dark things when his friend dragged him into a gothic nightclub one night back in 1999. Instead, he stumbled upon the inspiration for his first documentary film. That film, "Almost Beautiful," premiered Tuesday night in the Huntington Beach Central Library Theater to a sold-out crowd. It follows the band called The Last Dance — the one Costanzo saw in that nightclub all those years ago — recording and touring for their latest album "Once Beautiful."

On the fifth anniversary of 9/11, ceremonies held around the country remembered the lives and sense of safety lost as a result of the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York. Huntington Beach residents Aaron Haley and Joe Dunlap wanted to honor the event with a different focus. They chose to talk about molten steel, horizontal plumes of smoke and pulverized concrete powder. At 8 p.m. Monday night, nearly 100 people crowded into the Newland Barn to view the new film "9/11 Revisited: Keeping Up With Jones."

Do you enjoy laughing at the expense of another man's shortcomings? If so, you'll enjoy "The 40 Year Old Virgin." If you're easily offended by sexual humor and crude language, take your money elsewhere. I like laughing at other people and sometimes I even make my living doing this and therefore, I highly recommend this movie. Guess what? "The 40 Year Old Virgin" is about a guy who is 40 years old and a virgin. I bet you didn't see that one coming.

Director Greg Schell had nearly completed editing his second feature film when a phone call convinced him to cut his movie by nearly 45 minutes and replace the footage with shots thought to have been lost forever. Photographer Greg Weaver, who spent nearly 40 years documenting the evolution of surf culture in the hottest and often most secret surfing spots in the world, had found a long-lost reel of his best work. "I got this excited phone call that [Weaver] found the footage; I had to go back and re-cut," Schell said.

Local skater and surfer Tosh Townend, son of surfing legend Peter “PT” Townend, will premiere his new film, “The Weenabago Projekt 2/Crossing America,” at 7 and 9 p.m. Wednesday at the Regency Charter Centre Cinemas, 7822 Warner Ave. The first film portrayed a road trip from Huntington Beach to Vancouver and back by a group of skaters in a ’70s motor home. In the sequel, Tosh and friends travel to New York City. Admission is $10; half of the proceeds raised will go toward the building of a new Huntington Beach skate park, as the park on Main Street will soon be demolished.

Disney and Pixar have combined forces again to create an instant classic that takes animation to another level. Their new film ?Up? offers equal measures of laughter, joy, tension and sweet tears. The story reaches out to touch the real emotions we all share on life?s journey with those we love. The movie centers on a grumpy old man who reluctantly befriends a chubby Boy Scout. A wonderful montage at the beginning of the movie shows the heartfelt progression of the old man?s life.

They all share a love of film making and for one night during the fourth annual Surf City Student Film Festival, Huntington Beach Union High School students can showcase their work for the masses. There are around 20 7-minute films submitted by students from most of the high schools in the district, each with the hopes of earning a cash prize, said Susan West, Academy of the Performing Arts business supervisor. Screenings of the films will be held at 7 p.m. Monday at Huntington Beach Union High School District Auditorium and Bell Tower on the HBHS campus at 1905 Main St. Tickets will be sold at the door for $10. The genre of the short films range from comedies to dramas and documentaries, West said.

It only took one week in federal prison for Christian Hosoi to realize his life was on the wrong path. He had invented the "Christ Air" trick in skateboarding, had been deemed the rock star of the sport and rivaled Tony Hawk in every competition in the years before drug addiction led to his arrest in 2000 on charges of drug trafficking. In prison, Hosoi had a lot of time on his hands. He filled that time reading the Bible, and during his first days in lock-up he decided only one thing would save him, in or out of prison.

'The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers" is the second of three films the began with the Golden Globe-nominated and AFI Award-winning "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring."

Winners of the fourth annual Surf City Student Film Festival have been announced. Cameron Lew from Huntington Beach High School and his film "Swung" won best overall, nabbing the most points for the night. Ryan Talbot, also from Huntington, won second place for his film "Dawn's Story," while third place went to both Talbot and Lew for their film "Terminal. " Lew's film also won for best editing and best acting/directing. Talbot received an award for best sound design. Other winners were Duncan Boisineau from Huntington for best cinematography for "Copper Justice;" Jenni Rudolph, Paige Sciumbato and Kennedi Simons from Huntington for best originality for "Cupid's Curse;" and Assel Yerunkar from Fountain Valley High School for most entertaining for "Jason vs. Assel.

They all share a love of film making and for one night during the fourth annual Surf City Student Film Festival, Huntington Beach Union High School students can showcase their work for the masses. There are around 20 7-minute films submitted by students from most of the high schools in the district, each with the hopes of earning a cash prize, said Susan West, Academy of the Performing Arts business supervisor. Screenings of the films will be held at 7 p.m. Monday at Huntington Beach Union High School District Auditorium and Bell Tower on the HBHS campus at 1905 Main St. Tickets will be sold at the door for $10. The genre of the short films range from comedies to dramas and documentaries, West said.

Sei Fujii spent most of his life fighting for the civil rights of Japanese Americans. This weekend, he'll return to Huntington Beach to help preserve part of their immigrant history. It won't be the real Fujii, who passed away in 1954. But even in fictional form, his appearance may draw a crowd. A short film telling the activist's story, "Lil Tokyo Reporter," will screen four times at the Charter Centre Cinemas. The screenings aim to raise funds to keep the Wintersburg Japanese Presbyterian Church, which historians have called Orange County's most valuable surviving Asian American site, from demolition.

Last week, I wrote about Leroy Jauman after we visited the home on Eighth Street where he was born, the abode with those two tall, slender palm trees in front of it. His dad, Andy, planted those trees in honor of his son Leroy's birth back in 1924, and that they still sway in the ocean breeze is a marvelous thing: a symbol of everlasting parental love. But the day we met there, Leroy tantalizingly shared some information about another piece of local history that goes back to his youth: a movie that was made by a teacher at what today is Dwyer Middle School (and back then was known as Central Elementary School)

Shaun Piccinino said he knew he wanted to be involved in film ever since his first stage production when he was 5 years old. Piccinino, a Huntington Beach resident who never went to film school, has been noted for his visual effects work with productions like Cartoon Network's clay-animated shows "Robot Chicken" and "Moral Orel," as well as his work directing episodes of Spike TV's "Deadliest Warrior. " His second directed feature film, "The Lackey," has gained notoriety in various film festivals, including this weekend's SoCal Film Festival in Huntington Beach.

Timmy Turner's long-awaited film "Cold Thoughts" debuts Thursday night at Huntington Beach High School's Academy for the Performing Arts auditorium, so don't think twice about seeing it. Turner is Huntington Beach's own surfer-turned-filmmaker, and a survivor in every sense of the word. His story is well-chronicled - a staph infection in his brain nearly took his life a little more than six years ago and resulted in numerous surgeries, including the removal of three quarters of his skull.

David and Zev Brooks discovered some recent truth in a line from the 1989 big-screen baseball classic "Field of Dreams": "If you build it, he will come. " This past Tuesday, the American film distribution company Magnolia Home Entertainment released the brothers' award-winning 2009 independent film "The Yankles" on DVD andBlu-ray, bringing their first attempt at filmmaking into the home theaters of viewers across the country. On a late-night conference call last Thursday from their New York City hotel room, the filmmakers - David, a Westminster resident, who directed the film, and his older brother Zev, a Fountain Valley resident, who was its executive producer - reflected on the gamut of their film's success with fatigued delight.

Come June 15, after the last bell at Huntington Beach High School signals the end of the academic year, Bill Morehouse will leave his darkroom inside classroom I-8 and step into retirement. "I actually built this darkroom almost all by myself," said the veteran instructor at the school, who chairs its Industrial Arts Department, while walking through the film processing lab. For the past 35 of his 37 instruction years, Morehouse has taught hordes of Oilers to take, as well as make, black-and-white photographs using rolls of film - a fading craft in a digital world.

Vic and I attended the Newport Beach Film Festival this past weekend. Naturally, Vic and I focused on environmental documentaries. We saw three films, "A Fierce Green Fire,""Last Call at the Oasis,"and"Bitter Seeds. " "A Fierce Green Fire" is based on the book of the same name. The film explored the history of environmentalism from John Muir's failed attempt to save the Hetch Hetchy valley north of Yosemite from being dammed, up to today's battle to slow global warming.

I enjoyed reading your article "Movie experience still worthwhile" (City Lights, Jan. 5) and also the editorial "Big-screen blues" in the Los Angeles Times. One thing I would like to add as a reason movie attendance might be shrinking is that, like a lot of older people who have hearing problems, I have limited my movie attendance because I just cannot hear the dialogue anymore. With blaring background music and mumbling actors, plus the increase in ticket prices, it just isn't worth it to sit through a movie and not know what is happening.