We recently screened at our fifteenth venue, the Telluride Indiefest Film Festival in (Yes, you guessed it) Telluride, Colorado. Not as well known or flashy as the renowned Telluride Film Festival, the Indiefest is exactly what it sounds like - the "Mini-me" version of the big fest.

The town itself is hidden away at the base of the world famous Telluride ski range, just south of Ralph Lauren's Polo Beef ranch. Yes, he raises beef under his "Polo" brandname. The beef is sold only overseas. I guess raising cows and selling clothes don't exactly mix in the states. But I can't help but wonder if each one is stamped "Polo Beef." I'd buy that.

The festival is not as well attendedas the "Big One", but the town is very friendly, the festival is VERY filmmaker friendly and the skiing is fantastic. We were invited to the festival to be the closing night film. Our second such invitation, (see GURL.com Film Festival on the fest page) and we were happy to do it.

After watching your film, your creation, your "celluloid child" more than a dozen times with an audience you can't help but gain insight into the entire process of filmmaking. For what is a film that is never seen. Like every live performance, watching a movie with different audiences gives you such different perspectives of your own film. Diffferent people will respond and laugh and cry and remain silent at different moments than the audience directly before and after them. It's a very eye opening experience. I recommend it to everyone.

Enter your film in everything. It makes you a better filmmaker to see how people (ESPECIALLY THOSE WHO AREN'T IN THE "INDUSTRY") respond to your creation. As the one who gave birth to this celluloid child, who raised it, watched it change and grow, put it through college (you get the picture), you often lose the ability to see its greater effect on people concentrating on the little things that no other person (no sane person) would ever see or think to look at - or want to look at for that matter. But seeing it perform in front of others, seeing the effect it actually has in the real world allows you to see what really matters and what really doesn't in any film, let alone your own film.