The Red Baron Draws Enthusiastic Response At Reel Stuff Film Fest

 It was only a couple weeks before the 2nd annual Reel Stuff Film Fest took place that I found out about it... but the concept of an aviation film fest interested me enough to spend 3-1/2 hours on the road (each way) to Dayton Ohio on Sunday March 15th to check it out.  I'm glad that I did. 

 The U.S. premier of the German made film about WWI flying ace Manfred von Richthofen, 'The Red Baron' was all it took to get me to chase down a little white-line fever.

 There were 13 films in all, tho I was only able to make it for one.  But it was well worth the trip.  I'll be planning to take in most, or even all of the festival next year.

 The event is operated by the National Aviation Hall of Fame, and all of the proceeds go to support the NAHF learning center in Dayton.  The festival director indicated that the 2009 event was a success, with increased attendance over the first year, and there will definitely be an event in 2010.

 A little over 400 people gathered for 'The Red Baron' screening.  This is definitely a niche festival that's still in its early years, so you don't have huge crowds in attendance yet.  However, this is exactly the kind of event that people interested in aviation should be supporting.  I hope we all see the value in it and get behind it.

 The location for the screenings on Saturday and Sunday was the Dayton Convention Center downtown. The facilities were very nice, but the screen for ‘The Red Baron' was a little smaller than you find in your typical mega-plex. 

 The facility did make for attractive and comfortable surroundings tho. And, once the movie started, the size of the screen was quickly forgotten as the action pulled you in.

 The large area outside of the auditorium included a vendor with airplane models as well as several other tables set up with info related to the festival.  It all felt well organized and under control.

 The audience pic is from about 20 minutes before the 'The Red Baron' started, and while the seating did fill in more, there were still plenty of seats left over... you should have been there!

'The Red Baron' writer/director Nikolai Mullerschon answering 
questions from the audience right after the screening

Nikolai Mullerschon signing a large Red Baron poster that had been purchased

 The one part of the event that I had hoped would really make it special was the question and answer time with the film presenter, right after the screening.  As it turned out, this was the standout element of the day.

 Nikolai Mullerschon, the writer and director of 'The Red Baron' answered about 15 questions from members of the audience.  All of the questions were well thought out and relevant, and the answers were very interesting to hear.

 The movie itself was well done too. I'd probably give it 3 stars out of 4. While there are quite a bit of flying scenes in the film, it's interesting that there wasn't any real flying done at all.  There were a lot of 1:1 scale models used for close ups with the pilots, and then all of the inflight work was CGI, or computer generated imagery.

 The CGI was among the best I've ever seen in a movie.  But I have a hyper-critical eye when it comes to these things, and I sometimes found control surfaces slightly out of place or a maneuver that didn't quite look right.  But don't misunderstand, it was extremely impressive what was accomplished.

 The movie might be making it to U.S. theaters sometime here in the future. Nikolai indicated that talks are underway right now.  I hope it does,  this is definitely an aviation movie that every pilot should see.

 My experience at the Reel Stuff Film Festival was a really good one.  I've got a feeling that they have a solid concept going and that the future will be good to them.  But the bottom line is that they need people like you and me to support their efforts any way we can!