WHO
Fresh on the heels of winning the NASCAR Hall of Fame and Wet T-Shirt Contest, Charlotte soon will play host to the first annual Cackalacky Film Fest (a.k.a. Carolina Independent Film Festival) in October 2006. The brainchild of local entrepreneur, Ms. Dutch Stamey, the festival will feature approximately 50 indie films over a five-day period. Its purpose is to raise awareness of cinema as art with outstanding examples of films from around the world. BooneOakley of Charlotte created the festival’s name, logotype, and its first ad campaign—20 x 30-inch film poster parodies of Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Moonstruck, The Hunt for Red October, and Scarface. The irreverence, wit, and understanding of their state and local markets are the agency’s hallmarks.

WHAT
According to the official press release, the festival is also intended to impress upon Hollywood filmmakers that North Carolina is a place that takes filmmaking seriously. “This could mean a lot to Charlotte to show the film industry how serious we are about supporting the arts in the region,” says Stamey in the release. “An event like this can help filmmakers in Hollywood be more inclined to want to make their movies in an area that welcomes them and supports the work of artists.” How Hollywood moguls view BooneOakley’s send up of filmmaking in the South is yet to be discovered. At the very least, they might find Charlotte funnier than they thought. BooneOakley co-founder David Oakley explains the approach: “There was an initial concern that we were bringing up negative stereotypes of the South. Some people asked, ‘Shouldn’t we be focusing on the positives?’ I responded, ‘What’s more positive than having a sense of humor about yourself?’”

WHERE
Charlotte—North Carolina’s queen city, and the state’s banking center—has long had aspirations to become the state’s cultural center, as well. The millions it plans to give away to NASCAR to make it the home of their hot rod museum (it defeated Atlanta in the bidding war, much to the relief of thousands of Atlanta in-town residents) might help Charlotte’s pretensions. The film festival, in its insouciance and quirkiness, definitely will.

WHEN
Festival dates are Oct. 18–22. The scheduling will be similar to Sundance or any other film festival in that each film will be shown a limited number of times—maybe only once—over the five days at approximately a dozen venues around Charlotte. The ad campaign began in May and poster sales (to benefit the festival) began in April with brisk sales. Fundraisers and special events were held throughout Charlotte during the summer to benefit the festival.

WHY
“We have an unusual hiring practice at BooneOakley: Every employee must be a celebrity look-alike. We knew this would come in handy some day,” Oakley says. “When the creative team— Don Marshall Wilhelmi and Rory Odani—decided to create movie parody posters, we knew that day was at hand: Audrey Hepburn [account coordinator Charissa Ragot], Cher [account supervisor Claire Oakley], Sean Connery [agency president Phil Smith], and Al Pacino [copywriter Paul Korel] were already in the office. But unless you count ‘acting’ like they are ‘working,’ none of these employees are actual actors.” (Author’s Note: John Boone looks like John Ritter; Oakley looks like Shrek.)