Gasparilla, Sunscreen film festivals announced

Opening night films have been announced for the bay area’s two major movie events – the Gasparilla International Film Festival (Tampa, March 23-26) and the Sunscreen Film Festival (St. Petersburg, April 27-30).

Gasparilla opens with the Florida premiere of Miranda’s Victim, director Michelle Danner’s dramatization of the 1963 kidnapping and rape of Patricia “Trish” Weir; the case is what led to the legal Miranda warning.

The film’s star Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine, Zombieland) will attend the screening and a followup Q&A, along with Danner and actor Enrique Murciano, who plays a detective in the film.

Other Gasparilla highlights: Blackberry (March 26), which “tells the story of the meteoric rise and catastrophic demise of the world’s first smartphone”; Linoleum, with comedian Jim Gaffigan as a TV science host who builds a rocket in his garage; 115 Grains, the St. Petersburg-made drama about a police officer (Evan Gamble) suffering from chronic PTSD; Chevalier, based on the true story of violinist and composer Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges, the illegitimate son of an African slave and a French plantation owner, who rises to heights in French society.

The Gasparilla International Film Festival includes 23 feature films, 50 shorts, five panel discussions, a high school film competition and more. Find the full schedule, along with screening locations, here.

A Taste of Love, shot in Dunedin in 2021, will have its world premiere April 27 at the Sunscreen festival. It stars Erin Cahill (Christmas Bedtime Stories) as a big-city television chef who relocates to Florida, where her father’s hometown-favorite restaurant is in danger of closing.

Cahill and co-stars Jesse Kove and Martin Cove will be in attendance.

“Our entire community has been anticipating the premier opening of A Taste of Love since it was filmed in Dunedin,” Dunedin Mayor Julie Ward Buljaski said in a prepared statement. “Our business community and our residents welcomed the production team, cast and crew to Dunedin especially knowing the movie will feature the City of Dunedin as the actual location, and the real names of local places including our beloved downtown, Sea Sea Riders and the Wild Iris Café.”

Sunscreen’s slate includes 41 features from the US and around the world within various categories including foreign, documentary, thriller, drama and comedy; plus 150 shorts. And over half of this year’s films were written, directed or produced by women.

Find the full schedule, along with screening locations, here.