AfterImage Film Festival opens with award-winning documentary 'Maiden'
The 2019 AfterImage Film Festival will open Thursday, Sept. 26, with a VIP party and screening of the award-winning documentary film "Maiden," with special guest Dawn Riley.
The party marks the official start of the festival that will run Thursday through Sunday, Sept. 26-29, at Classic Cinemas Charlestowne 18, 3740 E. Main St., St. Charles.
The opening night film will be "Maiden," a feature documentary about a group of adventurous and inspirational women conquering their dream to win the Whitbread Round the World Race. The opening night party begins at 5:30 p.m.; "Maiden" will be shown at 7:15 p.m. Riley, the only American sailor aboard the Maiden yacht, will participate in a post-screening Q&A.
Additionally, at 9 p.m., Saturday, Sept. 28, AIFF will present "It's A Wrap Party!" at The Spotted Fox Ale House, 2615 E. Main St., St. Charles. Participants are invited to continue the festivities with a cash bar, food to order, and a disc jockey spinning dance tunes.
Tickets are $30 per person for opening night. The ticket cost covers entry to the party, the "Maiden" film screening, an open bar and an assortment of appetizers courtesy of Verita Restaurant in Batavia. To purchase, visit www.eventbrite.com/e/afterimage-film-festival-opening-night-vip-party-tickets-70311883737.
Tickets for the festival are available on the Classic Cinemas Charlestowne 18 website, www.classiccinemas.com/page/11882/AfterImage-Film-Festival- (AIFF). Tickets are $10 per person or four tickets for $30 using promo code "AIFF" at checkout. Other films to be shown during the festival include "Mike Wallace is Here," "Jay Myself," "Cold Case Hammarskjold," "Lost in Paris (Paris Pieds Nus)," "Saint Frances," "Summer 1993 (Estiu 1993)," and blocks of short films. The schedule of films and times is listed on the website.
About "Maiden"
In 1989, the very idea of a competitive all-female sailboat crew was nearly inconceivable to the manly world of open-ocean yacht racing.
Some said they'd never make it to the start of the Whitbread Round the World Race, much less survive to the finish. Tracy Edwards proved them wrong.
Twenty-six-year-old skipper Edwards, her secondhand racing yacht Maiden, and her seasoned crew not only became the first all-woman challenge to the Whitbread, they proved able competitors in the famously grueling race, besting male crews in their class. By the time they returned to their starting point at Southampton, England, after 32,000 miles of global racing, they had shocked, inspired, and transfixed the sailing world and the British nation.
Dawn Riley is both an expert big-boat and match-racing sailor. She was the first woman ever to manage an entire America's Cup syndicate and the first American, man or woman, to sail in three America's Cups and two Whitbread Round the World races.
The AfterImage Film Festival, a part of the Fox Valley Film Society, is a 501(c) (3) nonprofit dedicated to the role of cinema as a conduit for unique ideas and diverse perspectives. Their mission is to foster a greater appreciation of cinema and a deeper understanding of the world's myriad cultures and viewpoints through interaction with great films and talented filmmakers.
For more information about AIFF and the independent films being shown, visit AfterImageFilmFestival.com.