If you are anywhere near the Eastern Shore of Maryland this weekend, you really ought to come out and catch a few films at the 2011 Chesapeake Film Festival. There are films and film-related events happening in Cambridge, Easton, at Chesapeake College, and at our very own Prince Theatre in Chestertown.

We actually have two friends who will be screening their films at the fest – Richard Chisolm (primarily a fan of Iggy’s) directed Cafeteria Man, about bringing fresh and healthy lunches to the Baltimore school system.

The best line might just be, “It’s good and it’s nasty all at the same time,” which is pretty much how I feel about KFC and Taco Bell (the recipients of my hard-earned dollars far too often).

Another documentary of even more local interest is Band Together, directed by Kurt Kolaja (the gent who filmed our interview for the Chestertown Spy, and good guy all around). The film is about our local marching band here in Chestertown. The marching band is one of my favorite things about living here. Sundays before holidays, they’ll come marching right by our window down the middle of High Street, the main street in town, practicing for the big event – a ragtag group of car salesmen, secretaries, kids, truck drivers, and real estate agents, all led by our enthusiastic local Clerk of Court. They put on a good show for the main event, and there is just such a warm spirit of community support when they play that it brings a tear to my eye. Seiko was a big fan of the marching band, and would run over and get us to go watch whenever she heard them coming. So in spite of its small scope, this movie takes up a big amount of space in my heart.

Alden has been a big fan since her early years.

And those are just the two films where I actually know people involved. The Festival actually features a great lineup that includes recent independent film debuts from Sundance and Cannes as well as classics like Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf and Network.

You’ll definitely catch us at the kid’s event at the Prince on Sunday (also shown at the Historical Society in Easton on Saturday) – a bunch of animated shorts that were featured in the New York International Children’s Film Festival. There’s also a feature-length animation out of France called Une Vie de Chat which just looks beautiful.

Can’t tell if it’s weird that everyone in the movie sounds totally sexy because they’re speaking french, but either way, the movie looks like a total babe.

Hope to see you there.