Traverse City Film Festival Opening Night 2011 – 6 by Mark O’Shaughnessy, photo by tcfilmfest.

All week I’m working on the Traverse City Film Festival (TCFF) through Absolute Michigan. One of the neat features of the festival is nightly free movies on the BIG screen along Grand Traverse Bay. On Tuesday night and thanks to George Lucas, TCFF had an unprecedented showing of The Empire Strikes Back. I say unprecedented because this just doesn’t happen with Star Wars. However, festival co-founder Michael Moore asked, and Lucas said OK. That’s kind of been how TCFF has gone over 7 years. Nothing about it, from convincing the community that a festival celebrating film would fly in Traverse City to producing an almost 100% volunteer run festival, has been likely or easy. It has been fun & exciting though!

You can get a flavor of the action in Traverse City’s thank you to Lucas.

Mark O’Shaughnessy is one of the many photographers working the Traverse City Film Festival. Check out the epic battle that ensued and more shots in the July 26: Opening slideshow.