Homegrown filmmaker screens flick at Film Fest

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It was not always clear that Desmond Davenish would become an accomplished filmmaker.  When he was a student at Riverdale Country School and John F. Kennedy High School, he said he bore the label of an outcast. 

Now, though, after the long process of writing, directing and starring in his own film, he got to come home and relish in the moment, as his feature film “Misfortune” screened at the Chelsea Film Festival last weekend. 

“We started off in January on the festival circuit in India [and] we won the festival,” he said. “From then on, we played in Sweden, Tucson [Arizona], where we shot our film and got some great local support… it’s just been a great run and it’s great to have the support on the circuit.”

Mr. Davenish’s film, which was funded largely by the sale of his own home, centers around the story of a young man coming face to face with his father’s killer in the Arizona desert.

A Manhattan native, Mr. Davenish moved to Riverdale with his mom during his teen years and he said that experience helped form him as an artist. 

“In a way, Manhattan for all its worth is a great artistic landscape, but the move to Riverdale from Manhattan for me was wonderful,” Mr. Davenish said. “I was a little more recognizable to myself there.”

The film has won awards at two major film festivals so far at the Yellow Rose Festival and at the Black Hills Film Festival.   

Desmond Davenish, Misfortune, Chelsea Film Festival, Anthony Capote

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