CAPE NATIVE'S WORK WILL BE IN BIG MUDDY FILM FESTIVAL

A Cape Girardeau native had his first feature film accepted into a local film festival.

David Tlapek, a 1979 graduate of Cape Central High School, went into film-making about five years ago, giving up a legal career after getting a law degree from Georgetown University.

After five years of learning to make films, his first full-length feature, "The Search for Martin Frye," was accepted for the 18th Annual Big Muddy Film Festival at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale.

Tlapek was working at a law firm in Dallas when he decided to give up his legal career and enroll in the film school at the University of Southern California.

"I reached a point that if I was going to do it, it was going to be now," he said. "I think I've always been very interested in film and I wanted to capitalize on that."

What's "The Search for Martin Frye" about?

"In a word, God," Tlapek said. "It's about a man who's looking for a modern-day miracle worker. It's a very spiritual type of film.

"It's not autobiographical at all, but it does have observances I've made along the way."

According to Garrett Pominville with the film festival, Tlapek's film will be shown March 1 at 9:30 p.m. in the Student Center Auditorium at SIU.

"The Search for Martin Frye" is one of 70 films being featured at the event, which received more than 200 entries from film-makers around the world, Pominville said.

The festival will screen films beginning Friday but the event lasts for 10 days with film screenings at a half dozen locations in Carbondale.

"There are 3,000 international independent film-makers on our mailing list," Pominville said, "and they're sent the information about the festival."

In addition to the film screenings, the festival also presents guest lecturers and other activities for student film-makers and the public.

But the highlight of the festival is the independent film and video competition.