Questions surround film festival coming to Menifee

Scott Mann, Bill Gunasti and Daphne Barak (center, front row) posed with foreign dignitaries promoting the documentary film festival in August. According to Gunasti, Mann is no longer involved with the project.

It was introduced in April as the Documentary Film Festival at Menifee, promoted as the future signature event of Menifee -- a festival that would compete with Robert Redford's Sundance Film Festival for international recognition.

Later, the event's name was quietly changed to California DocuFilm Festival -- the name Menifee removed from the title but two local sites still advertised as venues for film screenings.

Today, the whole thing could be renamed the Mystery Theater.

Less than two weeks before its scheduled opening, there still has been no announcement of the documentary films to be shown at the two Menifee venues -- Santa Rosa Academy and Mt. San Jacinto College. Dates and times are vague, with the promoters stating only that three one-hour documentary films will be shown each day from Dec. 5-11 at each site.

Promises of press releases announcing details were not kept. There hasn't been a press conference concerning the event since August. And perhaps most puzzling of all, no one will give a straight answer about former Menifee Mayor Scott Mann's involvement -- or lack of -- in the festival.

A festival Mann once said will "showcase our town" has become an event that has lost its host mayor, lists information on its website that contradicts what promoters say, and is now spread out over at least two other cities in Riverside County with the mayors of about 10 cities -- excluding Menifee -- involved.

The president of California DocuFilm Festival is Bill Gunasti, a documentary film producer who worked for eight prime ministers, served as a Turkish press officer at the United Nations, and speaks six languages, according to a biography on the California DocuFilm Festival website. His business partner and chairwoman of the festival, Daphne Barak, is also a film producer whose works have been featured on ABC's 20/20, NBC's Dateline and CBS' 48 Hours documentary television shows.

How did they ever choose Menifee as a site for what was planned as an international film festival, with submissions from around the world and dignitaries from foreign countries attending? According to Gunasti, they were persuaded to come here by Mann, who met them at a political function when Gunasti ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Palm Springs.

Mann proudly introduced Gunasti and Barak at the two press conferences and posed for photos with them and various dignitaries. He also was listed on the festival website as the event's executive director -- until Tuesday, when a reporter pointed that out to Gunasti, who now says Mann had nothing to do with the event besides asking the financial backers to come here.

"Scott Mann has nothing to do with us," Gunasti said about Mann, who was defeated in the Menifee mayoral election by Neil Winter after it was announced that Mann faces a $60,000 penalty from the Fair Political Practices Commission for misappropriation of funds. "He is the one who introduced us to Menifee. But it doesn’t say anywhere we are committed to Scott Mann or Menifee itself. He’s just one of the persons who convinced us and showed us where Menifee is, so we learned this part of California from him."

Asked why Mann no longer has anything to do with the festival, Gunasti responded, "He never did. Where do you come up with this idea?"

A reporter than directed Gunasti to the film festival website, where Mann was listed under the title of executive director. Mann's photo, seen there a week ago, had been removed but his biography was still there.

"Oh, they lifted the photograph but they didn’t lift the article," Gunasti said, seeming surprised. "The article should be lifted because that was posted when we created this thing. That should be out of there."

By Tuesday afternoon, the section regarding Mann had been removed from the website.

"Calling him executive director ... the executive director, in my definition, he’s the one who handles the matters with the city," Gunasti said. "And we decided in the beginning we would have nothing to do with the city because the city doesn’t have any resources. It doesn’t have a Chamber of Commerce, a convention center, a theater ... it doesn’t have anything to offer for a festival. So we decided we are not going to use the city resources because it doesn’t exist, basically."

That comment came moments after Gunasti acknowledged the city does have a Chamber of Commerce when commenting on the lack of support he received in Menifee, other than offers of the new gym at Santa Rosa Academy and a conference room at MSJC. He said it is up to Laura Badillo, executive director of Santa Rosa, and Dr. Roger Schultz, president of MSJC, to announce schedule details for showings at those venues.

"The list (of showings) will be at Santa Rosa and MSJC," Gunasti said. "MSJC told us they have their own way of passing it to their own audience. Santa Rosa, I think, does it through email or text message. We have no way of going to other entities in Menifee to reach out to the public. The Chamber of Commerce never came on board because they had their own issues with Scott. Our audience in Menifee is limited to Santa Rosa and MSJC. Other than that, we are associated with 10 mayors in other cities."

According to Gunasti, another city in the county has offered use of a theater and a third city has offered use of a resort for additional film screenings. Details have not been released to the media.

The only one of 21 documentaries to be named so far is a film titled "Citizen Shimon", a documentary filmed with Shimon Peres. According to the California DocuFilm Festival Facebook page, it is "a story of Israel, starting with Ben Gurion. Israeli statesman reveals for the first time ever how Israel developed its atomic bomb."

The other documentaries, according to Gunasti, were submitted by "well-known" executive producers around the world. The original festival plans called for submissions by local students, but there is no indication any such student films were submitted.

Badillo told Menifee 24/7 that Santa Rosa would not charge for admission to films shown there, nor would MSJC. Schultz was out of town and unavailable for comment. MSJC Trustee Bill Zimmerman said school officials had originally hoped that welcoming the festival to campus would encourage student participation. Now, he said, "we'll have to wait and see what happens."

Questioned by Menifee 24/7 about the festival's finances, Gunasti said, "We didn’t collect one penny from anybody in the area. All the funding came from our own partners. Based on that, we are doing a charitable thing for the whole community."

Gunasti was again directed to the festival website, where VIP events including a President's VIP Event and an awards ceremony were advertised as costing $1,000 each for attendance, with website visitors invited to add those purchases "to the cart." A welcome cocktail, originally advertised as a Mayor's Welcome Cocktail Reception, is listed at $500 a plate. Gunasti now insists no admission is being charged for VIP events, although they are by invitation only.

"Those prices will be charged eventually, when we are ready to charge," Gunasti said, referring to future festivals scheduled. "This year we are not even doing a president’s event because there was no time to plan.

"We never tried to sell anything to anybody. They are the set prices for whenever those events take place under those names. We just didn’t organize those events yet. The President's event is me. That will take place when I organize it. It will take me a whole year. I posted it (the $1,000 price) to our strategic partners. I tested it with them and they said $1,000 is good."

In conclusion, there is a festival to be held partly in Menifee, with no film showings yet announced, with VIP events that don't exist and prices that don't apply.

And what of Mann? By being named executive director after convincing Gunasti and Barak to come to Menifee, was he supposed to receive money through donations to the festival? Is the festival being hastily reconfigured after the disclosure of his violations and his defeat in the election?

We may never know. Asked several times by Menifee 24/7 about his role with the festival, Mann has chosen not to comment. It is left for Gunasti to try and explain the former mayor's connection.

"Scott is no longer mayor," Gunasti said. "He has no say in our entity. This is a private entity between me and my partner."

In the same interview, however, Gunasti seemed to name Mann as the only reason he and Barak ever came to town.

"We didn’t do this for any other reason than we came across him," he said. "We don’t know Scott Mann. We met him maybe five times.

"At first, we didn’t even know what Menifee was. When we came in, it was our first encounter. We decided, 'OK, they are not a city yet. They don’t have the resources in place like the other cities.' To bring a celebrity from Hollywood, you need accommodations."

Gunasti was asked why he didn't check that out before committing to Menifee.

"We did," he said. "Everything is in place. People are still coming. We are just picking the whole Riverside County now."

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