FILM DEPICTING MURAL OF LIFE IN MISSOURI TAKES TOP HONORS

COLUMBIA -- "Tom Benton's Missouri," a film about the famous mural in Missouri's Capitol Building, recently won top honors at the Great Plains Film Festival in Lincoln, Neb.

The 28-minute production, one of 159 entries in the festival, was honored as Best Short Film in an awards ceremony Aug. 2 on the University of Nebraska campus. The festival is designed to promote films and filmmakers in the Great Plains area and attracts participants from across the Midwest and Canada.

The $1,000 prize for "Tom Benton's Missouri" went to co-producers Frank Fillo, executive producer of University of Missouri System film and video productions, and James Bogan, art professor at UM-Rolla. The two spent more than four years planing, fund-raising, shooting and editing the film.

"Tom Benton's Missouri" is the story of the native son's mural in the House Lounge, a large meeting room in the state capitol in Jefferson City. It depicts not only the state's history according to Benton, but the huge controversy his interpretation of history caused in Depression-era Missouri.

The mural, a montage of images from Missouri's frontier days through the Great Depression, was commissioned by the Missouri General Assembly in 1936. Benton, a Neosho native who gained fame for his vivid regionalist paintings, persuaded legislators that the state needed its own "Social History of Missouri."

Benton battled both the heat of an oppressive Missouri summer and interruptions by legislators, applying his paint in painstaking detail. He depicted the everyday lives of Missourians, from the earliest settlers to St. Louis factory workers, from the mythology of Mark Twain to the reality of Kansas City's Boss Pendergast.

The film documents Benton's rise in the art world and follows him through the mural's creative process and the stormy reception it received.

"Tom Benton's Missouri" is narrated by Benton himself, through excerpts from interviews concerning the mural. Additional commentary is provided by historian Bob Priddy. "Huckleberry Finn," "Jesse James" and other ballads by folk musician Bob Dyer are featured on the soundtrack.

For further information about this production, call Fillo at (314) 882-0603 or Bogan at (314) 341-4755. To order a copy, call (314) 882-7794 or write Benton, 9 Clark Hall, Columbia, MO 65211. Home copies are priced at $30, including shipping and handling.