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Shaker Heights natives debut 'Float' at Cleveland International Film Festival: A story on the rare world of competitive model airplanes

Even if you don't know a thing about model airplanes, 'Float' is a universal story about hard work and competition.

CLEVELAND — It's been a long road for Shaker Heights natives, Phil Kibbe and Ben Saks.

Friday night, their documentary, Float, makes its world premiere at the Cleveland International Film Festival.

It's a first for both of them.

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"It took us about a month to realize we just needed to make the film, and I remember we drove out to Tennessee and we spoke about it, and I was like, 'Ben you gotta produce this,'" Kibbe said.

"Had I known it would take nine years, I don’t know if I would have gotten involved," Saks joked.

WKYC spoke to Kibbe and Saks at the Great Lakes Science Center. A special thanks to Phil and Ben for helping to facilitate our visit. 

Watch the film's trailer:

They were both new to the film world, which means it was a learn-as-you-go approach.

"Oh, I didn’t know what directing was," Kibbe said.

"It's been kind of like film school for us in a way," Saks added.

Float offers a beautifully captured look into a world of competitive model aviation, but most fliers aren't doing it for a big reward. 

That's because there isn't one.

You see, building an F1D takes a lot of patience and pure love for this rare sport.

"It is a mixture of arts, science and technique," Saks explained. "It’s an art form because these planes are built by hand. There’s no kits you can buy, you have to sort of find how you get the materials, research how to put them together, and it’s a technique that takes a long time to develop. But it's really a simple thing when it comes down to it. It's really a simple device. You wind up a rubber band, you put it on the airplane and the propeller unwinds and it flies. So the basic idea is very simple but it takes a really long time to master it."

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Kibbe says the story is about an unlikely flier who is working his way up the ladder.

"So you’ve got an underdog story combined with kind of a young guy. You sort of have a young flier pitted against a new flier, and they’re both on the same team, and that’s who we chose to be our two main characters because of the unique aspects."

Cleveland International Film Festival Artistic Director, Bill Guentzler, says the movie was an early, and easy choice for this year's festival.

"It was actually submitted into last year’s festival, and I was talking to the director and the producer and I really loved it, I loved watching it. It’s a beautiful film to see, and the fact that they’re from Cleveland, it’s really important to us to feature local talent, but they weren’t ready last year. And, they reached out to me and said, 'Hey, would you reconsider for CIFF 43?' and I said, 'Of course.' I sat on it for a week, and I said I could watch the updated cut, which I ended up doing, but there was no way I was going to say no to it because I loved it. It was one of the first films we confirmed for this year’s festival."

The film was inspired by Saks' own experience competing and building F1D model planes.

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Filming took them across the world, then back home to Cleveland, an unknown hub for the sport.

"Yeah, I think there are people who are more outgoing at a contest than they are in their normal life. So we got to see them, through the course of filming, we got to see both at home, how they are in normal life and at the competition. There’s kind of an interesting difference. We filmed all over the world, we filmed as far away as Argentina and Japan, as well as a lot of places in Europe, in Serbia and Romania, for the world championships, and then in a lot of places in the United States."

"Cleveland is an epicenter for it," Kibbe added. "The number of fliers per capita in the world, compared to the number of fliers in Cleveland per capita, is certainly, Cleveland is a stronghold for it."

The fliers are standing on their own right now, but Kibbe says it's time to soar this sport into the spotlight. 

"This hobby is totally punk rock. These guys are going out and doing something nobody’s ever heard of. They're not sheep amongst a herd, they’re doing their own thing and I think there’s a lot to be said for that. At the same time, I think the hobby does need to get some attention in order to survive, and if this gets some young people to start doing it, that would be the best outcome we could possibly hope for."

You don't need to know about model airplanes because at its heart, Float is a universal story of competition, hard work and the desire to succeed in your own passion.

"It's about dreaming about winning and everybody wants to be a winner," Saks said. "It doesn’t matter what you’re doing, everyone wants to win. So, I think it's relatable in the sense that if someone knows nothing about airplanes or physics, they can watch this movie and become inspired to be the next world champion in whatever they want to be."

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The two Shaker Heights friends are thrilled it's all happening in the place they call home.

"I’m very glad to be back in Cleveland and premiering at the Cleveland Film Festival because it did start here," Kibbe said. "This is where we grew up."

"I couldn’t be happier to bring the film home to our home audience to see it for the first time," Saks added.

To learn more about Float click HERE.

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