Ping-pong pugilism at its $400 finest: Paccione's Duel at Red Table (Photo: Amazon.com)

Remember what I was telling you yesterday about the Tribeca Film Festival running in sort of an endless cycle forever, but that can be a good thing if you are a lucky Hunter College film student? It can also be a good thing if your name is Jack Paccione Jr. and your short film just took home about $50,000 in the TFF/Amazon Short Film Competition.

Festival officials classify Paccione's ping-pong obsessed prize-winner, Duel at Red Table, as "an action/comedy/horror film crafted around the ancient sport of table tennis." I guess that is close enough (think The Seventh Seal mixed with that table-tennis scene from The Squid and the Whale, and you should have the general idea), but it only gets better from there, according to a note sent over from Tribeca:

[Thursday], Paccione received $50,000 from American Express to fund his next film project. The budget for Duel at Red Table was $400. "If you had asked me in June what the greatest ride in the world was I would have said Great Adventures Kingda Kah. That answer's changed now." Paccione encourages viewers to "Please have a good time watching Duel! There are too many movies out there that bring us back to reality when they should be taking us away from it."

On that basis alone, I will try not to think about Paccione's arguably superior competition, such as Paul Matusheski's grim thriller Richter's Agenda or the dumb fun of Greg Benson's Coming Home. It probably comes down to paying dues, anyway--Paccione's Misfortune Cookie finished second in last year's competiton. Congrats to all of them, and Jesus, Tribeca--take a breath, why don't you?