John Jay Student Film Fest Moves to Caramoor [Video]

Roll out the red carpet—after an exciting inauguration last year at the , the John Jay Student Film Festival is back.

And this year, they're covered if it rains, as the event venue has changed from the outdoor garden at KMA to under a tent at the When it rained last year, guests were forced inside a smaller space not suited for showing films, student organizers explained to Patch.

However the museum will have a role as one of the partners—along with Caramoor and the Jacob Burns Media Center—presenting the event, which features a keynote presentation by , an Academy-award nominated documentary filmmaker.

Now the committee is excited and in the final planning stages for the festival.

"Media and digital work is progressing in all sorts of ways," said Julia Zuckerberg, a junior and film festival committee member who designed the publicity materials. "I like that this gives the arts a kind of hurrah in our community."

Sarah White, a senior, said she liked tying Caramoor together with the school.

"It's a good way to partner with the community and show our work to new audiences," she said. Senior Connor McCune, Elena Gallagher, a sophomore, and Christoph Sawyer, a senior, round out the committee.

The films

Twenty-three ten-minute films will be shown in a range of genres, according to Diane Nerwen, media arts teacher at John Jay. "The films will be a mix of stop motion animation, narrative films, music videos, animation and documentaries," she said.

And if the films submitted by the committee members are any indication, there will something for just about any filmgoer's taste.

Gallagher produced a stop motion video called Attack of the Origami Pigs, which she said is a quirky film and makes good use of a collection of paper pigs she made in the fifth grade.

Zuckerberg's A Primitive Treasure is a silent film about hikers getting their iPhones taken by gorillas, providing some commentary about "how helpless we are without technology," she said.

Silence of the Lobsters, produced by White, is a comedic take on the Hollywood blockbuster, Silence of the Lambs. "Learning how to work with team of people on making one final product—from storyboarding to writing a screenplay and doing cinematography—and then seeing how it all comes together as a final product was so valuable," said White. "Taking film class opened up a new creative path for me."

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McCune will be showing Alone, an experimental film about a girl who wakes up and discovers she’s the last person on earth. He said taking film classes also helped him to realize he wanted to pursue a career in cinematography and screenwriting.

Learning through filmmaking

Though the film festival was open to the entire student body, the majority of films were submitted by students in Nerwen's courses, "Take Two: Film Studies & Filmmaking," through which students receive both English and Art credit, and
Digital Moviemaking and Animation, through which students may elect to receive college credit.

Nerwen said that learning the language of film and filmmaking helps students to make sense of the world they live in, to think critically, analytically and express themselves creatively. About 65 students are enrolled in film studies at John Jay.

"Films can change the way we see. It can help students to understand who they are, raise their awareness about the world and explore issues they care about," she said. "In the video classes at John Jay, students are introduced to a variety of storytelling and filmmaking styles as a way to find their own creative voices. They learn to collaborate, write, shoot, edit and have the opportunity to share their stories with each other and the community."

The festival will be juried by a panel of professional filmmakers from the community.

Audiences will be surprised at what they see, said McCune.

"People should come to see what John Jay students are capable of," he said. "It will be a fun evening." The students praised their ArtsALIVE advisors, including Donna Walsh and Kelly Wheeler, for making the event possible.

Will there be a third annual festival?

"I hope so," said Nerwen, a filmmaker in her own right, who has a piece included in this week's Green Film Festival in Seoul. She said last year's festival was one of the most exciting experiences she'd had in her 18 years of teaching.

"To see the end product of the students' work shared in such a beautiful place and gain the appreciation of the community, and to feel the energy and enthusiasm around this extension of the classroom—it was just magical."

Tickets to the event are $20 for students and $25 for adults. Thanks to the generosity of the Katonah Museum of Art, festival-goers can use their tickets to obtain a discount on a family membership to the Museum (normally $85) for the price of an individual membership ($50), which represents a savings of $35 for a family to join the Museum. For more information about the film festival, and a full list of films, visit the Katonah-Lewisboro ArtsALIVE! website at: www.klartsalive.org.