Blog post written by Brian McCormick, Film, Photo & Visual Arts '12, FLEFF Intern, Wilbraham, MA

Information for this program:

Documenting Iraq Burin: Stories from a Palestinian Village and Witness to Uprising: Voices from Cairo and New York

When: Tuesday April 12, 7:00pm – 10:00pm

Where: Friends 309

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

FLEFF guest Menna Khalil is a graduate of DePaul University, and of American University in Cairo where she received her masters in International Human Rights Law. As a researcher and activist , Khalil is very concerned with ethnography and collecting the subjective stories of people to enable others to perceive places, people and events through their particular lens.

Khalil was kind enough to set aside time (on her birthday!) to discuss her recent work and travel, and what she will be presenting during her visit at the festival.

Q: What brought you to Palestine last summer and what work were you involved with?

A: "I hadn't had the opportunity to visit the West Bank before, and I was quite grateful for having that opportunity through a couple of programs which were taking place last summer specifically in Nablus and also other areas of the West Bank. I was on a delegation with the Research Journalism Initiative, which Michael Kennedy also works with, and we were helping to coordinate that delegation.

I'm really excited to talk [at FLEFF] about the experience ... the delegation had us working on multi-media projects focusing specifically on digital poetry and poetry of witness. We worked with international activists, young professionals, and also the local national students.

We went through a series of workshops at which we discussed different kinds of media, creating avenues which students or activists could reflect their views on what they bear witness to in Palestine. So that can be a slightly unorthodox form of talking about Palestine; it's quite different from the usual journalistic or human rights report, coverage and writing. We were keen on having a slightly different take on the way information is presented about Palestine and having all these stories we're collecting heard in a number of different ways."

Q: Could you talk more about your work in Iraq Burin?

A: "We were really interested in talking to different parts of the community, whether that was farmers, or the families of the boys [killed by Israeli soldiers], or the village council and the mayor.

In many ways that was the locals' perspective on what happened to the boys ... which creates a lens through which you can see much larger issues that are pertaining to the village of Iraq Burin but also to other communities in Palestine and how they deal with loss, representation and self-determination.

We were all quite moved by this kind of experiential narrative and wanted to take that and assist the village with constructing a web site through which they can raise more awareness and create their own versions of the stories that come out of their community and link up with other villages that are doing similar things."

Q: You recently spent four and half weeks in Cairo, can you tell us a little bit about your experience there?

A: "I'm Egyptian American. I was born in Cairo, and I moved with my family to the states in 1996, I was about 10-years-old. I partly grew up in Cairo, but I lived the majority of my life in Chicago. Obviously when the events happened, I didn't hesitate to go back to Egypt.

During the four weeks, I worked ... with two activist groups. There wasn't a form of political channeling, so you had a lot of groups out of this popular movement of the 18 days of the 'revolution' that felt that this is the perfect moment through which they can institutionalize themselves and start to work on representing different political views.

No one has seen that kind of political organizing, stemming from a longing for political participation, since the early '50s. This was kind of a reviving moment in many ways.

My particular role [working with the groups] was to gather stories -- again, because I am interested in ethnographic work. I was doing interviews with a variety of people in the Tahrir Square as well as elsewhere, basically anybody involved in that scene or impacted by it.

I intend on going back at the end of spring to visit other cities as well, again to bear witness, talk to people, do ethnographic work, and collect as many stories as possible."

Q: How does your experience and the presentation you're going to give fit into the context of FLEFF?

A: "Part of the reason of going to Cairo was figuring out, 'How do I utilize myself as an individual who is in-between two environments?'

It was about how to get yourself to contribute as much as possible to both environments and to create an awareness between the two. I feel the best and most genuine way of doing that is to go to Cairo for as long as possible in the hopes of returning to New York with testimonies, photographs, and other media of representation.

[We can help] by educating ourselves on what's going on and also contributing in different ways, such as FLEFF, through its educational, activist, and media orientation, by virtue of the kind of political issues that it chooses to engage with."

Q: What do you hope people will be able to take away from attending this presentation?

A: "What I'm most interested in having people walk out with is a better grasp of these issues and stories from the Middle East which are not necessarily being concluded or analyzed to fit a specific goal of understanding.

I think people don't necessarily want to be preached to, and there's information they can look up themselves on that. I think what's often inaccessible to us are these kinds of subjective stories from people who speak of their experience. That can resonate with any of us, regardless of where we're at, or whatever end of the political spectrum we're choosing to place ourselves."

For a behind the scenes interview with FLEFF adviser Dr. Harris, follow this link.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Don't miss this event!

Documenting Iraq Burin: Stories from a Palestinian Village and Witness to Uprising: Voices from Cairo and New York

When: Tuesday April 12, 7:00pm – 10:00pm

Where: Friends 309

Blog post written by Brian McCormick, Film, Photo & Visual Arts '12, FLEFF Intern, Wilbraham, MA

Information for this program:

Documenting Iraq Burin: Stories from a Palestinian Village and Witness to Uprising: Voices from Cairo and New York

When: Tuesday April 12, 7:00pm – 10:00pm

Where: Friends 309 

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Dr. Beth Harris, professor of politics at Ithaca College, is FLEFF's adviser for Middle East programming. In the past, she has served as a facilitator for events for FLEFF and as a panelist commenting after several FLEFF events. I had the chance to ask Dr. Harris about her specific activities coinciding with FLEFF this year.

Q: What have you been doing this year for FLEFF?

A: "This year I am facilitating two events at FLEFF on Tuesday night, April 12, 7:30-10pm. The first is a multi-media presentation, Documenting Iraq Burin: Stories from a Palestinian Village, nd the second is also a multi-media presentation, Witness to Uprising: Voices from Cairo and New York.

Last summer I participated in an international delegation to Iraq Burin, which is in the West Bank. After we learned about the killings of unarmed teenagers by Israeli soldiers and their impact on this very small cillage, we decided to help the village to create a website that would tell the story of Iraq Burin and provide a resource for sharing current news."

Q: How did you come across Menna Khalil (one of this program's presenters)?

A: "Our primary interpreter during this process was Menna Khalil, who took responsibility for itnerviewing the familiies of the martyrs and the village leaders. Menna is a remarkable young woman who communicates in a way that is validating for people of all ages and from many cultures, even for those living in the midst of trauma. The people of Iraq Burin, as well as our delegation, admired and appreciated Menna's leadership and skills very much.

After our documentary project with Iraq Burin was winding down, Michael Kennedy* began working on a photographic portrait documenting the impact of the boys' deaths on both their families and the entire village. Michael is a talented photographer, who created a very compelling essay about an Israeli prison for Palestinian youth, Al Fara'a."

*Kennedy is another FLEFF guest who will be speaking at this presentation.

Q: What brought you to program this event for FLEFF?

A: "I suggested to Tom Shevory that a multi-media presentation about Iraq Burin by Menna and Michael would be very appropriate for this FLEFF's checkpoint theme.

When I called Michael and Menna, I found out that they were very involved with documenting some demonstrations in New York City in support of the uprising in Egypt. Menna is Egyptian American, and both Mike and Menna have recently studied in Cairo. They have a very good understanding of the context and implications of this uprising. Some of their friends were in Cairo and others were on their way to document the uprising.

Talking to Menna and Michael on the phone, I thought it would be very valuable to the audiences of FLEFF to have the opportunity to hear a first-hand account of the uprising in Egypt and the solidarity demonstrations in New York City. Furthermore, I thought students at IC would be inspired by the voices of their peers in Egypt who are making history in a very profound way.

Menna just returned from her documentary project in Egypt, and I think their eyewitness account will be quite informative, interesting and inspiring."

To read an interview with Khalil, follow this link.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Documenting Iraq Burin: Stories from a Palestinian Village and Witness to Uprising: Voices from Cairo and New York

When: Tuesday April 12, 7:00pm – 10:00pm

Where: Friends 309

Blog posting written by Shea Lynch, Documentary Studies '14, FLEFF Intern, Glens Falls, New York

DON'T FORGET TO DOWNLOAD THE FLEFF EVENT CALENDARS! Click here to view/download now!

I had the great privilege of interviewing Canadian jazz pianist John Stetch about his live performance during the FLEFF Week silent film event, The Last Laugh. 

You will be playing piano during FLEFF Week's screening of The Last Laugh, tell us a little about the creative process you undergo.

The music that I'll be playing is all improvised. I'll allude to the period of the film occasionally so there will be some stylistic references to early jazz. But if it were only that, it would sound boring for the whole movie, and I might run out of ideas. So, I also go with the moment, and play modern-day piano sounds that reflect the action and images of the film. 

How long have you been performing for silent films? 

I've played several over the last few years but this one is the first solo piano performance. The nice thing about silent films is that many different bands and musicians will all interpret the same film in their own personal way. Because of that, there are infinite combinations and results for a limited amount of vintage silent films. It is also an opportunity for me to play a concert that's quite different than my normal line of work: by improvising to an inspiring film. The overall package for the audience is more accessible and engaging than just an all-audio concert.

The theme of FLEFF is Checkpoints, ideas coming together. How does the piano and the silent film represent the FLEFF theme? 

Sometimes there are sections in the film with either no action, or sections where images are inconsistently changing and unpredictably contrasting to each other, so part of my job is to provide a steadily flowing, forward-moving backdrop to tie these visible images together, provide a steady undercurrent and help make the audio link to the present.

What do you wish the audience can get out of this performance? 

I think its a chance to see a collaborative, creative process happen in real-time; they can even have fun imagining 'what would I play if I were a pianist at this moment'. And thank goodness we are going to have a real acoustic piano in Cinemapolis, thanks to Don McKechnie at Ithaca College Piano Services.

The Last Laugh will be screened Friday, April 15 at Cinemapolis. SAVE THE DATE!

Blog was written by Matthew R. Reis, Cinema & Photography with an Art History minor, '13, FLEFF intern, Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey

Who is Karin Chien? She is a rising star in the world of Independent film distribution. I interviewed her recently and this is what she had to say:

So how did you get your start in film?

I moved to NY from California to work in independent film and I just started looking for an internship. I started at an internship in January 1999 and worked my way up as a crew-member for a year and a half. After a year and a half I got a Masters degree at Columbia in Comparative Literature. After that I graduated in May 2001 and started producing in June.

Since you didn’t go to college for film did you feel like an outsider when you entered this industry?

I guess I felt like an outsider not because I didn’t go to film school but because I’m Chinese American and 10 years ago, there was almost no one in the Asian American community working in film so I didn’t know a single person that worked in the entertainment industry when I started. So it kind of seemed like an odd thing to do probably to my whole family. But no I never felt like an outsider because I didn’t go to film school. I didn’t feel like film school was necessary to be honest. And there are a lot of people in the industry, maybe over half that did not go to film school.

What skills did you learn from your education in running a business and promoting films?

I mean to be honest I didn’t learn any skills from my education about that. I mean what I got from my education was a real peak and layered appreciation for narrative. A very thorough understanding of how storytelling works, different forms of storytelling, I mean really just a love of stories that I got from my education. I also got an ability to think critically.

The practical skills like how to run a business and how to promote my films came from on the job experience after I graduated with a literature degree from [UC ] Berkeley. After graduation I decided that I needed some kind of business experience so I wound up running a start-up. It was just a very small start-up, but it actually performed due diligence for sub prime mortgage securitizations. So I found myself in the middle of this industry that was going to turn into a bubble. But running that company was the best producing experience I ever got.

Would you comment on the differences between New York City and Los Angeles and what each environment is like for filmmakers?

Yeah LA is very much a film industry town kind of like Detroit is an automotive town. If you think of LA as a Hollywood driven town, I mean a one-industry town just like Flint, Michigan used to be right then it makes a lot more sense. So if you’re an independent filmmaker going to the studio owned town it kind of becomes a hard thing to sustain your work in that environment. But LA is where the industry is based and NYC is very much a strong independent film community. I wouldn’t necessarily say industry, it’s a community even though there’s a lot of shooting that goes on here and there are some companies here. But film is just one of many, many things that dominate NYC and isn't one of the five major industries. There is a lot of great contacts for storytellers and artists to be a part of and to take from and be inspired by. And that’s the beauty of NY.

To continue reading please look below for part 2.

Blog was written by Matthew R. Reis, Cinema & Photography with an Art History minor, '13, FLEFF intern, Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey

So what are your plans for the future? Are you content with where you are now?

To be honest I think its good never to be content. So I try never to be in that situation. I think that dGenerate films will continue to grow. There are a lot of opportunities and a lot of need for work to be done within China [in terms of] growing their infrastructure for independent filmmaking. So that’s something that’s really interesting to our company right now and something that we’ve been approached about. But there’s still a lot of growth that can take place in [terms of] our core mission which is, to bring these films to the US. We’ve just started to make a dent in the market here so we want to keep doing that and keep pounding the pavement.

Do you plan of staying with dGenerate films since you founded the company or do you want to embark on other areas outside of the film industry? 

Potentially, but I don’t think I’ll get tired of producing. I think producing allows a great lifestyle because it’s very free and its independent and you work in film, which is a very collaborative environment and you have access and exposure to really amazing things that you don’t get in other jobs and other industries. But the crux in the work to me is kind of this intersection of story and political concerns. Political not meaning like democrats or republicans, but just kind of some of the major issues of the day. That intersection of story and politics I feel is my interest. So whether that’s in film or in any of the arts or in another field altogether I will follow that passion. And I predict my passion will take me outside the film industry.

When you started dGenerate films did you have much support from your family and friends? Also did you have any contacts in Mainland China or did you have to initiate contact with the people over there by yourself?

Well I don’t know if my family really knew what I was doing. My family left China during the Communist Revolution so I think that their first instinct was [to have me] not get involved in that environment. So I wouldn’t say that they were supportive. They also maybe just didn’t understand what I was doing to give me any real feedback.

My other three partners at dGenerate films are friends of mine so there was a lot of support from them. They’re actually the ones that got me to do it because it was not something I was looking to do at the time. In terms of in China I knew one person there and I think when I realized that this was an idea that had to be tended to and invested in I flew myself to Beijing, China. I knew this one guy but basically I said, "I’m going to Beijing please introduce me." I would tell my friends in the US to introduce me to anyone they knew in China and when I met those people I would also ask to them introduce me to more people. So I just kind of went through like 2^nd and 3^rd and 4^th degrees of people that, you know, my friends in the US knew. I was very lucky that people were willing to help me. Very quickly I met [some of] the key figures in China. But I went there not really knowing anyone.

To continue reading please look below for part 3.

Go to Cinemapolis to see "DISORDER" on Saturday April 16, 2011 at 2:10pm! Karin Chien, the producer, will be in attendance.

Blog was written by Matthew R. Reis, Cinema & Photography with an Art History minor, '13, FLEFF intern, Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey

How does the changing world of film, from theaters distribution to online distribution impact dGenerate films?

It has and it hasn’t affected our work. It has affected it because we due put our films online for streaming, downloading, and renting. We started the company in partnership with this platform called Reframe. Reframe is a joint venture between Amazon and the TriBeCa Film Institute and they use, you know, a lot of digital technology for their distribution, but at the end of the day we are primarily distributing to the very traditional educational market. I mean this market is fairly traditional [in that] they sometimes still sell films on VHS. It’s a very traditional price point, it’s a very conservative market, you know films that are a couple of years old are still considered new to them.

So we’re still getting our primary source of revenue from a very conservative and traditional market even though we are participating in the digital [roll-out] platforms, the truth is that those digital platforms are not monetized which means they don’t bring in a lot of revenue. Some of them don’t bring in any revenue at all. We have to participate in these new platforms, [but dGenerate hasn't been] effected that much because we’re still making our primary revenue from traditional sources of distribution.

And before you go would you just like to say one thing about “Disorder” and why you think people should see it at FLEFF.

I think “Disorder” will offer a view of China that you’ve never seen before. It has sometime for everybody because it’s a film for cinephiles, [among others.] And it’s absolutely fascinating the way the film is put together and they way the director, Huang Weikai made it. It’s also a film for people who watch movies to be entertained. “Disorder” is really about the pure absurdity of everyday life in China. So it is humorous and it's kind of mind blowing to watch what’s happening onscreen and it’s a film for people who are interested in Asia or China specifically. It offers this unmediated, raw view of life on the streets in China and features the kind of stuff that you really don’t get to see anywhere else.

My thanks goes out to Karin Chien for taking the time out of her hectic workday to talk with me. I hope you all get a chance to see “Disorder” and talk to Karin personally.

Go to Cinemapolis to see "DISORDER" on Saturday April 16, 2011 at 2:10pm! Karin Chien, the producer, will be in attendance.

Blog was written by Kelsey Greene, Documentary Studies and Production, '13, FLEFF intern, Buffalo, New York

As I mentioned several times in my blog entries, I am looking forward to all the events and guest at FLEFF 2011.

One specific event I am looking forward to at Cinemapolis is the screening of Good Fortune, Sunday, April 17 at 2 p.m.  I am particularly excited about the discussion following it with the filmmakers Jeremy Levine and Landon Van Soest.  

I have a strong interest in these filmmakers because they are Ithaca College alumni and I have talked to a few of my professors about them and their work.  It is very inspiring to me that they were able to start their own production company right out of college and pursue their passion in documentary.

I am also intrigued by the complexity of issues involved with the film Good Fortune.  

An event I am looking forward to on the Ithaca College campus is the performance of The Rite of Spring with Gustav Mahler's Ruckert Lieder by Brad Haughman and Deborah Martin.  The event will be Monday, April 11 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. at Hockett Hall.  

The two very talented individuals, who are also faculty members at the college, came and talked about the event at our intern meeting last week.  Their passion about the music was contagious and I cannot wait to see the live performance that will be a once in a lifetime event!       

Blog was written by Kelsey Greene, Documentary Studies and Production, '13, FLEFF intern, Buffalo, New York

As the FLEFF week approaches, my calendar is filling up with events I want to attend.  There will be so many different opportunities to take part in!

If you have been following the intern blog, you may notice several of the interns have written blogs about their top five film choices on campus or down at Cinemapolis.  Since I am studying different forms of documentary and new media in Dr. Zimmerman's class this semester, I have a strong interest in the new media artists who will be visiting.  

To go along with the concepts involved with new media, I do not want to stick to the traditional "top five" list.  Instead, I have chosen four new media artists that I am looking forward to.  I also will not number them because I do not believe I have the right to rank them at this point without attending their presentations or discussions.  

• Helen De Michiel- I am fond of her Lunch Love Community project because I have academic interests in the fields of agriculture, nutrition, and education.
• Laura Deutch- Her project Messages in Motion seems very appealing to me.  I love the notion of teaching youth how to use use film in a positive and productive way.
• Phillip Mallory Jones- Based on his bio, he seems very educated and experience in the new media field.  I believe I could learn a lot from listening to him.  
• Monica Haller- Her project Riley and His Story has an interesting concept and goal.  The intellectual preparation behind her works seem intriguing to me.  

This list is merely a small, categorized sample of the guests I am looking forward to seeing at FLEFF.  I believe every experience I am able to have with the film festival will expand my intellectual horizon.  I cannot wait for the events to begin!  

Blog was written by Kelsey Greene, Documentary Studies and Production, '13, FLEFF intern, Buffalo, New York

I had the chance to interview the talented Robby Aceto, who is an internationally recognized musician. He will be doing a live improvised score for the silent film "Storm Over Asia" with Chris White and Peter Dodge Storms.  

KG: Can you please explain why you are drawn to the electric guitar?  What about the instrument is appealing to you?  What makes it distinct from other instruments?

RA: It's true the instrument I am most often identified with is the electric guitar. When I get a call for a tour or to work on something, it's usually my guitar playing they are looking for.

But now, in my fourth decade of doing this, I guess I've begun to consider myself a musician first, then somewhere in there, a guitarist, and then more specifically, an electric guitarist.

The fact is I play a lot of instruments.  I love all kinds of things with strings: the guitar in particular, in all its many many permutations. It's been around for centuries, it's common to many cultures all over the world, and comes in all shapes and sizes.  There's that element of connection to something age-old that resonates with me.  

It is an instrument that begs to be tampered with. You can change the entire character of how the instrument speaks by altering the way it is tuned. You can change the entire roadmap of what's available with its range and harmonic possibility. It's incredibly flexible.

And this is really just about the guitar in general.  But the electric guitar; it's just another animal altogether.

The moment you introduce electricity and amplification into the picture, it really becomes another instrument. The largeness it provides, the energy, the ability to very easily alter and expand the timbal character of the instrument and the way it lends itself to sonic explorations well outside the confines of the notes found on the fretboard.  It's an instrument that can be approached in unlimited ways and offers immense creative possibility.

KG: What do you view as your career highlights and why?

RA: There are many moments that come to mind: places in the world I've had the chance to go, performances I've been a part of, amazing people I've worked with...

Unless you are the kind of artist who works exclusively by yourself, music is something you do with others. For that reason, the relationships you develop over the years become very significant… the caliber of musicianship, the quality of creativity, the ability to think alike and share some kind of end vision.

So for me it's not so much about where I've been and what I've done as it's about the incredible people I've had the good fortune to work with and forge lasting friendships with. Every relationship contributes in some way to you becoming the musician you are always trying to become, and I've been extremely fortunate to have worked with some of the best: Chris Frantz & Tina Weymouth of the Talking Heads, Mick Karn, David Torn, the always amazing Douglas September...so many others come to mind... great friends, and fantastic artists.

All that said, and for almost the opposite reasons, I can also say that I think completing the score for "Saved By Deportation" stands out for me as a real turning point; it was the first score I did completely on my own and featured a type of writing that was very new to me at the time. It put me on a path I am very much still following today.

KG: How did you become involved with music scores for films?    

RA: I guess I started out as a collaborator, playing on scores by other people.  That's a very high-pressure situation, especially if you are working to deadlines and on a studio clock.

I finally got smart about ten or eleven years ago and was able to build my own production room. 

Two things happened as a result of that; working in my own room made it possible to continue to collaborate with others, but I could work on my own clock and without packing up and traveling to another city. So even though I was going out the door less, I was still able to more or less maintain the income stream I had worked hard to develop.

I found when I worked without someone looking over my shoulder, I became better at, and more comfortable experimenting with different ways of getting sounds from the guitar to tape, and this freed me up to try to be more inventive, to look at using other instruments in my compositions and to develop my skills as a mixer. 

And most importantly, it allowed me to focus more deliberately on my own output. I made a conscious effort to put myself in situations where I had to deliver on deadline, but deliver work I always felt was my best.

KG: What do you enjoy about creating music scores for films?

RA: I like being in the "hot seat" and being solely responsible for getting the thing done. I enjoy working within the changing demands placed on the role of music in a film; the idea that it's solitary work, but ultimately a shared outcome.

KG: How did you get involved with FLEFF?  

RA: My first FLEFF as a performer, I was asked to be in a performing group to help realize a work by the wonderful composer/violinist Judy Hyman. It was a live performance of a fairly large group to a commissioned film with spoken-word component, also performed live. 

Before that, the environmental issues film, "The God Squad" by Emily Hart (that I worked on with composer Bobby Lurie) premiered at the very first FLEFF, back when it was still jointly run at Cornell, IC and Wells colleges.

"Saved By Deportation" also screened at FLEFF a few years ago. So I guess I have a history now with the festival.

KG: What do you enjoy about working with FLEFF?

RA: It's a world-class film festival right here in our back yard...what could be better! 

KG: What are you looking forward to about this year’s festival?

RA: I'm really looking forward to working with Chris and Peter again (Chris White and Peter Dodge).

As you probably know, last year's FLEFF had a different paradigm and there wasn't much opportunity for the live-improvisation-to-silent-film that has become a sort of hallmark of the festival. For the 2010 festival, Patty Zimmerman invited me to work with Anne Michel and Phil Wilde on developing content for the FLEFF online programming streams, which I really enjoyed doing.

But, I missed doing a live performance. So this year, Chris, Peter and I are back together doing another live improvised score for a really fantastic film; Pudovkin's landmark "Storm Over Asia."

It's an important film in many respects; it's the first film to be shot in Mongolia, features some amazing camera work, and is deeply rooted in the Marxist dialectic, telling the story of the Revolution through the eyes of a true believer.

For me, it's now doubly significant, given the disaster that was the ultimate result of the way the great social experiment of Marxism eventually played out; an economic and human disaster of almost epic proportions.

I'm also looking forward to improvising with those two great musicians... and excited to be performing with "Storm Over Asia.”  

KG: You mentioned improvising. Can you explain how you, Chris and Peter will be approaching your score for "Storm Over Asia?"

RA: Chris, Peter and I have done several performances at FLEFF, and at screenings for the film school.

Traditionally, we have worked in a totally improvisatory setting; meaning the score is invented live to picture and is a one-time event, impossible to recreate.

For this reason, it's unlike other scores. It moves almost into the realm of ethnic music; you have to work at it on many different levels.

We usually have some minimal thematic materials to draw from, but only very minimal. Instead, we focus on what instruments to use, what kind of "setting" we want to inhabit, and then in rehearsals, we set about working to develop a group vocabulary and a way to communicate.

"Storm Over Asia" is a great film and I have a great feeling about how we might interact with it. I've also been an admirer of Pudovkin since looking at his films when I was in college, so it's something I'm really looking forward to doing.

The Middle East continues to represent an intersection between the economic, political, religious and cultural interests of the East and West. The conflict has been changed considerably through developments or changes in policy, leadership and perceptions. However, the issue at its most base form was and continues to be a struggle for multiple groups to call the same land their home.

While most of us find ourselves comfortably halfway across the world and removed from any recent conflict in Libya, Iraq or Israel, we are obligated to bear witness and to observe testimony from a variety of sources with the intention of gaining understanding. For the 2011 festival, the Checkpoints Activism Panel on Tuesday, April 12 will present personal voices from some recent areas of conflict for a variety of perspectives. The purpose of this panel will be to observe and discuss tactics of bearing witness. Additionally, the panel will illustrate one of FLEFF’s many strengths by bringing an impressive variety of perspectives for an engaging and hopefully transformative dialogue.  

Here are the details:

 What: Checkpoints Activism Panel: Documenting Iraq, Burin: Stories from a Palestian Village, and Witness to Uprising:  Voices from Cairo and New York.

Where: Ithaca College, Friends 309  

When: 7 p.m.

Who:  Beth Harris (moderator) Menna Kahlil and Michael Kennedy.

Admission: Free. 

See you there!

Blog post written by Lindsay Harrop, Cinema & Photography '13, FLEFF Intern, McMinnville, Oregon

Erin Tustin graduated from Ithaca College in 2008. She now works at the Northeast Document Conservation Center (NEDCC) in Massachusetts as a photographer. The NEDCC is a nonprofit, regional conservation center that works to preserve paper, books and photographic objects.

"It's not about replacing the original with digital format but more about access," says Erin. "A lot of clients - historical societies, museums, universities - will use the files for an online archive that researchers all over the world can use. All of this also benefits the original artifact because it won't need to be handled as much and it will last a lot longer."

Erin interned with FLEFF as a senior at Ithaca College. I asked her how her experience with the festival has played into her work as a preservationist:

"FLEFF was a great experience and similar to my current work in a few ways. I'm not a curator but I work with a lot of curators who are trying to figure out the best way to present their information to the public, and that is part of our process of problem solving. A festival is the same, you have to look at the films and presenters you have and find the best way to program it all to make sense, based on each individual film but also on a greater theme. And I think the major themes of FLEFF and my job are essentially the same - access!

Watching films and meeting filmmakers and going to presentations is a great way to hone your 'detail oriented' skills which are important in my job. FLEFF offers a lot of opportunities for elbow rubbing and question-asking. You start to watch the films and think, 'What are the best questions to ask?' and 'How does this relate to the overall themes?' 'How does it relate to the other work I've seen?' These are all basic critical thinking skills you might not even realize you are developing under the guise of enjoying being a part of a festival!"

Erin is also one of the filmmakers behind Alive and Well and Kicking, a feature-length documentary about a paranormal magazine publisher in the midwest.

Blog posting written by Peter Keahey, Film, Photography and Visual Arts, '12, FLEFF Intern, Yellow Springs, Ohio

I was able to have a discussion with Ithaca College professor Peter Rothbart. Professor Rothbart teaches Jewish studies, music theory, and history & comparison. He has served as a programming consultant for FLEFF in the past, and this year he is teaching a FLEFF mini-course titled, "Cultural Ecology," which explores how different social elements influence environment.

Peter: When did you first become involved with FLEFF?

Rothbart: The first or second year it was at IC.

Peter: Why did you become involved with FLEFF?

Rothbart: I had an interest in film and sound and it was an interesting thing to bring environmental awareness through film and sound.

Peter: What are you're responsibilities as programming consultant?

Rothbart: I wrote a FLEFF mini-course Cultural Ecology. I also previously worked on sound production around environmental issues.

Peter: How did you develop your mini-course Cultural Ecology?

Rothbart: I went back to United Nations’ idea of ecology: an interaction of different elements that create a society or environment. As a musician, I focused on the interaction of different cultures and how new artistic cultures form, including what new aspects are created and what old aspects are lost. It applies the idea ecology to a cultural, anthropological perspective through the arts.

Peter: What aspects of music and sound do you bring to FLEFF?

Rothbart: I talk about music, soundscapes and how they are used to reflect culture and evolution and how sound changes or effects my students’ listening, studying, and thinking habits.

Peter: Are you involved in the silent screenings and live musical bands?

Rothbart: No, I did some of that a couple years ago, but not now.

Peter: What knowledge do you want students to take away from your mini-course?

Rothbart: An awareness of who they are, where they came from, and how artistic influences from different cultures have helped shape their history and their current habits.

Peter: How were you involved as an advisory board member?

Rothbart: We thought about what kinds of movies we wanted to bring, what direction we wanted to go, and what kinds of courses we wanted to offer.

Peter: What does FLEFF contribute to the Ithaca community?

Rothbart: It deepens the cultural experience of film-going, beyond entertainment, to edutainment. It makes people more aware of the environment on many different levels
 

Blog posting written by Peter Keahey, Film, Photography and Visual Arts, '12, FLEFF Intern, Yellow Springs, Ohio

I recently had the opportunity to speak with Ithaca College Professor, Jodi Cohen. She is a professor of communications at Ithaca College, and teaches lessons of public communication, theory, modern criticism, and rhetoric. Before Ithaca College, Jodi spent time studying in Colorado. She has brought her knowledge and experience from those times back to Ithaca to share with her students. This year for FLEFF, she is teaching a mini-course titled, "Tipping Points." which explores human involvement in creating change.

Peter: When did you first become involved with FLEFF?

Jodi: I don’t know. It was after patty brought it to Ithaca. FLEFF was at Cornell before then. When I was on the board at Cinemapolis, Patty and Tom came and the theatre became involved and I went to see all of the FLEFF films at Cinemapolis, which I would have done anyway.

Peter: What brought you to Ithaca from Colorado?

Jodi: I went to Penn State for my PhD and I taught there. I would love to go back to Colorado or to Utah or somewhere like that. I came to Ithaca for personal reasons. My husband was living in Albany and I got a job in Ithaca College. I like the small, informal school, unlike Penn State’s corporate-like image. Ithaca was much more my style.

Peter: Did you always want to have a focus on communications?

Jodi: Yes, ever since I was in high school. Like many young people today, I was interested in media, TV editing and filming, but I’m not good at it. I can’t handle the tension. I’m an excellent editor, but the business of media isn’t a good fit for me. It’s much too intense. I was much more interested in politics and rhetoric: persuasion and political, social, and environmental issues.

Peter: How long have you been involved with FLEFF?

Jodi: Since Patty had it, maybe in 2000. So 10-11 years. I joined the first or second year that Patty and Tom had it. Cinemapolis went nonprofit in 2000 and I joined the board there and Patty was the president of that board, but she had other obligations including to FLEFF.

Peter: How did you become involved with Cinemapolis?

Jodi: Through an IC student, Brent Runyon. He has published some books since his graduation. He worked for Len and Rich who owned Cinemapolis. He was a student of mine and I went to the movies and lot so I saw him in class and at Cinemapolis. He introduced me to Len and Rich and they turned the theaters into nonprofit when they couldn’t maintain a business and they created a board of their friends, including me. I had experience on a board for the YMCA in Portland. Patty pulled it together and I was the president after she resigned.

First we focused on becoming nonprofit. Nick Davis was a Cornell student and he was president after me until he graduated. Cinemapolis was still floundering a little and I became president again after Nick for about 5 years and we really got it together with bylaws and a 12-member board and a community presence. Len and Rich inspired us and ran the theater. But regal was building their new theater and they were bad for our nonprofit business. We were fundraising to maintain and Len Cohen (no relation) really kept everybody going. We fought regal to stay out of downtown. Cinemapolis is doing very well now after all the steps of getting the building and putting up the theater and getting the city to agree and to be there without regal, it all took a lot of persuasion.

Peter: As the presidents of the board of Cinemapolis, what were your responsibilities?

Jodi: I was basically a people manager and I took care of any issues that needed dealing with. A board president is an arranger: manage people, run meetings, plan agendas, deal with conflict. I educated myself about nonprofit and I worked to keep board members and get them involve and resolve conflict. I also talked to Len and Rich and the Cinemapolis employees, but didn’t that’s not a presidential responsibility. The logic of a board is sometimes curious. Boards tend to deal more with finances and not with films: budget and fundraise and worry about the mission. If there is ever a problem with Cinemapolis, the board takes care of it.

Petr: What inspired your mini-course, Tipping Points?

Jodi: I had just read the book and it was the first thing that popped into my mind for creating classes. Most films will deal with tipping points: what caused an event or series of events to happen and how people can become involved in making change.

Peter: Are you using FLEFF screenings as part of the mini-course?

Jodi: Yes, students will watch FLEFF films and read the book Tipping Points and watch whatever movies with whatever tipping points interest them. That will be the framework.

Peter: What do you hope students will take away from your mini-course?

Jodi: Three things: 1) Understand the value and the limits of the theory of Malcolm Gladwell’s theory in Tipping Points. 2) Develop their own interests and acquire new interests in topics through watching films. 3) Understand and have a sense of how they can make a difference in the issues that they care about. If something needs to be tipped, how they can play a role in that or if something is tipping and they want to stop it, how will they recognize that and stop it. I don’t know if Gladwell’s theory will always work and students should be reflective of that. Theory is not truth; it has holes.
 

Blog post written by Matthew R. Reis, Cinema & Photography '13, FLEFF Intern, Hasbrouck Heights, NJ

MR: What is your role with FLEFF. Are you promoting or showcasing any works?

SG: I’m a consultant. I am the moderator of a panel called “How to Get Your Break.” Ever since I have been involved with FLEFF we have held this panel every year and it’s been very successful. The panel usually consists of a director, sometimes a distributor along with a writer and an educator. Though I don’t think we are going to have an academic this year.

It really is good to hear how people got their start. You know, what it took for them to do it and what advice they can give now regarding today’s marketplace.

It’s also great to see these films. There’s not too many opportunities to see them. And boy I’ve seen some good films at FLEFF.

MR: Since you worked on large-scale media productions at Viacom for 20 years what do you like about the more intimate nature of independent film? And how do your professional experiences fit in with FLEFF?

SG: Well my favorite part of the job when I was at Viacom was discovering new talent. It’s always what I’ve enjoyed the most. So in conjunction with that one of the things I loved was going to festivals (like Sundance) and seeing new material.

The first part of my career I collected short films. I was actually paid to do that for a TV show that would put on a segment of short films from the Indie world. So I had a great interest in short films so FLEFF gives me an opportunity to continue that.

MR: What are your thoughts on web-based content and viral marketing?

SG: [Viral marketing,] it’s incredible and I think more and more media distribution is going to happen on the web. The online storage rates are better, the streaming rates are better, and as the technology catches up I really think more online distribution is going to happening. At the [Park School] student’s are studying this and want to be the leaders in online distribution. It’s you and your peers generation and that’s how you guys are going to watch film. You will enjoy film via the web.

MR: Do the filmmakers that attend FLEFF and screen their films rebelling against Hollywood or are they looking to get exposure so the Hollywood machine can eventually pick them up? Or are they just looking to get their personal message across?

SG: I think the filmmakers that come to FLEFF don’t have, necessarily, the Hollywood (type-of) film. They’ve found a way to distribute without Hollywood. I mean they want to make their “art.” They want to make art that people see of course — they don’t just want to make art. So Hollywood doesn’t hold that much *promise for them. They don’t want to get lost in a world of commercialism, which doesn’t pay attention so much to art film. I’m not saying that all films at FLEFF are art film. The works shown are just good stories.

(*Mr. Gordon believes that the prevalence of independent film in Hollywood is making a comeback after being down for the last 5 years.)

MR: From what I have heard and experienced firsthand FLEFF films seem to be like little slices of life. To put in another way they are window's into people’s lives that you would never experience for yourself. Do you find this to be the case?

SG: In town we have Cinemapolis (the home of FLEFF week in April) and Cornell Cinema. But without these theater’s FLEFF wouldn’t have a shot and there wouldn’t be an outlet for [Indie films.]

So yeah these films are small stories, they’re great stories, but they’re films that haven’t yet the made it in the Indie marketplace.

MR: Well thanks for talking to me Mr. Gordon.

So what interests you about Mr. Gordon and his amazing insights? Will you attend the panel discussion he is hosting at FLEFF? If so what do you hope to take away from it.

Blog post written by Brian McCormick, Film, Photo & Visual Arts '12, FLEFF Intern, Wilbraham, MA

With FLEFF almost two weeks away, I'm prepping myself for the films and events that I really want to see. I am especially excited for the wealth of documentaries being showed by internationally recognized filmmakers.

I am drawn to "human documentaries," which focus on human subjects' personal stories in order to speak to a whole, larger truth. Do you have a favorite kind of documentary?

I've focused my top five exclusively on the films being shown downtown at Cinemapolis -- for a larger list of documentaries and other films, make sure to check out our listings.

1) GOOD FORTUNE - a film by Landon Van Soest and Jeremy Levine

I had the privilege of interviewing Van Soest about his film and it sounds phenomenal. In Good Fortune, they explore the negative repercussions of efforts to alleviate poverty in Africa, honing in on the stories of Jackson and Silva who live in Kenya.

This is an extremely controversial subject. We are asked always to send money to these causes, but how do we know where that money is going? And also, is power always inevitably going to corrupt? Do we sacrifice good intentions for the "greater good"?

I think Jackson and Silva have an important story for us to hear.

(Showtimes: Cinemapolis, Sun. April 17 @ 2:00PM w/ Jeremy Levine, and 9:30PM)

2) AGRARIAN UTOPIA - a film by Uruphong Raksasad

The trailer for this film was the first piece of FLEFF that I saw, and I was blown away by the beauty and power in those images. This film shows two families working together on the same farm, trying to get through the season while adjusting to the country's changing economy, politics and society.

This documentary asks, does development and progression always mean increased happiness?

(Showtimes: Cinemapolis, Fri. April 15 @ 7:30PM; Sat. April 16 @ 9:30PM)

3) BUDRUS - a film by Julia Bacha and Ronit Avni

The Israeli village Budrus, with Palestinians and Israelis, Hammas and Fatahs, men and women, unite in non-violent protest against Israel's Separation Border, otherwise known as "the Fence." They are led by local community organizer Ayed Morrar, who brings the people together to save Budrus from destruction.

This is an inspiring story of unification against a common enemy, highlighted by Morrar's 15-year-old daughter Iltezam, who launches a contigent of women that quickly moves to the front lines (father and daughter side-by-side). The film chronicles this movement, which is still continuing today.

As said by a Fatah Party Member in the film: "I felt that, in order to succeed, we had to empty our minds of traditional thinking." This speaks wonderfully to the new environments and new ideas we are looking to explore here at FLEFF.

(Showtimes: Cinemapolis, Thur. April 14 @ 7:10PM; Sat. April 16 @ 9:30PM)

4) PEACEABLE KINGDOM: THE JOURNEY HOME - a film by Jenny Stein and James LaVeck

This documentary takes a hard, powerful look at how farmers are beginning to question traditional practices of handling animals and treating them as commodities. This is a very moving film that will give you the kind "inside look" into a way of life we don't think twice about. I think this is a very important film for us to see.

(Showtimes: Cinemapolis, Thur. April 14 @ 7:00PM; Sat. April 16 @ 9:30PM)

5) LOS HEREDEROS - a film by Eugenio Polgovsky

A look at child labor in rural Mexico, and how it has become a condition passed down from generation to generation. If you watch the trailer, you see it is a continuous cycle of labor: collecting water, shoveling, harvesting, sculpting, and so on. These children inherit these duties and are trapped in this cycle. Is it fair that our duties are determined by birth?

(Showtimes: Cinemapolis, Thur. April 14 @ 9:30PM; Fri. April 15 @ 10:00PM)

Well, there's MY list. I hope you're all looking through the films and finding out what you want to see.

The best part is that we have both the films AND their filmmakers -- any questions you have can be answered the same night you see it. Looking forward to it.

Blog posting written by Lindsay Harrop, Cinema & Photography '13, FLEFF Intern, McMinnville, Oregon

Fellow FLEFF Intern Abby Sophir has already highlighted her Top 5 films to check out on the Ithaca College campus for FLEFF week. For those interested in heading into town, here are five of the films I'm most excited to be seeing at Cinemapolis! 

1: Bastards of Utopia by Maple Razsa: As a politics student, I love learning about areas of international conflicts and the Balkan States are one of my favorite corners of the world. Bastards of Utopia is about three leftist-Croatian-activists who continue to fight for their political views after the collapse of Yugoslavia. As an added bonus, the filmmaker Maple Razsa will be at the 4:00 showing too! (Screening: Sunday, April 17 @ 4:00pm & 9:30pm)

2: The Last Laugh by F.W. Marnau:  Ithaca College's own award-winning pianist John Stetch will be performing live improvised accompaniment to this 1924 silent expressionist film. This is literally a once in a lifetime event that can never be recreated so make sure to be there! (Screening: Friday, April 15 @ 7:00pm)

3: Plunder: The Crime of Our Time by Danny Schecter: We hear about the financial crisis all the time but this film from "the news dissector" Danny Schechter explores the criminal activities that lead to the collapse of the housing market. Plus Danny Schecter will be present at the 2:00 showing on April 16th so it's definitely one to check out! (Screening: Saturday, April 16 @ 2:00pm & 7:30pm; Sunday, April 17 @ 7:30pm)

4: Four Lions by Christopher Morris: If you're in the mood for a narrative film, Four Lions is the story of an incompetent terrorist cell in the UK. It's a black comedy that's garnered a lot of critical attention and one I'm definitely interested to check out as something different from the mainstream. (Screening: Thursday, April 14 @ 9:30pm; Saturday, April 16 @ 4:10pm; Sunday, April 17 @ 7:40pm)

5: Agrarian Utopia by Uruphong Raksasad: Back to the documentaries, this is a gorgeous film from Thailand following two families trying to get through one more season of rice-farming despite facing seizure of their land. This is an important issue we don't often hear about and I'm interested to look at it from a non-American perspective. (Screening: Friday, April 15 @ 7:30pm; Saturday, April 16 @ 9:30pm)

What other films are you guys excited to see?

Blog posting written by Gena Mangiaratti, Journalism '13, FLEFF Intern, Feeding Hills, Massachusetts.

In the last few weeks leading up to to FLEFF, I've taken a look at the film list to learn about what films are playing this year.

While every film sounds like an opportunity to learn about something that you might not hear about many other places, here are some titles that especially intrigue me or appeal to my personal interests (no particular order).

Who Am I? The Found Children of Argentina by Estela Bravo - I learned about the Dirty War in Spanish class my freshman year at Ithaca and never forgot about it. I had trouble comprehending the idea of people being "disappeared" by their government. This film tells the stories of children whose had been among the disappeared, and as a result, did not learn their true identity until later in their lives. (On-campus; 5:25 pm - 7:05 pm on Monday, April 11, in Park 273)

After the Rape by Catherine Ulmer - One of the human rights topics I am most passionate about is women's rights, so this title instantly stood out to me. It tells the story of Mukhtar Mai, a Pakistani woman in the province of Punjab who was gang-raped as punishment for her brother's alleged relationship with a girl outside of their clan. She has also written a book, In the Name of Honor: A Memoir. (On-campus; 9:25 am - 10:50 am on Tuesday, April 12, in Williams 224)

The Bird Dancer by Robert Lemelson - Tells the story of a woman in Bali who has Tourette's syndrome. It's hard to think about how any medical problem, that people generally know about and understand in the United States, can be perceived and reacted to in another country with another culture. I'm glad this woman was given a voice through film. (On-campus; 2:25 pm - 3:50 pm on Tuesday, April 12, in Center for Health Studies 208)

Gender Redesigner by Johnny Bergman - Explores the struggles of a modern transsexual. This film is about a man born into the body of a woman. This title stood out to me because IC Human Rights, a club I belong to on-campus, recently held a "Right to Love" event that raised some awareness about transexuality. It is a topic I think for many can be difficult to understand, so I'm glad to see it represented in film. (**UPDATE** This film is not confirmed on the schedule... More details to come.)

You Must Know About Me: Sex Workers in Macedonia (Healthy Options Project Skopkje/WITNESS) - About the rights of sex workers in Macedonia. As someone interested in human rights, I am looking forward to learning more about this topic I don't know very much about. (On-campus: 10:50 am - 12:05 pm on Thursday, April 14, in Hill 57)

Though I have never made a film, I sometimes wonder about the parallels between documentary and print journalism. Both can bring awareness to a topic, and both need sources to do so. To some degree, you probably need to be objective in documentary film making, in order to be as informative as possible while still provoking your viewers/readers to question things.

I'm especially looking forward to hearing documentary filmmakers talk about what motivates them to pursue a certain topic and how they think as they go through the process of finding and interviewing people.

Blog posting written by Shea Lynch, Documentary Studies '14, FLEFF Intern, Glens Falls, New York

Schedules for Ithaca College Campus FLEFF events and FLEFF events at Cinemapolis are now up! Click here for more information.

One of the most exciting events during FLEFF Week includes two pianos, a baritone, and the meshing of two unlikely pieces of music.

You guessed it! The April 11 event, The Checkpoints Concert in Hockett Recital Hall.

This live performance features pianists Jairo Geronymo and Deborah Martin and baritone Brad Hougham.

Igor Stravinsky's work, The Rite of Spring, will be performed by Geronymo and Martin on two pianos. This commonly orchestrated piece will be reworked as a duel piano rendition. 

Brad Hougham will perform Ruckert Lieder by Gustav Mahler.

The combination of these two distinct styles is a never before heard event everyone must attend. It will dazzle all the senses and, accompanied with visual art on modernist screens, will be a show you cannot forget. 

I am excited to attend this event because I am not familiar with any of these works. It will be a great opportunity for me to learn something new and become more artistically cultured. I am also excited to see the visual art on the modernist screens my peer interns will be helping with. It is a bold statement but I am truly happy Ithaca College has the technology to support such an adventurous performance.

If you would like to attend this event, GET THERE EARLY. The event starts at 8:15PM in Hockett Hall on April 11. Hope to see everyone there!

Blog posting written by Peter Keahey, Film, Photography and Visual Arts, '12, FLEFF Intern, Yellow Springs, Ohio

I recently had the opportunity to have a conversation with former director of marketing for FLEFF, Tom Torello.

Mr. Torello is an Ithaca college, Roy H. Park school alum, who majored in television and radio, and minored in religion and philosophy. He is currently the vice president of University Relations at Pace University. Previously, he was the Executive Director of Marketing for Ithaca Collage. Mr. Torello has over 14 years of marketing experience in higher education, working in numerous positions including Media Planner, Account Executive and Senior Account Manager.

I was able to ask Mr. Torello a few questions about his previous experience with the Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival, as well as his experience as a Television Radio student at Ithaca College.

Peter: As a former TVR student, what were your interests at Ithaca?
 

Tom: I worked in the TV and radio stations. On the radio, I was a DJ on an AM station and hosted my own talk show. On TV, I hosted Panorama and was in the comedy show Nothing Special. I worked the camera or reported the weather or whatever needed to be done. As a weatherman I got some recognition around town. There is an IC TV jacket in the student union that was mine.

Peter: Did you have any interest in marketing at the time?

Tom: No, my goal was to by on-air talent as an anchorman, but when I arrived there were already incredibly talented people and I didn’t have that talent. I had a little interest in ads and decided to go in that direction.

Peter: When did you become involved with FLEFF?

Tom: Patty and Tom brought it to Ithaca and wanted help marketing it; I was in the marketing department. That was 4-5 years ago. Together, we came up with a marketing plan.

Peter: What were your responsibilities with FLEFF?

Tom: We took care of all the brochures, ads, website content, media relations and public relations, basically the branding of the college. For FLEFF, we decided what it should look like, its graphic identity, and how to build an audience. Each year, we had different goals and we built communication strategies specifically for those goals.

Peter: Are you still involved with FLEFF?

Tom: Yes, but not as much. I am on the advisory board. I still keep in touch with Patty and Tom. I give strategic input and this will be my first year attending as a guest.

Peter: How is FLEFF important to Ithaca and to the film community?

Tom: For Ithaca College, FLEFF creates and international presence and reputation, in addition to those already made by their academic programs. In India, FLEFF helps curate a project on water. International films come in through FLEFF. 10,000 people will see FLEFF films.

FLEFF creates an awareness of the city of Ithaca, too. through the film festival.

For the film community, FLEFF is not like Sundance or other festivals with traditional environmental agendas. FLEFF creates a broader awareness of environmental problems and creates more opportunity for film makers.

For example, once I met a couple who made films on polar bears. They had one film that other film festivals turned down because in their film, they said that global warming won’t kill the polar bears--because the change will be so gradual over time---but oil drilling will. Traditional environmentalists don’t want that message in their festivals, but FLEFF doesn’t have that agenda.

Also, FLEFF is incredibly entertaining, a great venue for artists.

Peter: What are you looking forward to at FLEFF this year?

Tom: The silent films and the parties and seeing people from Ithaca: Patty and Tom and other people I’ve connected with through FLEFF. Also, the musicians are amazing!

Blog posting written by Yukino Kondo, Exploratory, ’14, FLEFF Intern, Tokyo, Japan.

We have three weeks to until the opening events of FLEFF!

Before spring break, I had the opportunity to interview a fellow FLEFF intern and friend, Justina Koffie.

Justina is a sophomore and a MLK scholar. She is a health sciences major. During our free time, I always see her attacking organic chemistry problems. Whenever I look at her, she inspires in me  the desire to work harder and be the best that I can be.

What have you done for FLEFF so far and what have you learned from it?

“One of the first assignments I was given at FLEFF was to help sell out the house for Albert Maysles' film Gimme Shelter.

I figured it would be difficult because the screening was the same day as SuperBowl Sunday. To complete this task I used a lot of the information in class to find the target audience. I invited friends who would be interested in the screening.

Turns out it was a huge success and we sold out the house!

What I didn't know about FLEFF was that the festival is HUGE in Asia and India. I also didn't know that while the festival is about the environment, the environment could be anything from  a social to any type of cultural environment.

Through FLEFF, I learned it takes a lot of marketing, creative thinking, and man-power. Behind the scenes we need a good amount of these three forces to have the festival running smoothly.”

Spring break is unfortunately not over and this means, FLEFF is coming up soon.

I hope all of you are excited. And I hope the excitement will overshadow the disappointing snowy weather of Ithaca.

What have you learned so far about FLEFF?

Blog posting written by Shawn Steiner, Film and Photography ’14, FLEFF Blogger, Elkridge, Maryland

Welcome back FLEFFers. Here is a new FLEFF scoop!

I had the opportunity to talk to Rodrigo Brandão, the director of promotions for Kino Lorber Inc., an international film distributor. He also happens to be an Ithaca College alum.

Rodrigo at Ithaca College

Shawn Steiner: How did you enjoy your experience at IC as an undergrad? Especially your time spent as Dr. Zimmermann’s projectionist.

Rodrigo Brandão: My experience at IC was truly fantastic and not simply because I was living abroad for the first time in my life. The idea that all of sudden (and with relative ease), I could take classes in several departments and also explore different theoretical practices, technologies and fields was completely new to me. And it really changed my relationship with work and cinema. 

Luckily, I was able to transfer some credits from my college time in Brazil, and that gave me the liberty to reach for a double-major (in Cinema and Art History) and also take several film production and film theory classes. So I feel like I made the best out of that experience. 

And on top of that, I got that great projectionist gig right on my first year... It was just great to have an excuse to see Battleship Potemkin, Buster Keaton's The General and all those Chris Marker films again and again and again.

Repetitive viewing is how you really connect to some of these dense works, and I have to thank Patty Zimmermann for trusting me to work for her during those years.    

Rodrigo at Kino Lorber

SS: What company do you work for and what do they do?

RB: I work for Kino Lorber Inc, a film distribution company based in NY that specializes in foreign films, classic titles and some avant-garde work.

I am responsible for the company's publicity and communications departments, and on top of that, try to attend some US and International film festivals (as much as possible) to help my bosses find new and exciting works. 

It's a challenging job, especially because I'm often responsible for how our films are perceived in the media - and specially, among critics. And I am always dealing with indie filmmakers too, and I see up-close how they pour their hearts onto these films.... So I feel a certain degree of responsibility towards them.

But frankly, I wouldn't want to see films just as products... 

SS: As a distribution company would you feel that your role is extremely important to the current film industry?

RB: The role of the "film distributor" is changing violently these days, and even more rapidly now than five or eight years ago.

So, I do feel that the role of the distributor is important, but I also feel like more and more, we are being asked to re-invent ourselves-- and also, to justify our roles and choices as gatekeepers.

The economy is making people re-think their spending habits, old networks of distribution are falling apart, new technologies are resisting old forms of monetization, and what may be the most important point here, our relationship with cinema and media is changing.

The ways in which we create value around our films are different now, and the whole relationship among critics, academics, industry and audiences is so different than it used to be.

The questions of how we create value, and then, how to communicate the importance of these works to different audiences, has never been more important. And frankly, sometimes we learn by mistakes.

Rodrigo on His Current Work

SS: What have you done recently that you can talk about?

RB: Well, I am doing a lot of different things right now, but maybe the hardest thing I am "doing" right now is to sort of re-invent my job.

I used to have this script about how to promote a film, that usually started with a film getting a modest theatrical release and then, expanding to other markets and finally, ending up on DVD. Now, there are dozens of ways to release a film in the market, and the press has also become less scripted.

Different outlets now have different interest and priorities, and new technology is becoming such a major part of my job... So, I often find myself having to re-invent the wheel---as I'm driving the car! 

I just came back from SXSW and frankly, it's always amazing to see how new media, cinema, coding, design, and music are fusing into these hybrid artistic and commercial forms.

Ten years ago, it looked like the business community was taking over the film world. Nowadays, the indie/foreign film distribution scene is made of great film academics who can write HTML5, CSS3, PHP and Javascript! Seriously...

SS: What film(s) are you currently promoting?

RB: Right now, I am promoting a Danish war documentary called Armadillo, a German film about a famous Spanish restaurant called El Bulli, and a Chinese film about the raping of Nanking called City of Life and Death.

Rodrigo at FLEFF

SS: Having been to FLEFF before what do you think of the programming/topic for this year?

RB: I like that FLEFF thinks outside the box when it comes to its categories, especially because this way, the categories themselves (and the context in which the films are presented) become part of the film experience. That way, we already walk into the theater asking questions.

In a much less exciting and daring way, that's kind of what I do at Kino Lorber: I'm always trying to push audiences to interpret, discuss and engage with our films. I also think that the idea of checkpoints evokes a multitude of feelings, from reflection to resistance and struggle.

It's both a powerful image and crippling idea, and one that makes us realize the collective and constantly shifting nature of our modern lives. It makes me think that "stopping" is sometimes important and necessary.

And yet, it reminds me that "checking," or even simply naming and categorizing, can be a powerful form of oppression.

SS: Are you excited for FLEFF? Anything specific?

RB: I am super excited about finally seeing A Film Unfinished, Budrus, Los Herderos, Pueblos Unidos: Swine Flu Ground Zero in Mexico and Sex in An Epidemic. 

SS: Will you be in attendance for FLEFF 2011?

RB: Yes! And I can’t wait!

* * * * * * * *

I would like to thank Mr. Rodrigo Brandão for his time.

This very modest man does a lot in the film world. I am glad he was able to spare some of his knowledge with us. He raises some incredible points. I hope that you enjoyed reading these responses as much as I did.

And better yet. He will be joining us at FLEFF!

There was one point Mr. Brandão made that I would like to talk about. He said he “wouldn’t want to see films just as products.” Do you think that currently we are moving in a direction where film is becoming more of a product and less of an art?

Blog posting written by Gena Mangiaratti, Journalism '13, FLEFF Intern, Feeding Hills, Massachusetts.

Dr. Tanya Saunders, assistant provost of the college and executive producer of FLEFF, met with me in her office to talk about her role in FLEFF, discuss the definition of sustainability as it relates to the festival, and share her hopes for this year’s festival with its theme of Checkpoints.

Dr. Saunders also talked about how the festival was able to go on last year with its two directors abroad, and how the virtual accommodations made in order to run the festival ended up expanding the online aspect of the festival for future years.

GM: FLEFF began in 1997 out of the Center for the Environment at Cornell University, and moved to Ithaca College in 2005. Can you talk about the transition in bringing FLEFF over from Cornell? How did the festival change?

TS: [In 2004] we did most of FLEFF, but it was still associated with Cornell…Then the next year when the former provost, Peter Bardaglio, announced that sustainability would be a driving force at the college, we saw the benefit of bringing FLEFF to Ithaca College.

We asked Dr. Zimmermann and Dr. Shevory if they would take on the responsibility for putting an Ithaca College stamp on FLEFF so it wasn’t just a continuation of what was happening at Cornell, but more in keeping with what we understood sustainability to mean.

I would say that while FLEFF was at Cornell it was more about the environment in a very narrow sense. When it came to Ithaca College we began to use the UNESCO definition of sustainability which is more comprehensive and more concerned about interrelationships among different systems, meaning: the environmental, the human, the corporate — how all of these considerations impinge on the other and determine how we live.

GM: Can you tell me more about the way FLEFF approaches the definition of sustainability? I’ve noticed a lot of the films at FLEFF have to do with human rights topics.

TS: Exactly. We think that human rights are part of the issue of sustainability and the environment. If you look at which people live in pristine environments, which people live in polluted environments — it all has to do with human rights as well as environmental rights and animal rights. They’re all interrelated; you can’t divorce one from the other, at least in our opinion.

GM: What is your role as executive producer of the festival?

TS: My role is to make things happen that need to happen in order for FLEFF to be successful. I know that that’s a very broad statement, but FLEFF is something that was new to the college as an annual campus-wide experience.

We had to secure funding. We had to secure support from various units of the college. We had to assess what we were doing every year and brainstorm about what we should improve and do the next year – How do you incorporate students so that they feel that they’re a part of FLEFF? How do you involve faculty from five different schools in FLEFF?

All of these were new for the college, this whole notion of interdisciplinarity that wasn’t limited to the vision of any one school.

So my job was to work with the rest of the FLEFF team to make sure that we were always moving forward, always improving upon what we had done the previous year, and then strategizing how to make FLEFF respond as well as it could to the institutional mission. We wanted FLEFF to be not just an interdisciplinary initiative, but an international one as well.

GM: How do you go about making FLEFF an international initiative?

TS: By the films that we show, by the speakers we bring to campus. Frankly, last year with the open space theme that we identified, and the virtual FLEFF that we offered, we became more aware of the greater potential to have FLEFF be as international as it was interdisciplinary.

So in a way, you could say that the Fulbright awards that took Dr. Zimmermann to Singapore and Dr. Shevory to Mongolia forced us to think about FLEFF as more than an on-campus experience. It’s anchored on campus, but it has a broader reach, if you will, that is national and international.

Social media gave us that realization. Now, what we’re trying to do is to build that or expand that international reach even as we strengthen our anchor on campus.

GM: Can you talk about the role social media played in helping to continue FLEFF when both Dr. Zimmermann and Dr. Shevory were abroad?

TS: We use blogging. We used streaming…I remember Tom Torello* sitting with all of us saying that you can’t have a year where there is no FLEFF. We’ve built this momentum, and now just because Dr. Zimmermann and Dr. Shevory are going to be on sabbatical doesn’t mean that we say OK, we’re going to suspend FLEFF for a year.

So we were forced to think about: Well, what would a virtual FLEFF look like? And how could we use the network and the computer to maintain FLEFF’s presence, yet still involve students and faculty in what we were doing?

Even though we had had blogs and things of that sort before, they were not as integral to how we were presenting FLEFF. We were leading with what happened on campus or downtown at Cinemapolis. Now, we realize that virtual FLEFF was just as important to our goals as the physically present FLEFF.

So we had Open Space, and I think Open Space was a metaphor for how we were viewing FLEFF: There’s no horizons, so-to-speak, to limit us in our understanding of what FLEFF could do and how FLEFF could engage the international community in the conversations that we were trying to initiate on the home campus.

I would say that FLEFF became even more interactive in an international sense because blogs allowed voices from overseas to log in and comment and participate.

(*Tom Torello was formerly the director of marketing for FLEFF and the executive director of marketing communications at Ithaca College. He has since taken the position of vice president of university relations at Pace University.)

GM: How do you think this film festival can apply to the interests of everyone at the college, particularly outside of film and communications students?

TS: We’re all citizens of this world, and presumably, we’re all interested in justice. We all have self-interest in protecting the environment. We all have self-interest in protecting human rights — if not for others, at least for ourselves. Therefore, to that extent, we are all involved.

I guess it means, too, that we have to think about FLEFF as more than a film festival. It isn’t just a film festival that only appeals to film majors, because it’s not the medium that is important to us, but the content. The content is the source of dialogue and interaction.

For film majors, the medium may be important to the extent that the message is delivered through film. But remember, we also have art installations. We also have guest lecturers. We have multimedia contests. [Last year] we had “Compose Open Space,” which was about music. The interaction of these different media helps us convey whatever the theme is of FLEFF that particular year.

So I guess you could say: Is this a conflict between form and content? — I would say it’s a false conflict, because we’re leading with the notion sustainability; we’re not leading with the notion of film.

It just so happens that we took the name of the Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival, because it already had an established identity. We continued with that name rather than changing it to something else and then having to create a new identity for that new name.

So that also leaves us always having to say: FLEFF is more than a film festival.

GM: What are your hopes for this year’s festival?

TS: I would like to hear people talking about FLEFF and the idea of Checkpoints beyond the week of the festival.

Last year we had one theme. Before, in previous FLEFF programs, we had four themes. Last year, because Patty was in Singapore and Tom was in Mongolia, we chose one theme and decided to explore that in depth.

Then that was so successful we decided to only have one theme this year, and then look at Checkpoints as it is expressed in various aspects of our lives, whether the checkpoint is going though security when you cross the border, or some boundary that limits you — in other words, various interpretations of the notion of Checkpoints as they govern the way we live.

Every year we reflect back on what went well. We try to identify: Well, why did it go well? We also look at what did not go well, and why — What could we do to improve? So it is a continuous assessment and improvement process involved in FLEFF.

Blog posting written by Gena Mangiaratti, Journalism '13, FLEFF Intern, Feeding Hills, Massachusetts.

Q&A with FLEFF intern Kristin Sargoy, Cinema and Photography ‘14

GM: What got you interested in your major?

KS: I probably got interested in Cinema and Photography because of my cousin, who’s like my big sister. She’s 7 years older than me. She lives in the city; I live on Long Island. So I used to go visit her, and she would take me to some of her cinema classes and stuff like that.

She was also an assistant manager at IFC (the Independent Film Channel) so I used to go and help her.

She brought me up in the projectionist booth a lot so I know how to project, which is cool. She taught how to use the 35 mm projector without completely destroying the film.

GM: Did you have any opportunities in high school that encouraged your interest in film?

KS: I took film appreciation in 11th grade. We had this film appreciation class and my teacher was amazing. We got really close. I think that’s what really really made me decide.

It was the SATs and college time when you’re thinking about it, and I was like —I think I want to major in film, I love this. That was the final thing that did it.

[The class] was a lot like Dr. Zimmermann’s class, watching movies and analyzing them, but it was more mainstream stuff.

GM: So when you say analyzing movies, was it kind of like you would discuss and analyze a book in class?

KS: It was basically exactly like that — picking apart a book, but it was a movie. And also just enjoying a movie.

GM: How has your experience as a FLEFF intern been so far?

KS: It’s been pretty good. I probably would not have known about the Alfred Maysles “Gimme Shelter” [event] if it wasn’t for being an intern, and I’m really glad I went to that. That was awesome.

Hearing the filmmaker talk about his work gives you an entirely new perspective on it. Because if you’re just looking at it it’s like, ‘oh, he’s just standing on a stage holding a camera’ – No, it’s really difficult. He told us stories about what happened when the camera wasn’t there, and that was really interesting.

GM: Is there anything in particular you’ve learned from working for FLEFF that you hadn’t known before?

KS: Probably the thing I’ve learned most from it is how a movie theater is run. I’ve learned more about event-planning and how intricate and how scheduled things have to be.

When you go to an event you don’t really think about it too much. You’re just like, ‘Oh, this is happening now, this is happening later’ — but it requires a lot of planning.

GM: Do you have a favorite movie?

KS: That’s so hard.

The first movie I remember being really wowed by —like, every aspect of this movie was incredible — was American Beauty… It was more so I couldn’t find something that I didn’t like about it:

The cinematography was great. Kevin Spacey is great in everything that he does, ever. When I saw it, I think it was unlike anything I had ever seen before. I think that’s what really got me.

This past week, I spoke with Phil Wilde, FLEFF producer, Internship Coordinator (my boss!), and coprincipal of Insights International. We talked about the unique atmosphere of the festival, the various interpretations of the term "Environment" as well as our shared enthusiasm for soul music. Phil has been active in the festival since its inception and expressed excitement for the upcoming events.   

Evan Johnson: What are some of your responsibilities as FLEFF Intern Coordinator and have their roles or responsibilities changed this year?

Phil Wilde: What we tried to do this year was to create some teams that would allow people a lot of flexibility. If someone has a class one night - someone else can pick up the slack. It's a task where assigning someone a job in Februrary that needs to be done in April is a very difficult thing to do so having a team that's assigned the project means there's a flexibility to get the job done   

EJ: Recently, you told me about the appeal of "the big city" and a much more rural environment. Could you tell me more about why they appeal to you? 

PW: It's not what they have in common, it's more of what's different between the two. The idea of the environment is really based on where you are. So a "city' person will have a different view of the environment than a "country" person and that's something that FLEFF really plays with - the different environments people find themselves in.

EJ: The interpretations of "environment" is something that FLEFF does a terrific job of analyzing. As the festival has grown in success and popularity, how has FLEFF changed its interpretation of the term?

PW: FLEFF was very much involved in activism and the green movement at Cornell. What's become unique about FLEFF is that the kind of people who are now helping the program have a very deep around the cultural issues around the environment. Not just if we have enough air to breath but what will get us there through cultural understanding.

EJ: As an organizer, what drew you to the festival?

PW: One of the reasons i gravitated towards working with FLEFF is that I'm very conscious of people's environmental perception. It's what I studied in college and what I studied in grad school. What I tend to make films about are people's perceptions of their environment. Whether it's a person in the disabled community, urban-rural issues, or farming, food and putting food on the table. I'm always interested in people's personal perspective and I try very hard not to prejudge. And that's what FLEFF tends to be.

EJ: What are some different perspectives audiences can expect this year at FLEFF?

PW: I think its very similar to previous years only in that the films are not typical environmental films. People would have a hard time calling some of the films "environmental films." But the perspective of the people who are programming it have brought a good enough explanation so that we'll understand those things.

EJ: Are there any long term plans you have for FLEFF outside of the Ithaca area?

PW: I really don't think there's a need to address that. If it grows in the same way it's been growing then I don't think it needs to leave the Ithaca area. Maybe something in the city that shows us off - but I think we're doing quite alot by having it here at Ithaca College.    

EJ: What is the best part about having FLEFF interns?

PW: It's absolutely their ethusiasm. I know what they're about to experience and how much they'll enjoy it. Some people have no idea what we're about to do - others have seen it last year or the year before but it's always an amazing event when it happens because people find a common bond after watching all these films.      

Blog was written by Brian McCormick, Film, Photo & Visual Arts, '12, FLEFF intern, Wilbraham, MA.

I recently had the opportunity to speak with FLEFF filmmaker Landon Van Soest, an Ithaca College alumn (‘04), who is screening his documentary “Good Fortune”  at FLEFF 2011. As the film’s director/producer, Van Soest works alongside partner producer/editor Jeremy Levine. Together, they operate their own production company, Transient Pictures.

Prior to making “Good Fortune,” Van Soest was a film major at Ithaca College, where he produced the award-winning documentary “Walking the Line.”

Van Soest was able to travel extensively while in college, including participation in a SIT study abroad program in Kenya where he lived with local families. His witness to the extreme poverty there inspired him to return to Kenya on a Fulbright grant to learn more about international development. In Kenya, he talked to people whose lives made more difficult--rather than improved-- by the influx of international aid and development. This observation led him to produce his next film, "Good Fortune."

Q: What is "Good Fortune" about?

A: "Good Fortune is about the unintended consequences of large scale international aid projects that are imposed on African communities. The film follows two very different approaches to development aid projects with strikingly similar outcomes."

Q: Can you talk about the film's subjects, Jackson and Silva?

A: "Jackson is a farmer in a rural area of who's home is being flooded by an American corporation intent on stimulating commercial agriculture in the region. Silva works as a midwife in Nairobi's largest slum, where UN Habitat has launched a major 'slum-upgrading' project.

In both cases the development organizations aim to address poverty and improve the lifestyles of the community, but for people like Jackson and Silva, the projects threaten to destroy their homes and livelihoods."

Q: How long did it take to make "Good Fortune"?

A: “There were a couple of moments where we were really on edge, but overall it went surprisingly smooth, albeit a slow process. From start to finish it’s taken about four years, with about three years of shooting.”

Q: What are your influences as a documentary filmmaker?

A: "I'm influenced by so many things its hard to know where to start.

The great thing about documentary filmmaking is that it allows you to synthesize so many things––visual arts, narrative story telling, social commentary, etc.––in one medium, so influences can come from a variety of places.

I can say that documentary has been evolving rapidly over the past ten years or so and there are a number of people pushing the medium forward, so its truly an exciting time to be making films."

Q: What advice do you have for emerging filmmakers?

A: "Just make movies.

It’s easy to get caught up in other things. Some people get decent jobs with production companies and get caught up with that, which isn’t a bad thing.

But if you want to be a filmmaker, the best way is to just get out there and make films.”

Q: Why is "Good Fortune" important to FLEFF?

A: "Good Fortune asks us to reassess our relationship with the developing world.

The film asserts that we, as Western citizens, project a paternalistic attitude toward other cultures, economies, and the natural world. Reassessing these relationships, and striving for a more equitable, sustainable world are the essence of what FLEFF has always embodied for me."

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Because Van Soest is currently shooting for his next film in Abu Dhabi, his partner  Jeremey Levine will be on hand to discuss the film at FLEFF 2011.

What does it mean to screen "Good Fortune" at FLEFF for Van Soest ?
 
"I studied filmmaking at Ithaca College, where I met my co-producer Jeremy Levine. So screening at FLEFF is a wonderful homecoming for us," Van Soest explained.

Blog posting by Shea Lynch, Documentary Studies and Production '14, FLEFF Intern, Glens Falls, New York

It is now spring break for all Ithaca College students. I am currently watching Lost in my room in my sleeveless shirt.

I interviewed Emily Potts a few days ago, FLEFF Intern and team leader.

Who are you?

"I am Emily Potts. I am from Southwick, Massachusetts and I am a Junior Park student at Ithaca College.

For the first two years of college, I attended Springfield Technical Community College, and received my associates degree in Digital Media Production.

This is only my second semester at IC, but I already love it here."

Can you share your FLEFF experience with our blog readers?

"Currently I am a team leader for FLEFF and it has been a unique learning experience being immersed in the planning of a film festival. It is fascinating to know how the film industry works regarding getting films and artists for an event.

Perhaps my favorite FLEFF experience so far was attending several of Albert Maysles' documentary screenings, and having the chance to talk with him afterwards. Being able to interact with such brilliant artists is an invaluable opportunity to share and listen to ideas."

I hope everyone has a great spring break and make sure to sign up for mini-courses and buy FLEFF passes!

Question of the Blog: What are you doing for spring break?

Blog was written by Kelsey Greene, Documentary Studies and Production, '13, FLEFF intern, Buffalo, New York

Today I was able to catch busy, co-director Thomas Shevory for an interview about his experience with FLEFF. 

He has been highly involved throughout the festival’s history and became co-director in 2006. 

When he’s not working out FLEFF details with co-director Patricia Zimmerman, he educates students on issues related to law, public policy, and popular culture as a professor of politics at Ithaca College. His academic work gives special attention to health and environment, which is one of the reasons he became involved with the festival.   

What are some of the challenges you face?

Well, there’s a lot happening, so keeping everything straight is a challenge. There are so many things to juggle, so many elements. so many people involved.   Just trying to keep track of everything and keeping events and people on target, I think that’s our biggest challenge. 

Some things are more routine than others.  Finalizing films and filmmakers for Cinemapolis seems to be the biggest challenge at the moment.  Patty has been working the commercial film side of things with Lynne Cohen and Rich Szanyi, who manage Seventh Art.  It’s a difficult world to break into, but they are doing a great job.

Is there anything specific you’re looking forward to with this year’s event?

I’m looking forward to, well everything. 

The Rite of Spring event with Mahler lieder featuring vocalist Brad (Hougham) and pianists Jairo (Geronymo) and Debbie (Martin), and film projection, that’ll be fantastic. They’re just great musicians who we’ve worked with in the past, and that’ll be a big, spectacular event, always a highlight.  Also, we have some fantastic guests, including venerable new media artist, Philip Mallory Jones and Laura Deutch...an IC alum...with her innovative project, Messages in Motion. Also Tom Swartwout will be on campus. He's a highly regarded film editor (who has worked with Sidney Lumet.) 

I'm excited to host Tom and Laura in a class I'm teaching.  My colleague Beth Harris is organizing an event on the Egyptian uprising, with two filmmaker/activists who have just returned from Cairo, Menna Kahlil and Michael Kennedy.

The downtown music events, live music silent film events you know, they are also very popular, and deservedly so. They’re in a sense unexpected, because live music performed with film always creates unforeseen resonances.  Even if you've been to the rehearsal, the event itself always surprises, and often mesmerizes.

And then we’re bringing in several film directors this year, so I’m looking forward to that, including Tina Mabry (Mississippi Damned), IC alums Jeremy Levine and Landon Van Soest (Good Fortune), David Brancaccio (public radio's Marketplace, and his film Fixing the Future), Jenny Stein and James Laveck (Peaceable Kingdom), Maple Raza (Bastards of Utopia), Danny Schecter (the "news dissector"), and Helen DeMichiel (Lunch Love Community). (Helen will also be on campus for much of the week.)

The downtown events are fun because everyone is together.  It's a combination social event, big college seminar..media confab.  Well it's a festival.   And a chance to get together with people we haven't seen in a while. 

And we'll be opening at Cinemapolis this year with the premier of Uncorked, a series of webisodes featuring wine and upstate New York.  We've partnered with Park Media Lab (Carol Jennings) and the Ithaca/Tompkins County Convention Center Visitors Bureau (Fred Bonn) and the Finger Lakes Wine Center.  (Be there on the evening of Sunday April 10th!)

Also, it'll be great to be in the new theaters. The theaters are beautiful, plus excellent screens and good projection.  It’s a very open, welcoming space.  A great place to gather. 

I'll tell you something else...a lot my colleagues have mentioned how great the mini-courses look. And, if I were a student, I'd definitely enroll in one.

What have you taken away from you involvement with FLEFF throughout the years?

I came into this through the door of environmental politics, and FLEFF is a different kind of space, but still a very political one on many levels.  I find the political aspects of an environmental film festival (as we define it) to be very compelling, and there's a politics to the whole concept of a festival, that is convening people in public spaces to engage ideas.

In many ways, it has been an eye- opening experience. I've learned so much, almost like a second career, a different trajectory, a new path. I had never really organized events on that kind of scale that FLEFF involves.  I was definitely not schooled as an events planner, believe me.

Is there anything else you would like to add?

I really appreciate all the people we work with, especially the interns.

What makes the festival, actually any festival, worthwhile are the people involved.  The interns, the faculty, our web design and social media marketing team (Joanne Hindman and Steve Shoemaker),  the guests, the musicians, Lynne and Rich at the theaters, Anne Michel and Phil Wilde (our producers and now intern directors),  writing prof Barb Adams (who is organizing prose readings at Buffalo Street Books), Warren Schlesinger (who organizes the mini-courses and our FLEFF Fellows program), the filmmakers, the new media artists, the activists, the alums, the students... and the ideas....that's what keeps me coming back. 

Also, Patty is a great person to work with.

Blog posting by Shea Lynch, Documentary Studies and Production '14, FLEFF Intern, Glens Falls, New York

Things are heating up!

We have FLEFF mini-courses coming up after spring break and FLEFF Week is just around the corner. I interviewed FLEFF Internship Coordinator Ann Michel to give us further insight into the FLEFF community.

Why is FLEFF important to the student body and community?

"We hope it encourages you to think. I mean, your whole college experience should be about that but we hope that FLEFF, in a concentrated way, really gets your braincells activated in new ways that you didn't think could."

How do you like "team teaching"?

"I like it because it takes the pressure off me. Two heads are better than one. I think humans do very well in groups and that's one of the reasons we structured the class to have groups of eight or nine people. Those groups will come up with more than 45 individuals ever could."

What are some struggles in teaching the class?

"It's tricky to schedule people to come in to speak to the class and coordinating 15 classes to make sure that each of the classes is worth it for [the interns] is a challenge. I want everyone to walk out of this room saying, 'I didn't know that before'."

What about the future interns?

"Bigger and better. If [the current interns] are successful this year, [FLEFF] will be bigger next year because we would have sold out more shows, created more buzz, made more of our guests happier, and our brand will become better known, which means we will get more money, more sponsors, and more audience. Hopefully we will continue to be better."

Ann Michel has been with FLEFF for 5 years with her company Insights International, Inc. and this is her first year teaching the FLEFF Internship class, invited by FLEFF Codirector Patricia Zimmermann. Michel teaches alongside Phil Wilde and together they hope to inspire many creative minds and continue the FLEFF legacy next year.

Blog posting written by Abby Sophir, Television/Radio, FLEFF Intern, St. Louis, Missouri. 

As former FLEFF Intern Brian Cicero described in a previous post, as interns we are divided into teams to accomplish specific tasks. This serves as a great opportunity to meet new people and get to know fellow interns.

At a team dinner last week, I got to meet Josh Nelson, a sophomore Cinema & Photography and History double major from Long Beach, New York. He shares what he has gotten out of his experience with FLEFF so far. 

"Through FLEFF I have come into contact with people who are very passionate about their beliefs," Nelson said. "These people range from inspirational filmmakers to community leaders and even students. It is great be a part of this experience as I am learning how to coordinate group efforts and, at same time, appreciate the communal environment. Everyone has important input, we just have to listen."

He said he has found that the Ithaca community as a whole is less fatigued and easier to get excited about an event that IC students. He now has a better understanding of the cooperation required for an event of this size. 

"Before FLEFF I did not realize how closely different divisions of the City of Ithaca worked together in order to construct such an event. I found that involving the entire commercial district of Ithaca, not just Ithaca College, truly creates a wider audience and gives new life to the festival itself," Nelson said.

Blog posting by Shea Lynch, Documentary Studies and Production '14, FLEFF Intern, Glens Falls, New York

I hope everyone purchased their FLEFF passes! Go! Go! Go!

I met with Professor Jonathan Ablard, Latin American Studies Coordinator at Ithaca College, and discussed the FLEFF spring mini-course Garbage, Oil, and Other Dirty Things: Environment, Commodities, and Film in the Americas.

Professor Ablard has taught at Ithaca College for six years and teaches Latin American Studies and History, among many other programs. Coupled with his new course this semester From Sugar to Oil ("which examines the history of commodities in the Wester Hemisphere"), Professor Ablard will challenge the Ithaca student body with this FLEFF mini-course.

Also teaching this course with Professor Ablard is Professor Michael Smith, who has been teaching Environmental Studies and History at Ithaca College for about 11 years. His new book, Citizenship Across the Curriculum (2010), has received great reviews.

"I got interest in doing this course," said Professor Ablard "because I am teaching a commodities course and [Professor] Smith is teaching the American Environmental Thought class so we are kind of bringing the two themes of both courses into this one-credit class."

The class will examine the links between "unsavory commodities and to get people to think about how history and environmental studies and film can enrich our understanding." Commodities such as coal, organ trafficking, garbage, and oil will be studied. 

Films being shown during this class:

Waste Land directed by Lucy Walker

The Charcoal People directed by Nigel Noble

Dirty Pretty Things directed by Stephan Frears

The class starts right after spring break and enrollment ends Sunday, March 27, 2011. There are 20 seats total for this class and it is offered Monday and Wednesday, 2:00 p.m. to 2:50 p.m.

This mini-course is "geared towards everyone" and is a SDF (Pass/Fail) course. There will be some writing assignments and will be heavily discussion based. Special guest speakers will also be planed including Diane Cohen, Executive Director of Finger Lakes ReUse. She will discuss how garbage can be turned into something useful: a commodity. 

This mini-course will not only challenge students to think outside the box, it will also challenge Professors Ablard and Smith to work outside their own "disciplinary boxes."

"I think there is a lot that everyone can gain from team taught classes. It is good for students to have more than one faculty in the room at one time because one of the things they can see is different teaching styles but different approaches to the material. It can open great avenues for thinking."

If you would like to sign up for this course, write down this information:

HSP 10100-04

CRN 43202 

Question of the Blog: What would you do with a pile a trash?

Blog posting written by Lindsay Harrop, Cinema & Photography '13, FLEFF Intern, McMinnville, Oregon

One of the awesome things about FLEFF is not only that it incorporates so many different visual and artistic styles (from documentaries at Cinemapolis to performing arts to live music at Delilah's), but that there are so many unique people supporting behind the scenes.

I had the opportunity to catch-up with FLEFF intern Jackie Nedorezov and hear about her FLEFF experience thus far. Jackie is a sophomore Cinema & Photography major from Blue Bell, Pennsylvania. She's been able to integrate FLEFF into the Ithaca College campus in her own way. Here's what she had to say:

"On campus, I am the Film’s Chair for Student Activities Board (SAB), which is the second largest organization on campus. In this position, I am responsible for showing the films played on campus every other week.

We recently added a promotional video as previews before each film showing to highlight other areas of our organization. Because a lot of people who come to our films are interested in films, I added a little segment about FLEFF to encourage college students to attend. Hopefully that got the word out there!

In terms of operations for FLEFF, there is far more planning and preparation required for these events than I ever accounted for. I never really thought about how much work goes into getting the rights to book certain films and invite certain performers.

With all the work that goes into this, I know I’m extremely excited to help run this festival smoothly when it comes time in April!"

Thanks for sharing Jackie! Now for everyone else: what are you doing to spread the FLEFF word?
 

Blog was written by Kelsey Greene, Documentary Studies and Production, '13, FLEFF intern, Buffalo, New York

Recently, I had the chance to catch up with Brianne Riviello.  She is currently an assistant to the internship coordinators.  As a senior television radio major and integrated marketing and communications minor, Brianne has contributed a lot to FLEFF as her statement shows.

Brianne describes her experience with FLEFF by saying:

The Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival caught my eye as a freshman as simply a way to combine getting involved with my love for films. As I took my seat in the auditorium for my first intern meeting, I had no idea the overwhelming effect the festival would have on me over the next four years.

I started as an operations intern, learning the ropes, meeting guests, and watching how the festival operated. I also immersed myself in the content, from a deeply intense film about abortion in 1980's Romania to an incredibly inspiring documentary about refugee children in Uganda using dance as an escape from their war-torn lives. Needless to say, I walked away from the week immediately hooked on everything the festival had to offer.

The following year I worked as a team leader for FLEFF, leading the Blogging team, and am currently serving as an assistant to the internship coordinators for the 2011 edition of the festival.

I couldn't be more thrilled to have FLEFF landing, physically, back at Ithaca College and Cinemapolis once again. Every year, co-directors Dr. Patty Zimmerman and Dr. Tom Shevory, continue to surpass themselves in their selection of thought provoking and boundary pushing films, performances, and guest artists.

Essentially, I am involved with FLEFF because it makes me think. And it makes those around me think as well. And then we get to talk about it, with producers and directors of the films, no less!

I have still yet to find a place where so many diverse ideas are laid out to be revealed, discussed, argued about, and shared.  So often in college, we as students fall into weekly routines, focused on campus life and the grind of writing papers and taking tests. FLEFF brings something more to the table, and inspires us to look a little deeper and a little wider at the world we live in.      

Blog posting written by Shawn Steiner, Film and Photography ’14, FLEFF Intern, Elkridge, Maryland

Welcome back to the FLEFF blog! Glad to see you are still checking in!

Today we have some proof of how this festival is truly international. Here at FLEFF, within our group of interns, we have Neli Gacheva. She is a freshman here at Ithaca College who hails from Bulgaria. She’s pretty far from her hometown. But she’s here working with the festival.

Here's Neli describing what her FLEFF experience has been like to date:

February is already over. March is already here. April is just around the corner. Now, FLEFF week is approaching with the speed of light.

My name is Neli Gacheva from Plovdiv, Bulgaria. Currently, I am a freshman Cinema & Photography major at Ithaca College.

A week ago, I was tabling at Cinemapolis as part of my internship at the festival. Sitting at a small table, I had to convince people to come see movies at the festival.

At the interns practica course, they taught us the importance of appealing to a large group of people. Focusing on the pros and cons of tabling and what was at stake if we do not fill the house.

When I first heard about my assignment, I thought it was going to be an easy job. First, because I was going to be talking to people at the cinema, already known moviegoers. Second, because I knew FLEFF was already well known in the area.

However, as it turned out people were not willing to stop for very long. So I had to come up with a strategy to get as much information out as fast as possible. (Shawn: As the other intern that afternoon I can vouch that Neli did an excellent job.) 

But, the people who actually had time to stop by the table demanded to know as much information as possible. (Shawn: Here's some!) Hence, I came to understand the importance of one of the key points always made at the FLEFF practica: “Learn, read and know everything that has to be known in order to be a trustworthy employee and to attract as many people as possible.”

*  *  *  *  *  *

Thank you, Neli,  for sharing your voice. Now, if you see her walking around campus or at Cinemapolis,  ask her about FLEFF. She’s ready.

Finally, check back in at FLEFF INTERNS VOICES as much as possible. All of our interns are working really hard to get the information out. Make sure to buy a pass for the festival!

P.S. If you have a good story idea check out our FLEFF Story Contest! And if you don't: think one up and write it down.

You still have plenty of time for this chance to win $500 dollars!

Blog post written by Kelsey Greene, Documentary Studies and Production, '13, FLEFF intern, Buffalo, New York

I had the opportunity to speak with Laura Deutch, an Ithaca College alumna and Philadelphia-based media artist and educator.

KG: Can you please describe why you decided to use media as a tool for social justice?

LD: Media is a powerful tool to support advocacy and educational campaigns for social justice. Visual media allows people to connect with one another, and identify with diverse points of view.

The problem is that in the current system, there is inequitable access to resources for creating and effectively distributing media messages. Even with the explosion of social media, the digital divide is very real.

As an educator, it’s important for me to not only help create alternative media, but to transfer these skills to underrepresented communities so they understand how media is constructed and manipulated, and gain the knowledge to document and express their own experiences and analysis.

KG: Your most recent project is Messages in Motion. Can you please explain this project and your reason to start it?

LD: There are two components to the Messages In Motion project. First, I’ve been identifying and working with organizations to conduct video workshops with the flip camera. At a workshop I speak about what a story is, what a shot is, what it means to upload, edit, and so on. 

Participants see that they can create a video, and so they gain confidence. They see the power of this tool to reach a wider audience. 

I’m a little less interested in having them recreate media they see on TV, but rather we experiment with voiceover, direct address and images to create something expressive and reflective of their experiences. The videos are used in an educational context or as part of an organizing campaign. 

Second, I outfitted an old Chevy work van into a mobile media studio. I have 2 laptops, a workspace and a monitor. The equipment is powered by a solar panel on the roof.
 
People can stand outside the van and watch what others have created. I wanted to create a self-contained system so participants can create, upload it, and exhibit their work within a few hours. 

Once people go through the whole process, it gives them the confidence that they can do it themselves.

KG: What has your experience been like doing such a project?

LD: For me, it has been really great. The neighborhoods in Philly are very segregated and have their own identity, so I enjoy being able to be mobile and being able to show people’s videos and create connections between places.
 
What’s great is that now that I am building an archive of videos, the participants are inspiring one another. They see the work of their peers in other parts of the city, and they respond to it, and build on it.

I’m starting to develop a broader understanding of the city.  I hope to use this work to draw deeper connections between issues and create stronger alliances among organizations and neighborhoods.

KG: You have also recently completed a feature-length documentary, El Sol Sale Para Todos. Can you please give a brief summary of what the documentary is about?

LD: The documentary chronicles the last 15 years of the growth of the Mexican community in Philadelphia. 

We wanted to show what it’s like for the first generation of an immigrant community to come to a new place and build a life. By now, the community is quite established, but it’s a history that many people do not know about. 

What’s happened in South Philadelphia is similar to what is taking place in many urban and rural towns throughout the US. Through the stories of the seven main characters, the film puts a human face on the struggles and complexity of migrating to make a better life for oneself and one’s family. 

It tries to break down stereotypes and can be used as a way to enter into the immigration debate.

KG: How did you find the story for the documentary? What was it like making the film?

LD: Since moving to Philadelphia 5 years ago, I became aware of the changing populations in the neighborhood where I was living.

I started volunteering with JUNTOS and Media Mobilizing Project for an initiative titled, Our City Our Voices. The goal of this project was to train low income and immigrant adults in citizen journalism media production.

During those workshops, I met Carlos and Leticia and we started making short films together, and 2 years later, we collaborated on this feature doc. Between the three of us we each brought unique experiences to the project. Ultimately it’s a piece made by the community, for the community.

KG: Did you ever see yourself doing the projects you are doing?

LD: Yes, as a student I was a media studies major. I never took production classes at school--I got trained at the Public Access Center in town.

I was always interested in community media. My junior and senior year I was more politically active. 

Since that point, I’ve been pursuing work that allows me to combine my interest in documentary and radical experimental film with social justice and media education. Going back to school, and creating the Messages in Motion project was a logical outgrowth of those interests.

KG: What are some of the difficulties with a career such as yours?

LD: The biggest challenge is stability. I work on a project-to-project basis and teach a lot of classes.  

However, organizations and institutions are only starting to realize how important web video and social media is to their work.

KG: Can you please describe some personal benefits you have achieved from doing your projects/films?

LD: I like the independence that I have because it has allowed me to work with many different people.

Working with media has allowed me to access a lot of different struggles, stories and cultures and it has helped me understand my role as an educator and producer.

KG: What are your views of FLEFF? 

LD: I appreciate the vision and holistic approach to expanding one’s understanding of environment beyond global warming, for example, and trying to address the interconnected social, political and cultural issues which impact our natural and social environment.

KG: What are you looking forward to about FLEFF 2011?

LD: I feel very honored to be coming back as an alum. 

I was always really inspired by visiting guests as a student--and I hope I can return the favor.  I’ll be bringing the van, and I hope to offer something that can connect college students and town residents.

I am also very excited to see and hear the presentations and meet other artists.

KG: What advice would you give to aspiring media students today?

LD: Take responsibility with the skills and knowledge you are developing, stay true to your values and instincts.

Blog posting written by Shea Lynch, Documentary Studies '14, FLEFF Intern, Glens Falls, New York

I hope everyone is having a great week!

The FLEFF Intern team is busy preparing for FLEFF Week coming up April 10. We are all really excited. I hope everyone bought their passes!

I interviewed FLEFF intern and team leader Holly Kreczko about her experience with FLEFF.

Holly is a Documentary Production and Studies major at Ithaca College and has Anthropology and Outdoor Pursuits minors.  She is from Endicott, NY and likes to hike, go camping, explore the Adirondacks and make movies. Her academic interests include photography, anthropology and art. Holly hopes to one day start her own independent film company for documentaries and music videos. She enjoys watching documentaries about African social rights activism. 

What Holly does as a FLEFF Team Leader:

• team leader for a group of 7 interns
• makes sure her group is doing their jobs correctly and that everything is running smoothly
• keeps the enthusiasm for FLEFF running high throughout the semester

What Holly has learned:

"FLEFF is much more than just a film festival.It's an opportunity for people to come together, learn about a topic, and discuss it afterwards.

Going into this, I thought the festival would just be about directors making movies and presenting them, but I soon learned that it's all about activism." -Holly Kreczko

 Question of the Blog to our Loyal Readers: What is your favorite Film Festival?

Blog posting written by Abby Sophir, Television/Radio '14, FLEFF Intern, St. Louis, Missouri.

When the day winds down and theaters close during FLEFF week, the fun is not over. In fact, according to London McDaniel, it has just begun.

McDaniel, Promoter and Music Manager for Delilah’s on Cayuga, has arranged for several after parties to take place at the venue. 

“I thought that it was a perfect, perfect combination,” McDaniel said.  “One of the things about FLEFF which is fantastic is the quality of content. All I want to know is about content. But unfortunately, because I lived in Los Angeles for so long, I have a sense of flash as well. I’m about content but I’m very familiar with flare.”

He says content and pizzaz are both essential to a successful film festival. He hopes to bring the two together. 

“It doesn’t matter how much you want to be earthy and how much you want to be grounded, the reality is all the film festivals that are having high revenue turnover are having it because they have great quality but they also have a lot of media attention. They are the place to be-- people want to come there, they want to party there, they plan their years around it.”

Not only does McDaniel work for Delilah’s, he is a lifelong musician himself. He got involved with Delilah’s (known as the Wild Fire at the time) as a performer and later took over as programmer. He says his job is to bring the community music he knows they are going to love.

“Delilah's has a very comfortable environment and low-key atmosphere,” he said, “and at the same time there’s a distinctive aspect about it. Like if you are in Manhattan and you go to the Knitting Factory or the Blue Note or the Sweet Basil. These types of clubs have a specific atmosphere which are very conducive to being really entertained.”

He argues that there is no place like Delilah’s in Ithaca. 

“It’s different from any other venue because there’s no other venue in town where it’s high, high quality entertainment, a fantastic restaurant and a wonderful place to see the music,” he said. “Every other place to see music in this town, other than The Haunt, is a bar.”

He studied music at a conservatory in his hometown of Seattle, Washington before completing his studies at the Berkeley College of Music. He has taught in the Music Department at Cornell and performed around the world. 

“I play a number of instruments. I play kettle steel guitar, steel guitar, banjo, and upright base. I play a lot of guitar. And I play many different styles-- jazz, bluegrass.”

McDaniel also does production work and has written music for hip hop artists that have “gone platinum.” One of his pieces was picked up by the very popular P-Diddy.

However, he has found that music is becoming antiquated-- a throwback to another time. Through his work, he aims to bring live music back into peoples lives. 

“Sometimes in the pursuit of technology and progress we lose the beauty and the simplicity of what moves our souls,” McDaniel said. 

Although details of the FLEFF after parties remain a secret, he reveals that each night will feature a different theme, several artists performing, and a DJ to end the night. He guarantees a variety of music and a good time.

“It’s not a question of why should they come to the after parties, it’s a question of it’s going to be the most happening thing in town,” he said. “If you don’t want to be there-- you want to be a lump on a log--  you’re welcome to do that. I’m not trying to get in the way of anybody and their movie night on the couch. If you want to do something with your life and experience live entertainment, that’s what’s going to be happening at Delilah’s club.”

Keep an eye out for more information about the FLEFF after parties at Delilah’s!

Blog posting written by Gena Mangiaratti, Journalism '13, FLEFF Intern, Feeding Hills, Massachusetts.

Shannon Kelley is a member of the FLEFF International Advisory Board and currently the Head of Public Programs at the UCLA Film and Television Archive. His former positions include Associate Director of the Sundance Documentary Fund and Director of Programming for the Morelia International Film Festival in Mexico.

He graduated from Ithaca College in 1986 with a B.S. in Film Production.

In a phone interview, he took the time to explain his role as an adviser for FLEFF,  to recall being a film student at Ithaca College, and to share advice for current student filmmakers.

GM: What is the most interesting part about serving an adviser for FLEFF? What kind of advice do you provide?

SK: A festival is a very dynamic system.

You can plan and plan and plan, but then as soon as things start happening, they happen in an unexpected way.

The largest reason for that is that film festivals are not only made of film and moving images, but are also made up of the efforts of people. Everybody you’re dealing with is an individual with his own perspective, and also he or she probably wants something out of the festival.

So it's a little bit of negotiating the needs of people, and sincerely wanting everybody to get most out of the festival that it can offer. That might be concerns that a filmmaker would have, or concerns that audience members would have, even concerns about what the organizers should take away from the festival.

In this case, for all sense of purpose, this is a student-run festival, it ought to be an educational experience, even though it has to function and has functioned as a world-class festival… Because it is taking place in an educational institution, you might be more conscious then. You want this group to take something away from the festival that's rewarding and helpful to their future careers.

So [the FLEFF organizers and I] have a lot of ad hoc conversations, something will just come up, and I’ll usually get a call and we'll talk through it.

But it also typically is something that has a general principle to it that when we discuss it, hopefully it's helpful to the festival in the future in a general way: Ways of treating filmmakers, ways of dealing with the business, ways of finding new films, ways to make the experience rewarding to everybody.

GM: How did your time at Ithaca College spark your interest in film festivals and other alternative venues?

SK: At that time there was a film series, Women Direct. This was an opportunity to see films that were not going to be coming to Ithaca otherwise, and were directed by women at a time when not many women were getting their films shown anywhere except in educational institutions and other alternative venues.

So if I hadn't been at Ithaca College, in this kind of community that had been aware of a film series that had been organized basically for students like me, these are films I never would have seen in my life — even still, probably. They were really important to me. Every one of them had been curated because it had some special quality. It just became an opportunity to see a movie for free with the filmmaker present discussing how the film was made, their reasons for making the film, and topics like that, which is an opportunity I had never had before and it was a very important one.

Like a lot of students, I came to Ithaca College with the thought in mind to learn about filmmaking and film culture in a way that would kind of match up with my preconceived idea of what film was, which was basically films made by major corporations for mass distribution.

Here was an opportunity to recognize that film culture is much more than that. I think that most of us don't learn [that] unless we learn it in an alternative venue, like a film festival.

GM: What is the most significant thing you took away from your film education?

SK: Most of us go into film because we enjoy film and we want to keep enjoying it. It's kind of a very appealing, self-indulgent topic — your education, your career will be all about you enjoying something. There’s a fantasy that work doesn't come into it.
 
No, in fact showing films and making a career around film exhibition and film education is very very hard work just like anybody else's job…

A thing I think happens to a lot of people in their film education is they go over a threshold when they realize: This is actually a responsibility to talk about the pictures and symbols that get exchanged in our culture as if talking about them matters and makes a difference.
 
And yet work doesn’t need to be a drag; work is one of the great joys of life, and this kind of work can be very enriching and very relevant to your everyday life…

So there’s a way of indulging oneself, but at the same time one of the things you end up indulging is the pleasure of working hard on all this and participating in large conversations about what the movies are doing.

GM: Do you have any advice for student filmmakers?

SK: I would say take advantage of every opportunity that the college gives: to participate in community, participate in filmmaking.

It’s a busy time, and there's a reality of finishing papers and so forth, but at the same time, this is maybe one of the last times in life [with] all these things being offered to you that later you have to chase down in your career.

Some of these experiences don’t come to you so readily. Especially given an opportunity like a film festival, where it’s possible to go see film, then have a whole community of other people going through what you’re going through all around you, maybe have filmmaker at hand, and say, ‘what was he thinking?’ — and then be able to turn around and ask him to his face. These things take a little more effort to get together in your later life.

In a nutshell, here you have a big environment of experience laid out for you — and if you play your cards right, you will experience a lot of things and you’ll develop yourself to your full potential, or develop yourself in powerful way and in a way that’s very tricky to put together later on, because after that, it’s all up to you.

Blog posting written by Matthew Reis, Cinema and Photography, '13, FLEFF Intern

MR: When did you graduate from Ithaca College?

EM: I graduated in May 2007. I was part of the Cinema Production program (in the  Roy H. Park School at Ithaca College.) I probably have most of the same professors you have: Elisabeth Nonas, Cathy Crane and Patty Zimmermann. I loved Professor Changhee Chun’s classes in particular---he’s great.

MR: So did you jump right into teaching or did you take a gap year and evaluate your life?

EM: I probably should have taken a break in between degree programs, but I didn’t. At the behest of some of the professors and my own personal beliefs, I decided to go to grad school right away. I didn’t want to go to Los Angeles. I applied to a couple of places. I received a fellowship to attend a three-year MFA program at the University of Iowa.

In August 2007,  I started up at Iowa and then graduated in May 2010. I put myself on the job market right after I graduated. I got offered a really nice position at the University of Tennessee. So I moved out to Tennessee, and started teaching in August 2010. It’s going pretty well so far.

MR: Do you work independently or with other people? Also do you like to work in rural areas or in a city atmosphere?

EM: Yeah---I mean, I make movies simply, by myself. It is stuff that I can make on my own. It is very portable. I really like that aspect. To answer your other question, I currently live in Knoxville, TN. It’s quite a bit bigger than Iowa City, where I was previously living.

I was born in New York City. I think some people move to a big city like New York because they believe all the world’s culture is there. But in new media and web work, the culture is online. As long as you have an Internet connection, you can get the culture instantaneously.

MR: I found your glitching videos to be quite interesting. How do you go about making some of your movies? How do you conceive them and what processes do you go through ?

EM: While I was at Ithaca College, I had David Gatten (a former Associate Prof. in the Cinema Department) as a professor. He was really interested in using 16mm celluloid film stock not to represent images, but to use  the stock as a artifact and a medium itself.

So back to my work. Everything on a computer is basically a container for 0’s and 1’s. So like a flash video, a picture or an mp3 file can be opened up and looked at as text.

With a couple of other students from my graduating class, John McElroy and Michael Wexler, we started thinking that it would be really excellent to decode videos--and so we did.

We started cracking video codecs by going into the (video’s source) code and rearranging things. Then we re-encoded them. Computers have really specific guidelines for what they want their files to be. 

We thought that if we make the file’s code a little different--but not super different-- if we kind of gauge the file and play chicken with it, we could put it in a position where it would die. But, its death would be a little slow. We would capture parts of it. That’s where the glitches come from.

We were doing it (glitching) you know, just because it was new and interesting. At that point in time (2007), there were not a lot of people in the world who were doing it, maybe a handful at the most. We thought we were pretty, pretty excellent.

Thanks Evan!

Stay tuned for more postings on Mr. Meaney and his life as a teacher, artist and FLEFF collaborator.