After another year of experience, last year’s second-year MFA school of film students were able to learn some more about filmmaking and their craft, and this weekend, they are going to show how they’ve progressed.
The Athena Cinema at 20 S. Court St. will be showing their work during a second-year screening at 7 p.m. Saturday.
“First, second-years’ works are a bit longer than the first-years’ work — (as) each piece is around 15 minutes — and therefore have the time to compose the work,” said Hsin-ning Chang, head projectionist at the Athena Cinema. “Secondly, compared to (how) many first-years' works are shot on 16mm film, second-years' works seem mostly shot on digital camera, and therefore the texture of the images would be pretty different on our screen.”
Students Luke Fisher, Rani Crowe, Eleanor Crews Mladan “MJ” Jurkovic, Sarah Leibamn, Jeremy Zerechak, Jon Coy and Michael Greene will be showcasing their work to an eager crowd Saturday. As each film is screened, each filmmaker will take something different away.
“I hope to gain more from the audience than they might gain from the film,” said Jurkovic, who will be screening his short
Birds of Paradise
. “Rough cuts, table screenings, test screenings, revisions — all these steps can help you salvage your film, but only a theater full of people responding to what they see can make you a better filmmaker.”
Though he will be learning more about his film on Saturday, Jurkovic already learned some key lessons from last year’s hard work.
“Because of the more ambitious film projects in the second year, I learned that to surpass your limitations you must put full trust in your friends and collaborators, aka the film crew,” Jurkovic said. “Filmmaking is done with the help of others and for everybody around you. If you are too unique and consider that your work is only worthy of your own appreciation, then stay home and make eggs.”
Fisher, meanwhile, was able to learn more about the art of comedy. In particular, he was able to learn that having funny gags, props and characters is not enough—and that it’s really about how and when the joke is presented, he said.
“As always, I hope the audience just has a good time watching my films,” Fisher said. “If they get anything out of it maybe they will come to the same conclusion we all eventually come to after a tough breakup — it might have seemed sad at first but the whole thing was actually pretty funny. That doesn't mean those heavy feelings were meaningless, I think my film
Dead to Me
has some legitimately sad moments, but the things love can make us do can be soul-crushingly hilarious.”
wa054010@ohiou.edu
@thewillofash
Movie list:
-
Good Bad Not Evil —
Directed by Sarah Leibamn
- Dead To Me —
Directed by Luke Fisher
- Estragon’s Boot —
Directed by Rani Delighe Crowe
- Birds of Paradise
— Directed by Mladan Jurkovic
- The Good Sumaritans
— Directed by Michael Greene
- Town and Country
— Directed by Jeremy Zerechak
- Vengeance
— Directed by Eleanor Crews
- Bridges
— Directed by Jon Coy
If you go:
What: Second-Year Screenings
When: 7 p.m. Saturday
Where: Athena Cinema, 20 S. Court St.
Admission: Free
