Seeing double: Two film festivals reel students in for cine-fun

CU Film Festival

It’s officially film festival season. Columbia contributes to the plethora of independent films showcased this spring with the 24th Annual Columbia University Film Festival (CUFF). Presenting films and scripts by graduate students in the School of the Arts film program from April 25 to May 12 in New York and June 8 to 10 in Los Angeles, CUFF primarily attracts industry insiders, film academics, and fellow artists hoping to catch a first glimpse of the work of up-and-coming filmmakers.

CUFF Director Lydia Cavallo dismissed any notion of competition with Tribeca Film Festival. “Tribeca brings a lot of top members of the industry to New York, and we benefit from that, because they also come to our events during the time they are here,” Cavallo said. “Columbia students and alums are always well represented at Tribeca.”

For example, this year, as Cavallo said, “Two CUFF shorts from 2010 are in competition, and we’re excited about SoA alum Dennis Lee’s feature ‘Jesus Henry Christ’ premiering in the World Narrative Features category—the short film it is based on won Best Film at our 2003 CUFF.”

CUFF will introduce two new special events to this year’s program in an attempt to attract a wider audience, notably the Columbia community.

First, in conjunction with University Programs & Events and the School of the Arts, CUFF will showcase SoA alumni films at an outdoor festival screening, CU at the Movies, on Tuesday, April 26 at 7:30 p.m. After the short films are screened on Low Steps, the filmmakers will participate in a Q-and-A session moderated by Professor Ira Deutchman.

Secondly, CUFF celebrates the partnership and works of director Milos Forman, professor emeritus of SoA, and producer Michael Hausman, adjunct film professor, with a screening of their first movie collaboration, the 1971 farce “Taking Off.” This will be followed by a discussion with Forman and Hausman about their eight films together, which include “Hair” and “Amadeus.” Miller Theatre will host the duo on Tuesday, May 3 at 7 p.m.

Perhaps the biggest honor at CUFF is the Andrew Sarris Award, given for, “outstanding service and artistic achievement of distinguished film program alumni,” according to the official release. Named after famed Columbia film professor and critic Andrew Sarris, this year’s award goes to writer-director Greg Mottola, SoA ’91. Known for directing “Superbad,” “Adventureland,” and “Paul,” Mottola discussed his experiences while at the Columbia film program.

“It was a total fantasy world. I spent all my time just watching movies and talking about movies,” Mottola said. “Now, that I’m older and I have kids, a demanding career, I really miss those days of just watching movies all the time and talking about them. You realize how good you had it when you were young.”

Mottola is currently working on an HBO pilot written by “mad genius” Aaron Sorkin, as Mottola described him, and an “anti-romantic comedy” screenplay tentatively starring Natalie Portman and Brad Pitt.

Without Columbia, Mottola might have done things differently. “I don’t exactly have the kind of career that I thought I’d have, but I feel like I have the tools to have a weird enough career, so that I could go back and forth between indie films and studio films,” Mottola said. “And I think if I hadn’t had the experience that I had at Columbia that I wouldn’t be attempting to do something like that.”

Forman was co-chair of the film program while Mottola was there, and he says his filmmaking philosophy was heavily influenced by the creative atmosphere of the program.

Mottola explained, “They came out of the ‘70s where the mainstream movies and the weird, indie movies were overlapping and ... the mentality that the film industry, the business side of it, doesn’t get to tell you what kind of filmmaker you are, really rubbed off on me.”

No stranger to the film festival scene, Mottola offered advice to the young filmmakers premiering their work at CUFF.

“If I were to look back on the mistakes I made when I first came out of school, I think the biggest mistake I ever made—and this probably stretched out for many years of my life after school—is that I had a very rigid idea of what kinds of films I should be making,” Mottola said. “And I would say that it’s good to pursue anything that interests you at all.”

—Maricela Gonzalez

Tribeca Film Festival

Now that students have registered for classes, a whole other scheduling challenge has emerged. The Tribeca Film Festival, which inundates lower Manhattan with a colossally wide range of films from around the world, is in full swing now through May 1. From early morning to midnight, screenings are taking place in theaters ranging from Clearview Cinemas Chelsea to BMCC Tribeca PA to AMC Loews Village 7.

Arguably, the crux of the festival is the World Narrative Competition, in which 12 films from five continents compete for Best Feature. This year’s competition includes “Black Butterflies,” a Dutch film about Ingrid Jonker, whose poetry written during the tumultuous years of apartheid earned her the nickname “South Africa’s Sylvia Plath." Two other films touch upon the struggles women face in politically tense countries—“Cairo Exit,” about a pregnant teen contemplating leaving Egypt for Greece, and “Artificial Paradises,” about a heroin addict in Mexico. But perhaps the film most likely to resonate with students comes from the peaceful nation of Norway.

“Turn Me On, Goddammit,” based on the 2007 novel by Olaug Nilssen, tells the story of Alma, a 17-year-old girl with raging hormones living in a middle-of-nowhere Norwegian town. Her reputation is effectively ruined when her whole school finds out about an awkward encounter she has with her crush. Director Jannicke Systad Jacobsen said she was attracted to the novel’s “mixing the protagonist’s sense of reality and imagination and letting them float into each other.” Indeed, the film hilariously juxtaposes Alma’s sexual fantasies with her drab, quotidian life.

The World Narrative Competition is complemented by a World Documentary Competition. This year, in addition to the run-of-the-mill non-fiction fare (i.e. films about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and various sports heroes), Tribeca offers some quite striking documentaries. Take “Our School,” which chronicles the pioneering work of three gypsy children in rural Transylvania to combat ethnic segregation in Romanian schools.

This year’s “Spotlight” sidebar includes a handful of familiar international auteurs. Chinese action director Tsui Hark’s latest film, “Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame” provides a vision of ancient China through the eyes of film noir and steampunk. Mika Kaurismaki, the brother of acclaimed Finnish director Aki, presents a documentary on South African musical sensation Miriam Makeba. Last but not least, Cédric Klapisch, the French writer-director of “L’auberge espagnole” (“The Spanish Apartment”), will be at the festival with his latest, “My Piece of the Pie.” The film is a drama about a single mother who, after losing her job in a factory, has to become a housekeeper for a suspicious family.

Students should keep their eyes peeled for free events spread out over the next two weekends. This Saturday, April 23, the ‘80s classic “The Muppets Take Manhattan” will screen on the lawn outside the World Financial Plaza doors at 6 p.m., film at 8:15 p.m., rain or shine. Next Saturday, April 30, North Moore Street, between Greenwich and West Streets, will be transformed into a sports-themed street fair sponsored by ESPN. Tribeca has something for just about everyone this year.

—Joseph Pomp