The International Student Film Festival

Posted by on Feb 10, 2012 in News | 0 comments

Between 3rd-5th February 2012, the London College of Communication played host to the International Student Film Festival, attended by filmmakers far and wide to showcase their work and enjoy the offerings of their peers. Not only was it a vital platform from which to exhibit their efforts, the festival provided a fantastic networking opportunity to bridge people within the industry and those who are hoping to find themselves working in film. This was achieved by accompanying screenings with discussions and Q&As, as well as workshops, parties and a (highly competitive!) film quiz.

Their ethos was to support education in film development, both locally and globally, and highlight the merits of the nurturing of talent in students. The film market can be exceptionally difficult to plan a route into, as often it’s a case of who you know and what hands-on experience you already have. ISFF supports the belief that providing a structured education that guides talent in the appropriate direction, focusing on theory as well as practical application, is extremely beneficial to the future of the industry. All submissions were student-made, and highlighted just how much can be achieved through study.

Considering the ISFF was in its first year this year, the standard of entries was surprisingly high. There were many stand-outs for me, but one that made me smile the most was in the postmodernism vs. naturalism short film section, ‘Hula Girl’, by Joe Toms-Ashcroft and Mark Bull. ‘Hula Girl’ is a documentary following Chris Storey, a young graduate who finds himself so inspired by a video of a girl hooping in America, he travels to the States in an attempt to track her down and meet her. Needless to say, the craziest of ideas always make for the most interesting films, and ‘Hula Girl’ went down very well with its audience.

Other winners include the Fiction Feature Award winner, ‘Somewhere West’ by David Marek, Short Documentary Award winner ‘Abuelas’ by Afarin Eghbal, 16mm Film Award for ‘A Man Asleep’ by Ophir Ben Shimon and the Online Popularity Award was won by Arthur Arensen with ‘Two Doors’, produced by the MET Film School. One of my personal favourites purely from a mechanical stand point was the winner of the Animated Short Award – ‘Playing Ghost’ by Bianca Ansems. It used stop-motion puppets, shot frame by frame with three puppets over seven sets, using stopmotion software with great skill and technique.

For a full list of award winners, visit http://www.sfflondon.org/en/index.html

After a successful first run, I’m hopeful the International Student Film Festival will garner more publicity and press coverage next year and that the word spreads even further internationally to attract submissions from all over the world.

For those who are keen to get involved next year, you can sign up to the SFF newsletter – if you are a budding filmmaker and wish to submit your film for next year’s festival, it’s worth subscribing so you can keep an eye on developments – you might even consider volunteering or supporting the cause with sponsorship.

Well done to all who got involved this year, let’s hope ISFF continues its great work in supporting student filmmakers next year!