In Production Magazine Fall 2014

FALL 2014

CHAPMAN UNIVERSITY DODGE COLLEGE OF FILM AND MEDIA ARTS

An International Premiere: Chapman Filmed Entertainment’s First Film Screens in Busan

FROM DEAN BOB BASSETT B

The loss of a dear friend ...

While this issue was in the works, we received the very sad news that our truly dear and generous friend Marion Knott passed away.

Words can hardly express the difference Marion made to our college.

I met Marion in my first years at Chapman, when I was a naïve assistant professor. Over the years and in many ways, she taught me the essence of fund-raising: that people give to people and that what takes place is essentially an exchange of value. Please see the story on page 22 for more remembrances of this remarkable woman.

Our Rankings and Reputation Continue to Soar with Good Reason College rankings offer intriguing findings and real challenges for prospective students and their parents as well as for college administrators and faculty. Rankings differ in both methodology and meaning. Nevertheless, a good ranking can attract attention and increase reputation, which is why we are gratified at this latest measure of what Dodge College has to offer.

Regular contact with top industry professionals and the 600+ internships that our students had last year are critical to this kind of education. And, of course, our students enjoy using industry-standard tools in Marion Knott Studios. With the addition of the incredible Digital Media Arts Center (see page 6), we can truly offer a world-class education.

Dodge College was named #4 in America by College Factual, which publishes rankings based on “high quality data from many reliable sources.” The results are “heavily weighted by outcomes like graduate rates, student loan default rates, and average starting salary.”

These are statistics that students and parents will find particularly valuable.

Our graduates are succeeding in the industry and making films that are getting attention, such as Justin Simien’s Dear White People. We continue to build industry connections that drive recognition by the entertainment industry, such as our ranking as #7 in the country by The Hollywood Reporter.

Since many other college rankings are based on subjective survey data, I believe that much of what drives the data here is the quality and design of our programs. Numbers such as the percentage of students at a college studying that major and the percentage of all bachelor degree graduates in the major represented at a given college show that students choose Chapman because of what we offer.

Our global reputation also continues to grow through partnerships, such as our exchanges with Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan. Just last month we hosted the international congress of CILECT, the International Association of Film and Television Schools (Centre International de Liaison des Ecoles de Cinéma et de Télévision – CILECT), which brought 200 film school faculty from 102 schools in 48 countries to Chapman (see page 18).

What we offer is a hands-on, student-centric program that prepares students for the careers they are pursuing.

Helping students understand how the entertainment business works and how its business models continue to rapidly evolve gives our students the education they need to get a job and advance as they build a career.

But rankings are just part of the story. The bottom line is the experience students have at Chapman.

To provide each student with the very best experience we can, we will never rest on our laurels, but are committed to finding new and better ways to offer our hands-on, student-centric education.

WHAT’S

INSIDE

OTHER STUFF FEATURES 2

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First Cut

20

An Interview with William Friedkin

21

Visual Storytelling Unites Disciplines through Collaboration and Creativity

24

Demand Soars for Summer Film Academy

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Roy Finch Teaches the Art of the Continuous Take

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Justin Simien Rides the Wave of Media Attention

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John Badham Receives Lifetime Achievement Award

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Blaustein Creates a Runaway TV Success – in Russian

34

Storyboard Class Puts Filmmakers on the Same Page

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Dodge College Alumni Notes

38

Seeing Through the Eyes of Others

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Festival Highlights

41

Documentary Successes

The Barber in Busan

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DMAC Opens to Rave Reviews

10 The Evolution of Film Language Faculty Look at Innovative Storytelling Strategies

18 Film Faculty From Around the World Gather at Chapman

22 Marion Knott A Living Legacy

28 Film Studies A Critical Approach to the Literature of this Century

On the cover: Director Basel Owies MFA/FP ’10 was invited by the Busan International Film Festival to attend the premiere of The Barber in South Korea.

In Production: Editor, Janell Shearer; Writers: Brian Hamilton, Meagan O’Shea, Sorrel Geddes, Derek Horne and Jeff Heimbuch; Publisher: Kris Elftmann, Noelle Marketing Group

THE BARBER in A collective gasp greeted the news that The Barber was director Basel Owies first feature and a world premiere.

Enthusiastic crowds at three sold-out screenings at the Busan International Film Festival (BIFF) stayed for extended Q & A sessions and then lined up to ask for photos and autographs.

The film screened as part of the Flash Forward section, which features non-Asian first time directors. World Cinema Programmer and Director of the Asian Film Academy Dosin Pak, who selected The Barber for screening in the festival, was also impressed that this was Owies’ first feature, noting that he sees hundreds of first features each year which “have no idea what the audience wants to see.”

Basel Owies, MFA/Film Prod. '10, signs autographs after the screening.

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E X C I T I N G

N E W S

WORLDWIDE SALES FOR THE BARBER The Barber will see theatrical distribution in spring 2015, following the signing of a domestic distribution deal with ARC Entertainment. The film is being represented by Robbie Little, a well-known sales agent with The Little Film Company, who screened the film for buyers at the American Film Market in November. International sales are currently being negotiated with Australia, the Middle East, the Benelux countries, Mexico, and Colombia.

Talks are also underway with the United Kingdom and Germany.

“Getting theatrical distribution is a big win for Chapman Filmed Entertainment,” says Dean Bob Bassett, “as that is a record of accomplishment films in the $1M range rarely achieve. It says a great deal about the quality that our alumni were able to produce in this very first film for CFE and significantly raises the visibility of the company in the eyes of the industry.”

Festival Director Lee Yong-kwan greets Dean Bob Bassett and Professor Janell Shearer on the red carpet opening night.

BIFF FACTS

THE BARBER O & A Many of the questions at the Q & A sessions following the screenings of The Barber were about the subject and themes of the film. As Professor Nam Lee, a specialist in Asian cinema, observed, Asian audiences tend to ask more questions about the philosophy or morals of a film whereas American audiences tend to ask more questions about how a film is made.

Basel Owies faced a sprinkling of both types of questions. Here’s a sampling from Busan:

o

How is your film different from other serial killer movies?

This movie is designed to keep you guessing whether or not the main character is a serial killer. We were trying not to do what everyone else has done. I watched a lot of serial killer movies and tried to stay away from things that modern audiences can pick out.

o

How did you keep from being affected by the topic?

The key is research so you don’t go down that dark hole.

But you do need to think about the character. As I told the crew, you need to be a wolf to catch a wolf.

o

What’s your opinion about the press that murderers get?

As a filmmaker and storyteller, I love the details. But I know that victims’ families find the stories painful and want to keep them private. So I’m divided on that.

Owies also commented on the father/son themes in the film, saying that part of his research included talking to his own father about what it was like to grow up without a father around. Those conversations played a role in the development of the character of John.

Above, Basel Owies finds his photo among the featured directors in the Flash Forward section of the festival.

Below, Basel Owies and World Cinema Programmer and Director of the Asian Film Academy Dosin Pak.

The 2014 Busan International Film Festival presented 312 films from 79 countries, including 96 world premieres and 36 international premieres. The Flash Forward section, in which The Barber premiered, presented 35 films from 29 countries. As the BIFF website noted, “This year in the Flash Forward, films from the Americas require a special spotlight both in quality and quantity.”

e chose the film in part because it “has many elements of what a good psychological thriller should be. I liked the way the story unfolds and that it has more than one twist.” He was also impressed with Scott Glenn’s performance and Owies’ “meticulous and well planned” direction, commenting that Owies is “a noteworthy director and I am looking forward to seeing his next feature.”

H

“It’s a tremendous accomplishment for Chapman Filmed Entertainment to see its first film in this internationally renowned film festival,” says Dean Bob Bassett. “Busan is really known as the Cannes of Asia. It’s a huge festival with a market attached, and given the growing importance of Asian markets, its stature continues to grow. We are fortunate that we have had an on-going relationship with the festival, through our own Busan West showcase, and through our ongoing partnerships and exchanges with various Korean universities.”

For Owies, MFA/Film Prod. ’10, the experience was novel in many ways. Invited to Busan by the festival, Owies had not only never been to Asia before, but he certainly had never had anyone ask for an autograph.

Watching the film with a paying audience was also a treat, as Owies enjoyed the reactions of film-goers to shots he’d seen “ad nauseum” through the editing process. In particular, the reactions of one girl, sitting just a couple of seats away, presented a wonderful barometer of audience reaction. “She reacted very physically,” he says, “she was very animated, put her hands up, as if the film was interacting with her in a direct way. It gives you confidence you know what you’re doing to see how the film plays.”

Following the screenings, Owies met young indie filmmakers who reminded him of himself before he went to film school.

They asked questions about financing, as he remembers thinking, “I’ve got an idea, but how do I make this?” Owies advised them “not to give up, to keep hitting the ground, because you’ll get a million ‘no’s’ but you won’t remember them when you get that one ‘yes.’ The misconception is that money is the only thing standing in your way, but you’ve got to be proactive, to counterbalance money with effort.”

“There are so many people trying to do this and you keep asking yourself, do I have the drive, the vision that will keep you in the game,” he says. The Barber gave him entrance into “the feature club, which is a hard club to get into, like a union.” Now, he says, he feels “way more equipped and ready, not intimidated by the scale of a project” and looking forward to what’s coming next.

For Owies, the chance to direct a $1M+ first feature through Chapman Filmed Entertainment was “priceless,” he says. “You don’t usually get opportunities above your current level, to have the chance to grow through trial by fire. When you get to direct a film not funded by your parents, it’s a big moment, regardless of the outcome.

And what is next for Owies? He’s writing, working on and producing smaller projects, including web series and commercials. He’s meeting with some talent agents and looking for the right project. And, he’s ready to go back to Korea, any time the opportunity should present itself.

CHAPMAN STUDENTS TRAVEL TO For the past five years, Chapman students have traveled with Professor Nam Lee to the Busan International Film Festival to get a taste of Asian cinema and culture, from seeing the works of Korean masters like Park Chan-Wook and Bong Joon-Ho as well as films from China and other parts of Asia, to visiting temples and tasting kimchee, Korea’s national spicy national dish.

Hollywood techniques) are linked to the culture in which they were created.”

“Being in Busan for a week and immersed in its culture and activities gave our students opportunities to see themselves from other points of view and to reflect upon Hollywood films as well as themselves from a distance,” says Dr. Lee. “This trip allows them to understand ‘other’ cinemas, cultures and people, to see different ways of storytelling and the cultural context they emerged from.”

For example, she says, “portraying the commitment of the husband to his dying wife in the Korean Revivre out of duty rather than love, demonstrated a culturally specific predilection of devotion and selflessness or a collectivist identification rather than the individualistic notions commonly presented in Hollywood cinema.” Such experiences help students acquire a perspective on the influence of culture on national cinemas.

Hannah Gary, a senior in the 4 + 1 Film Studies program, which enables her to complete her undergraduate degree and the first year of her graduate work simultaneously, learned “how deeply Asian films (despite their usage of

Chapman students also attended the premiere of The Barber.

“The Barber was a success in Busan because it won people’s hearts,” says Naam Lakkana Palawatvichai, a grad producing student from Thailand.

Basel Owies, Professor Nam Lee (third from left) and Dean Bassett (far right) with Chapman students in Busan.

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DMAC OPENS TO RAVE REVIEWS

The fall opening of the new Digital Media Arts Center drew heaps of praise from students, faculty and visitors alike who found the colorful, open spaces and state-of-the-art technology inviting for both work and relaxation. The availability of fresh food through the Grab and Go cafĂŠ and outdoor seating was particularly welcomed by Dodge students who previously had no access to food at the west end of campus except through vending machines.

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What the students are saying…

“

IT INSPIRES AND PROMOTES CREATIVITY. THE SPACE IS INVITING AND SOCIAL – AND ALWAYS SEEMS TO BE BUZZING WITH NEW

IDEAS. IT'S FANTASTIC TO SEE THIS

NEW HOME FOR DIGITAL ARTISTS BEING SO WELL CATERED TO THE “CREATIVE-CULTURE” THAT THE MAJOR ITSELF PROMOTES. I AM TRULY

GRATEFUL TO THE DONORS MADE THIS POSSIBLE. IT IS THE RESOURCE I NEED IN MY SENIOR YEAR AS I WORK

AND THOSE WHO

ON MY THESIS FILM. DAVID REYNOLDS BFA/DA ’15

”

The DMAC building is amazing.

Before now, we had to make room reservations at Dodge or take over the production design room to hold meetings. We couldn’t meet in the computer labs or we’d disturb other students.

There were very few places to go to have a quick meeting or just hangout. Now we have a beautiful lounge area – I can’t imagine going anywhere else.

I can meet with my team whenever I want and sit in comfy, colorful chairs. We can relax, doodle on the glass walls, and socialize freely, which actually helps productivity.

JUSTINE STEWART BFA/DA ’15

Seeing the Digital Arts

major through freshman eyes,

as a sophomore I now see a BRIGHT

future for the Digital Art Students at Dodge! There are SO many resources at the tips of our fingers. The only thing that makes it even better is our awesome faculty, who help us learn to use them. Thank you donors, you've made a bigger and better future for us!

RACHEL BELTRAN BFA/DA ‘17

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What the faculty are saying… d udents an ys at t s , s t s i t r “As a are alwa e w s l a n . professio g studios n i w a r d r u home in o has been able to Chapman mazing a is h t e c u d lso repro ent while a

environm e comforts th adding all anyone y g o l o n h and tec or.” r ask f could eve N EI BORENST SHELDON

The best thing about the DMAC is that our students now have a place to just “be.” The natural lighting creates an warm and inviting environment where students and faculty can work, talk, eat and spend time together. In terms of technology ... it’s hard to know where to begin! Recently, I was showing Ansel Adams images and scenes from Pixar’s Ratatouille to my lighting class and the projection system was AMAZING. Picture clarity is comparable to that in a movie theater. JUDY KRIGER

The DMAC is impressive for its striking design and advanced technology. Most visitors may not realize what all those monitors, powerful computers and state-of-the-art Cintique digital drawing tablets represent.

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It’s the only 4K-stereoscopic workflow in America! I applaud our Dean and Chief Technology Officer

Dan Leonard for his vision to keep Dodge firmly in the vanguard of this evolving industry.

My favorite aspects are two distinctly “nontech” features. For the first time, we have an

art studio without computers – where students can draw, paint, make a mess, and train the way artists have for centuries. And we have lounges, benches, and picnic tables, where all students can relax, mingle, and exchange ideas. Real creativity thrives in this spontaneous, unplanned interaction. BILL KROYER

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A key focus of a Dodge College film education is the evolution of film language – how narrative strategies and the filmmaking techniques that enable them allow filmmakers to continue to break new ground to tell stories that will reach audiences in new ways.

Beginning with a class first taught by legendary screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz, Dodge College Dean Bob Bassett has constantly pushed faculty to engage students with leading edge approaches to storytelling for the screen.

“If students want their work to stand out, they need to study both the best of the past,” Dean Bassett says, “as well as keeping an eye on emerging and inventive narrative strategies. We try to help our students do this through classes, of course, but also by bringing in filmmaker guests at the top of their game and taking students to festivals where the newest work is being screened. It’s a constant, but fascinating, pursuit to track this art form as it continues to evolve.”

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Amazingly compelling and inventive. A man in a car on the phone, jugging the complicated pieces of his life as it falls apart over a couple of hours.

A great performance by Tom Hardy, Wright is a director who is able to use the camera in an extremely limited physical space to tell a complex story. We are virtually eavesdroppers, witnessing the tension and tumult of Locke’s life and feeling as if we are participating in it. Loved it.

– BARBARA DOYLE

Stories We Tell directed by Sarah Polley immediately struck me as documentary that uses inventive narrative strategies to explore the filmmaker’s own family. Polley utilizes narrative film techniques, fusing together interviews, home movies, and newly shot footage to show how family memory and hindsight vision is not always 20/20. – EMILY CARMAN

Boyhood completely knocked me out. The richness and the complexity of the movie depended on rolling back our expectations. We filmgoers are used to grand drama and constant impending doom scenarios, but that intensity has dulled our senses. This

film succeeds by letting us see that the drama contained in real life is scary enough, sad enough, and challenging enough to keep us on the edge of our seats. – SUE KROYER

South Korean director Bong Joon-ho is one of the most innovative filmmakers working today who successfully combines commercial entertainment and thought-provoking social commentaries. Snowpiercer is his first “global project” using the English language and an international cast. It is an adaptation of a French graphic novel of the same title which many thought was not cinematic at all. However, borrowing only the idea of a perpetually running train in the new ice age, Bong has created a dystopian epic that is tonally unpredictable and visually spectacular.

An excellent example of storytelling (adaptation), art direction, set design and cinematography. – NAM LEE

This 2012 documentary, directed by Joshua Oppenheimer, is about the mass killings in Indonesia in 1965–66. What’s remarkable and innovative is the way Oppenheimer tells the story: he gets the perpetrators of the murders to talk about them openly, proudly, and then re-enact them. In doing so, they cast people to play their victims, and stage the murders as if in a movie. Which of course it is. And how did they learn how to commit murder? By watching movies. So this film is more than

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just a breakthrough documentary: it is a critique and observation on Hollywood movies, their global influence, and the filmmaking process itself. – ADAM LEIPZIG

American Hustle, not only for the tone of its character-based black humor making fun of a dark side of the America’s obsession with success, but mostly for the moment in the bar midway through the movie when all the characters are dressed up to meet the De Niro mafiosi. Each of them is almost drunk with anticipation, and then Jennifer Lawrence’s character, her eight-ball craziness building from a long time before, comes at everyone like a bowling ball descending on the pins, capable of sending the protagonists and antagonists careening to disaster in all directions.

Narrative so nimble and giddy with possibilities. David Russell really today’s Billy Wilder. – JEFF FAZIO

I find stories that tell stories that play with time – e.g., creating multiple streams, telling all or parts of the story in reverse, making huge leaps forward or backward in time – fascinating, and when done well, hugely influential on filmmakers. This past year, in TV – True Detective, in film – Boyhood. – PAUL WOLANSKY

It’s a major achievement to create a seamless canvas of visual effects integrated with live-action. But, it’s another to raise the end result to a lyrical

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level. Gravity is a film that did a phenomenal job of merging both the art and craft cinematic story-telling.

The POV between the objective and subjective realms were switched ever-so-subtly. The camera would traverse invisibly through walls that separated the two; when Sandra Bullock’s character is spinning off into space, the camera and sound effects went from exterior of spacesuit to interior of helmet to her perspective with no hint of a partition. The audience was taken from without to within. The filmmaker did this several times in different ways. – ARNIE SIRLIN Where the innovation came in for me was in how the director handled the problems surrounding the shooting of long scenes (150 of them were over 45 seconds in length) in a zero-g environment (i.e. space). Computer-generated imagery was used for the spacewalk scenes, and automotive robots were used to move Sandra Bullock’s character for interior space station scenes. This meant that shots and blocking had to be planned well in advance for the robots to be programmed. For most of Bullock’s exterior shots, she was placed inside a giant, mechanical rig. If all of this work wasn’t innovative enough, there was still the lighting to contend with. Cuarón and Lubezki had to simulate the authenticity and reflection of unfiltered light in space, and invented a manually controlled lighting system consisting of 1.8 million individually controlled LED lights. – LEE MARSHALL

Nebraska took acclaimed director Alexander Payne (Sideways,The Descendants) over a decade to get it made. Why? The film’s composed of all seniors, shot in black-and-white, no violence, no sex. Just a great story – well shot, written and acted.

Go with your father if you missed this gem. There’s a belief among many that The Sopranos saved television, showed that a story-driven, character-driven, show could succeed in the 21st century, succeed with millennials.

Here’s hoping films like Nebraska do the same for cinema.

– PETE WEITZNER

Top vote getter, with twice as many votes as any other film, was Gravity. Tied for second: Richard Linklater’s 12-years-in-the-making film, Boyhood, and Stories We Tell, a documentary by Sarah Polley. Also getting multiple votes: the documentary The Act of Killing and Terrence Malik’s The Tree of Life.

Otherwise, films nominated – and the reasons for their selection, were as varied as the faculty. Those named included:

This was a film I saw that I particularly enjoyed for the structure and visual language. As A. O. Scott wrote in the New York Times, “The drab, mumbly realism with which the director Edgar Wright depicts that city is offset – subverted, enlivened, thrown into crazy do-it-yourself pop-art relief – by images and situations drawn from arcade video games.

“The line between fantasy and reality is not so much blurred as erased, because the filmmakers create an entirely coherent, perpetually surprising universe that builds on Mr. O’Malley’s bold and unpretentious graphic style without slavishly duplicating it.”

– DAN LEONARD

The Polish film Ida for storytelling cinematography, acting, directing – but especially cinematography. The visual language envelopes you from the first image, and never lets go. Shot in 1:33.1 aspect ratio, B&W (Alexa), simply lit, with a mostly stationary camera – groundbreaking in terms of film language, telling its story through inventive narrative strategies. – FREDERIC GOODRICH

Under the Skin, directed by Jonathan Glazer. Very rarely these days do we see films that broach multiple genres and indeed, this film took ten years to get to the big screen, but it was worth the effort. I could spend a lot of time talking about how the film was shot, the phenomenal performance that Scarlett Johansson and the other actors gave, the score, the pacing, etc., but I’ll just say that it all comes together beautifully, in a way that entrusts us to our own interpretations of what it’s about… something else that’s also a rarity these days. – MATT DELLER

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

500 Days of Summer The Act of Killing American Hustle The Arbor The Artist Avatar Blue Jasmine Boyhood 5 Broken Cameras Buck Captain Philips The Cove Dale vs. Evil First Cousin Once Removed Food, Inc. The Gatekeepers The Great Beauty Gravity Her Ida Incendies The King’s Speech The Life of Pi

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Locke Lovelace Midnight in Paris Nebraska The One I Love A Prophet The Rabbi’s Cat Scott Pilgrim vs The World The Secret in Their Eyes A Separation The Skeleton Twins Small Apartments Snowpiercer The Social Network Stories We Tell The Tree Of Life The Triplets of Belleville True Detective (TV) Tucker Ultimate Dog Tease (web video) Under the Skin Waiting for Superman

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I am very interested in the new trend of hybrid documentaries – non-fiction films that are pushing formal and narrative limits. Excellent examples include The Act of Killing, Stories We Tell, and The Arbor (Clio Bernard, 2009), a complex story about playwright Andrea Dunbar – a drug addict and alcoholic – and her children, who suffered enormously as a result. Bernard uses actors to lip-synch the words of their real life counterparts and highly stylized performative recreations; it’s an unexpectedly engaging storytelling device that evokes strong visceral reactions. The stories they share might be impossible for the audience to absorb without the strategies Bernard employs. What makes this film even more interesting is that it successfully interweaves three distinct approaches: the one just mentioned, scenes that are purely archival, and a contemporary performance of one of Dunbar’s awardwinning autobiographical plays set in the neighborhood where it actually took place. The film is hard to describe but very worth seeing. –HELEN HOOD SCHEER

The Tree of Life points to the future of cinema not in terms of subject matter but rather in how writer-director Terrence Malick utilizes an economy of dialogue and verbal exposition to tell his story – what I have termed a type of Narrative Shorthand. As commercial cinema evolves, audiences require less and less information in order to comprehend plot and character. Malick pushed this idea much further than many mainstream audiences are presently willing to accept, but it seems inevitable that the day is coming when such extreme narrative economy will become the norm. – ANDY ERISH

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The film that had the biggest effect on me in recent years was Spike Jonze’ Her. It was bold provocative filmmaking with a humanistic vision of the near future that I have never seen before. Unlike most futuristic films, it was intimate. Most of the film we’re on Joaquin Phoenix’s face. The love interest was simply a voice. A lesser filmmaker would have chosen to show Samantha at one point ... or have her become human at the end. Her challenged me visually, intellectually and most importantly, emotionally. For some, Her was about how technology is taking over our lives. For me, it was about human loneliness and our need to connect with one another. Like all great films, it challenges us, making us look inward to explore the frailty of the human condition. It’s a film worth viewing every couple of months to remind us how truly wonderful cinema can be.

– BARRY BLAUSTEIN

The King’s Speech photographed on 35mm film by Danny Cohen, BSC (Les Miserables), is worthy of mentioning in regard to excellence in filmmaking and straying from the traditional approach.

This was a traditional story based on real events. The choice of using extraordinary wide lenses often but throughout the film in both master shots and close-ups as well as unique compositions, often what I would call “Half a Bubble Off,” with distortion of lenses intact when wanted, and the camera placed in order to use the effect, left the audience with a very specific emotion centering on both of the main characters.

The shallow depth of field used throughout also kept the audience focused on what the filmmakers intended. The lighting and the color shifts from cool to warm according to the emotional content of the individual scenes was likewise brilliant.

King George VI suffering with a speech impediment (stammer) and the speech therapist who helps him overcome this are the two main characters. The use of the short focal length lenses (wide) and the sometime awkward compositions were done so the audience would have a strong emotional reaction to the King’s particular problem/challenge at the center of the story. A daring approach but so well executed and appropriate to story and the results were astonishing. – JOHNNY JENSEN

When I teach the students to shoot with a moving camera I emphasize that all camera movement must be invisible.

The purpose of the film is to transport the audience into the story. If we see the camera moving this destroys the reality of the film.

a very “solo” point of view – that of the main character at a crossroads in his life journey and utilizes a challenging concept (shared by Gravity, and the Life of Pi), that is telling the story largely through the experiences of a single character undergoing the action, the dramatic movement of the piece, on a solo basis.

For pushing special effects to the furthest limit available in each of their release eras, I would mention Avatar, Gravity, and Life of Pi. Not only do the visual effects break heretofore believed “barriers,” they are absolutely integral to the dramatic movement, tone, production design and overall effectiveness of the work. Also, the use of visual effects dwarfs the live action, which the effects are utilized to supposedly support. The audible and palpable intake of the audiences’ breaths during the screenings of these films defies responses to more traditional filmmaking and reflects audiences’ delight and utter surprise throughout the entirety of each film. – ALEX ROSE

Today the trend is to push the edge of the envelope and to shoot with a camera that is constantly in motion in a sometimes blind quest to make the film as visually dynamic as possible. The best directors know how to do this, but always keep the camera motion invisible and also honor the fact that the drama of the story is best conveyed in a two, matching, static reverse close-ups.

The two best recent examples of this balancing act are A Prophet, directed by Jacques Audiard, and, A Separation, directed by Asghar Farhadi. – GIL BETTMAN

500 Days of Summer was a wonderfully innovative film as wild and unpredictable as romance itself. It embraced a wildly varied tone and fantastic variety of narrative techniques to allow us to feel both the exhilaration and heartbreak of love. Told in nonlinear fashion and daringly revealing the unhappy fate of its young lovers at the beginning of the movie, it still pulls us into their struggle and gets us to hope against hope for them to work things out thanks largely to the assurance and bold thinking of its filmmakers.

My number one, by far, is The Great Beauty. It’s a film that includes spectacular visuals, encompassing, at times, a more traditional approach to staging and lenses – and utilizing visual special effects, but these effects are never more outlandish or beyond the scope of what one would imagine the main character capable of conjuring up, even in his dreams. The film is also conceived from

One example of the wild creativity embraced by the makers of 500 days of Summer is the musical segment which steps away from the style in the entire rest of the film and uses old-fashioned musical conventions and an up tempo song by Hall and Oates to portray the mad rush of love as experienced by Tom Hansen, the film’s main character. Another one-of-a-kind technique is employed when we are simultaneously shown via split screen both Tom’s expectation and the reality of an interaction with Summer at a point when he hopes to reunite with her. –DAVE KOST

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FIRST CUT Premiering the Storytellers of Tomorrow

Industry guests joined Dodge College students, alumni and faculty for the 2014 Leo Freedman Foundation First Cut Screening at the Directors Guild of America Theater in Los Angeles in September.

Five films, Barstow, Gefilte Fish, REAllOVE, Unspoken, and Wire Cutters, showcased the inventive thinking of Dodge College filmmakers. The films explored stories as diverse as an elderly Jewish woman who ultimately sees past her ingrained racism when she is forced to work with a young AfricanAmerican man performing community service (Gefilte Fish) to an otherworldly story of an old model robot tangling with a newer model robot as they compete to collect minerals on another planet (Wire Cutters).

Applicants for the coming year mingled with the guests. “I was really amazed by what they accomplished in these films. They were extremely professional looking, and looked just like a Hollywood feature!” said one. “Impressed isn’t even the word I would use. SUPER impressed is more like it,” added another.

“It made me want to attend Dodge even more.”

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hey came from all over – from Vietnam to Bulgaria, from South Africa to South America, from Finland to the Philippines.

Some 200 film school faculty from 102 schools in 48 countries around the world came to Dodge College in mid-October for the 2014 CILECT (Centre International de Liaison des Ecoles de Cinéma et de Télévision) Congress.

For the first time in nearly 30 years, the international association of film schools came to North America. “I think it says a lot about how Chapman is seen in the global film school community,” says Dean Bob Bassett, noting that the last time the conference was held in North America it was hosted by USC.

BY JANELL SHEARER

The conference theme of Pre-visualization brought forth a stimulating dialogue during the four-day conference, which was kicked off by the delegates visiting Dodge College and a lively on-stage interview of director William Friedkin (The French Connection, The Exorcist) by Dean Bassett.

Film Faculty FROM AROUND THE WORLD

❶

Gather at Chapman Other highlights included presentations by keynote speakers:

•

Gil Zimmerman, an adjunct professor at Dodge College and Layout Department Chair at Dreamworks Animation, talking about how pre-visualization was used on How To Train Your Dragon 2, the highest grossing animated film of 2014.

• Dan Gregoire, founder of the Pre-visualization Society and of HALON Entertainment, one of the Hollywood’s top pre-visualization houses whose artists have worked on such blockbusters as Avatar, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Spider-Man 3, Kung Fu Panda and many others.

•

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Chris Edwards, CEO and Creative Director of The Third Floor and another founder of the Previsualization Society, who has worked for Disney and worked on films from Iron Man 2 to Star Trek, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian and many others.

❷

CILECT Executive Director Dr. Stanislav Semerdjiev, who is president of the Bulgarian Association of Film, TV and Radio Scriptwriters and formerly rector of the National Academy for Theatre and Film Arts in Sofia, Bulgaria, was thrilled with the organization and success of the conference.

“I have heard from many of our members that this was a great congress and that Chapman University is definitely a leader in world film and TV education,” he says.

❺

A good number of Chapman faculty attended the conference as well, enjoying the conversations on different approaches to film education and discussing new international connections.

Film Division Chair Barbara Doyle hopes one result will be “more grad applications from international students and more international exchanges.” And Professor Dave Kost found that the opportunity “to share experiences and insights with film educators from such completely different cultures broadens my perspective in a way I can take back to my teaching.”

❻

❸

Ultimately, as Dr. Sermerdjiev says, the value of CILECT comes from conversation.

He recalls one evening with friends old and new when “it just struck me down that out of the five people at the table we had a Jew, a Muslim, an Orthodox Christian, a Catholic and a Protestant. Not one of them even thought about it before or during the dinner. Being a screenwriter, though, I kept thinking of it and before I went to sleep, I just said to myself – wouldn’t the world be a greater place if that unbelievably beautiful situation could become the modus vivendi of it?”

❶ Garth Holmes (left) from the South African School of Motion Picture Medium and Live Performance and Lambert Beyens from Erasmushogeschool Brussel in Belgium at the opening reception.

❷ Dean Bob Bassett joins CILECT Executive Director Dr. Stanislav Semerdjiev and President Dr. Maria Dora Mourao, University of Sao Paulo, addressing the delegates.

❸ Delegates enjoyed a beach theme at the welcome reception held in Sound Stage B.

❹ In business sessions, members vote by country. ❺ What students should learn about the pre-visualization process was a key topic of discussion at the Congress.

❻ The Congress included representatives from 102 schools in 48 countries.

❹ 19

Delegates Dieudonné Timothée Mballa Mballa (left), and Madeleine Mitlassou, from Cameroon Radio and Television.

AN INTERVIEW WITH

CILECT President Dr. Maria Dora Mourao, University of Sao Paulo, at the welcome reception with Professor Silvio Fischbein, University of Buenos Aires.

William Friedkin

Director William Friedkin, a one-time Filmmaker-inResidence at Chapman, returned to share his insights from more than five decades in the business on his career and how filmmaking has changed in the age of pre-visualization. A few key thoughts:

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•

On The French Connection: “I always wanted to find a subject that uses documentary techniques, where the camera discovers the action. The idea is following the action as purely and as smoothly as possible.”

•

On the famous chase scene in that film: “The chase is a metaphor for the lead character, it shows his obsession, that he cared about nothing but getting this drug smuggler. Fitzgerald had a note card posted above the desk where he wrote: ‘action is character.’

What they do is who they are.”

•

On chases in movies: “They are purely visual, something you can’t do in any other medium. It’s pure cinema. A lot of what we see in films is no more than a photographed play. A chase is knitting one image to another.”

•

On Sorcerer: That’s the film I hope to be remembered by, it’s the best I’ve done. We did one take on every shot because it was so well planned and laid out.

I made sure we were all on the same page.”

BY MEAGAN O’SHEA

Unites Disciplines through Collaboration and Creativity enior Paige Katz never pictured herself as a filmmaker. So when she enrolled in the Public Relations and Advertising program in Dodge College, she was surprised to see a film class among her requirements.

It wasn’t until after she completed the Introduction to Visual Storytelling course did she grasp its necessity and realize its benefits for her future career.

“Before taking the class I did not think about the best way to present a story to an audience,” says Katz. “But I now try to apply the ideas I learned in Visual Storytelling to my PR classes when I am working on various campaigns and projects.

I was able to learn so much about the filmmaking process and how to tell a story.”

“It all ties into the concept of visual communication and visual literacy,” says Associate Dean Michael Kowalski. “We’re talking about an entire generation of students who grew up consuming visual media and, in order to be literate, they need to be able to not only write it but produce it as well.”

Aside from serving as the foundational course for all disciplines within Dodge College, from advertising to film production to film studies, Visual Storytelling teaches students how to create emotionally compelling characters that resonate with an audience while building a culture of collaboration among Dodge College students in diverse programs.

The class is structured like a workshop. Students from the different degree programs work together in a boot camp-like setting where they get to know one another and forge partnerships that not only aid them throughout their time at Dodge College but also can follow them in their professional years.

During the semester students are instructed to create eight videos that vary in length from 30 seconds to seven minutes. The exercise directives focus on creating emotional connections between character and audience via story and performance, and creatively expressing a character’s inner states through the visual and aural elements of filmmaking.

Students create short videos including dramatic non-fiction narratives as well as fictional stories that demonstrate point-of-view, create compelling characters and illustrate desires/stakes, action/complication and climax/resolution – all with few or no words. They then screen and critique one another’s projects, discussing what worked and what didn’t work, to learn how to give and receive constructive criticism.

“The idea of having to do something creative and put it in front of a group of people is kind of terrifying for most students. This is a good class to get over that fear, to get students willing to constructively articulate about each other’s work.”

PROFESSOR DAVE KOST

Visual Storytelling lays the groundwork for more complex projects such as Andrej Landin's senior thesis Into the Silent Sea.

Marion Knott

A LIVING LEGACY

I

n Southern California, the well-known name Knott means very different things to different people. To older generations, the Knott of Knott’s Berry Farm means an old West ghost town and chicken dinners. To younger generations, Knott’s Berry Farm means thrill rides and Knott’s Scary Farm, a favorite Halloween haunt. But to the students of Dodge College, the name Knott, as in Marion Knott, has meant opportunities unlike those at any other film school in the country.

With the passing of Marion Knott on November 13 at age 92, Chapman University has lost a very special friend. But her name and legacy will live on, benefitting generations of students who will never see her gentle smile or experience her direct inquiries into their career plans and job prospects.

And they will nonetheless benefit from her generosity and commitment to their welfare.

Since 2006, Marion Knott Studios has been an unrivaled facility in film education. But well before that, Marion Knott was making a difference at Chapman, as a trustee, as the

Left photo: Marion Knott and her husband Tony Montapert take a hard hat tour of the studios under construction. Mrs. Knott loved interacting with students and came regularly to lunch with scholars and filmmakers participating in the Marion Knott Filmmaker-in-Residence program including writer/director David Ward (center photo, white jacket) and director Peter Medak (right photo, brown jacket).

first person to see and support the wisdom of Dean Bob Bassett’s proposed Filmmaker-in-Residence program, as one of the earliest donors to support a fledgling film program that eventually became Dodge College of Film and Media Arts.

Mrs. Knott’s gifts ranged from the first gift Dean Bob Bassett received, well before the film school existed, to her $1 million pledge to endow the Marion Knott Filmmaker-in-Residence in 1999, a critical step that raised the visibility of the program in Hollywood by bringing prominent filmmakers to campus for a semester. Through the years, guests included well-known filmmakers such as Arthur Hiller, Mark Rydell, Carl Franklin and Tom Mankiewicz, as well as those who eventually became full-time faculty at Dodge: John Badham, David Ward, and Martha Coolidge. The program inspired other filmmaker-inresidence endowments, doubling the impact of the program.

With construction underway for the new studios in 2005, Mrs. Knott came to the rescue as rising costs created the prospect of opening the building without equipment. Her surprise gift of $3 million in cash reignited a stalled fund-raising campaign and, as Dean Bassett remembers, “In a few months our campaign chairman Paul Folino and I had the money in hand to open the building as it was meant to be.”

Yet, Mrs. Knott was always self-effacing – giving to benefit others, not drawing any attention to herself. When Dean Bassett approached her about putting her name on the studios, she said “absolutely not,” and reiterated that she had never allowed her name on any building. But he told her, “It’s not for you, it’s for us, because we want to associate ourselves with your values and your sensibility.”

Years later her son Darrel Anderson shared that she was proud of having her name on the facility that was symbolic of the vision she and Dean Bassett shared and that she was particularly happy with the growing reputation of the film school and the work it did with future generations of storytellers.

Touched by

An Angel In many ways, Marion Knott was the film school’s guardian angel. Dean Bassett’s memories of her, shared with news of her passing, elicited feedback from students, parents, and alumni – some whom knew Marion personally, many who did not.

Kathy Munson, Communications, ’84: Marion was an inspiration and a class act without being stuffy in the least. I loved the opportunities I had to spend time with her. I am sorry that you will no longer benefit from her enthusiasm, but I’m sure she is keeping an eye on you and “the kids” from her new vantage point!

Jaho Koo, sophomore film production major: Thank you for sharing the inspiring story of Marion Knott. I am sorry I did not know her personally, but I am extremely thankful for her gift and vision. Knowing our school’s history, I feel more connected to our community and I am glad to be a part of this dream-like place.

Sue Wiedenfeld and Allen Hillel, parents of freshman Hadley Hillel, film production major: I heard you speak on parents’ weekend and love the story of how Dodge College has changed from when you were an assistant professor until now. My husband and I love hearing how your vision and leadership has moved Dodge forward. Clearly, Marion Knott was a critical part of that growth.

Again, we so appreciate hearing about the evolution of Dodge and the visionary woman who was its great benefactor.

23 FOR STUDENTS, ALUMNI AND FRIENDS OF DODGE COLLEGE OF FILM AND MEDIA ARTS AT CHAPMAN UNIVERSITY

Facing huge demand for its Summer Film Academy program for high school students, Dodge College accepted the largest group of students ever this year, 35 in each of two sessions. “We were lucky,” says Assistant Director of Admissions, Lauren Kacura, “because everyone we admitted wanted to come.

DEMAND SOARS FOR SUMMER FILM ACADEMY

We also had an exceptional list of students on our waiting list, so we decided to open up more space to let them all in.”

For two weeks, students live on campus and attend rigorous, all-day classes that extend late into the evening. They learn how to write scripts, shoot movies and edit sound. Subjects of this year’s films ranged in tone from the dark story of a school shooter to the comically absurd story of a production assistant working on his first film where everything goes wrong.

Students got a chance to see the technical side of the industry as well touring a camera and equipment rental company and Mole Richardson, one of the oldest lighting rental houses in Hollywood.

Of course, it isn’t all hard work. Students got to see Walt Disney Pictures’ Maleficent at the El Capitan Theater, take a tour of the Warner Bros. Studio backlot, and wander the shops of Anaheim’s Downtown Disney District. Then, at the end of the session, the students presented their films to their friends and family at a special screening in Folino Theater.

“The Summer Film Academy is the reason I came to Chapman,” says Matt Somogyi (BFA/FP, ’13), who participated in the program two years ago. “I had gone to film camps at other universities, which were okay, but they were more seminar-based. Chapman’s program is much more intense. We were in preproduction, production, or post-production creating films. I thought if this is what it’s like to be at Chapman, this is where I want to be.”

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BY JEFF HEIMBUCH

uring an uninterrupted shot that lasts much longer than a conventional shot, sometimes incorporating an entire sequence, the camera never cuts away, and everything has to be just right in order for it to work. Of course, this takes hours of planning, practice, and rehearsal, but the results can be pretty spectacular such as the famous walking scene in Goodfellas, or, more recently, the long takes in Gravity.

LONG TAKE. THE ONER. SEQUENCE SHOT. ALL OF THESE ARE USED TO DESCRIBE A CONTINUOUS SHOT, ONE OF THE MOST NOTORIOUSLY DIFFICULT SHOTS TO PULL OFF IN ANY FILM.

Since the beginning of film, continuous shots have amazed audiences. Sometimes they open a film. Other times, they come in the middle, catching the audience off guard.

Some can even be viewed as short films in their own right. Most leave viewers with their jaws hanging open, wondering “Just how did they do that?”

Professor Roy Finch aims to help students understand these complicated shots in his summer Continuous Take class. Each week, the class watches a handful of clips, from modern classics to unknown gems, and breaks down each aspect of a shot to learn its secrets.

In addition, everyone in the class shoots their own continuous take project. Joseph Weber (BA/Film Production ’17), came prepared to talk about his ideas for a short horror script he had written about a girl being stalked by a mysterious creature. After reading it aloud, the class began a lively discussion on just how to accomplish the entire thing in one shot, including the pacing and the practical and special effects needed to accomplish his goal.

Trevor Stevens (BA/Film Production ’15) will be using his new-found knowledge of continuous shots this spring for his thesis film, RUN. He showed the class some rough storyboards of how he was going to tackle his sequence of two rival gang members escaping from a building, complete with location photos and a very animated explanation.

Jeff Hodges (BA/Film Production ’16) brought in a quadcopter, modified to hold a GoPro camera, and the class took it outside to do some tests. The result was an amazing mix of continuous shots and breath-taking views that were once only possible on million-dollar budgets.

Finch challenges his students to get creative. If something isn’t working, regardless of budget, it isn’t the end of the world; it just needs to be re-evaluated. He stressed that creative limitations sometimes force you to create an amazing solution that works out even better than before, such as that continuous shot that will blow an audience away.

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Justin Simien O

n the heels of the theatrical release of his film Dear White People by Lionsgate, Justin Simien (BFA/Film Production ’04)

seems to be everywhere lately. From being named one of 10 Directors to Watch by Variety in 2013 to winning the Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Talent at the 2014 Sundance Festival, Simien has gone on to appear on CNN, The Colbert Report and appeared in a fashion spread in the November issue of Esquire in which “four of this year’s breakthrough movie directors show off the best bold overcoats for fall.”

(Left) Professor David Ward (The Sting) leads a Q&A with Justin Simien.

Yet in the midst of this whirlwind of activity, Simien took time to return to this alma mater to screen his film to a full house in the Folino Theater and answer questions about where he is today, how he got there, and where he’s going next.

After spending eight years on Dear White People, Simien is ready to move on. What’s next? Writing a horror/satire script, reading indie scripts, pushing for the DWP TV show, and being attached to a studio project. Noting that the bar is “pretty high” for a sophomore project following the success he’s enjoyed with his first film, Simien nevertheless says “I just want to get back in the director’s chair; it’s where I feel most alive.”

Interviewed by Academy Award-winning screenwriter and Chapman Professor David Ward, Simien shared some observations:

• Simien started thinking about the film after a Black Student Union meeting at Chapman.

Noticing how some of his friends answered the phone depending on whether the caller was black or white, he realized that “we toggled aspects of our black identity up and down.” That observation reminded him of his own experience: of being “too black” at his white elementary school and being called out for speaking “too white” in the black Dallas neighborhood where he lived.

• On shaping his story and characters: “Nothing reveals structure problems as much as a table read.”

• “Characters have to be archetypal to some extent because you don’t have time to flesh out personalities. I looked for four that surprised me.” Simien is creating a TV series based on Dear White People so that he can further develop other characters and stories.

• The film does not have a moral or a message, but rather explores a theme, “Who I really am versus how I’m perceived.”

Simien appeared for a sold-out Q&A at Dodge College in late October. Students lined up from around the block to see the film.

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Chapman students join the crowd in Bologna, Italy, for an outdoor screening.

A Critical Approach to the Literature of this Century

BY JANELL SHEARER Although she does not discount the value of studying literature, Professor Carman’s assessment reflects two intertwined realities. First, that the visual media are increasingly supplanting written language (an occasion the merits of which are deeply and hotly debated in many quarters beyond academe). And second, that many young people are simply attracted to the study of a subject they love – film.

s “Film studliiesh is the Engf the degree o ury.”

21st cent

“If it is not the English degree of the 21st century,” says Erik Castanon, B.A./Film Studies, ’15, “it is definitely the liberal arts degree tailored for the needs and interests of the 21st century.”

More importantly, says Dean Bob Bassett, “film is the literature of this century. Film is the way we tell each other stories and ask ourselves questions about who we are and why we are here. Literature has always fulfilled that Y CARMAN IL M E R role in society, but film today has a far greater reach in society at large.

O PROFESS Personally I wish everyone would read and study the great works of literature.

But to ignore what film contributes to the conversation is literally to miss out on the primary conversation taking place about the stories we tell each other as human beings.”

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Yet why study film, in an era when “what career will this major prepare me for” is a driving question for both students and parents? Many students see film studies as a good choice for a minor, where they can indulge their passion for film and still pursue a more defined major/career path.

Others, perhaps more committed to film but reluctant to depend on a liberal arts focus alone, choose a double major in film studies and, often, a major like business.

“Film studies is often not taken seriously,” says Professor Nam Lee, “because films are too close to everyday life. There may be people who don’t read, but everybody thinks they can talk about film.”

And everybody does – on Rotten Tomatoes and on social media, on podcasts and through YouTube parodies, the barrage of public opinion is fast, relentless and often mindless.

Directorial choices, the faithfulness of a book adaptation or the choice of a given actress for a lead role are endlessly debated. Having seen plenty of “behind the scenes” videos and read interviews with directors, cinematographers and editors, people feel comfortable weighing in on subjects about which their knowledge may be shallow or ill-informed.

In the broadest sense, film studies provide “a context for what films teach us about human nature, and about our world,” says Dr. Lee. Today, in particular, studying film is a way to study other cultures, she says, to see how they are reflected in film. In the past, the influence of Hollywood was primarily one-way: the traditions of Hollywood films were carried overseas. Now the flow of storytelling forms is

more global, she says, and film studies can help students understand the thought behind differing narrative structures and cultural traditions.

In addition, film studies asks students to engage in a scholarly dialogue with other scholars, says Dr. Lee. And, for the broader student population for many of whom writing is a challenge, the analytical challenge of a scholarly paper demands “learning to articulate and vet your ideas,” says Dr. Carman,

rm, “As an artaftoions the obserfvfers on that film o at large the culturcet directly interse ny other with ma study.” areas oEfMILY CARMAN R PROFESSO

skills that can be useful in pitching a project for funding or in attracting the participation of key talent or applied to work in virtually any field.

As an art form, the observations that film offers on the culture at large intersect directly with many other areas of study, says Dr. Carman. “Film raises questions related to journalism, about the value of fiction versus non-fiction. It explores how we see history, how ideology affects

our perceptions of gender and women’s rights, about how we see the future. And it often addresses questions that can’t be discussed in the mainstream media.” All of these questions and more are explored in film history classes as well as a wide range of genre and topics classes, from horror films to censorship.

Film studies classes also offer tremendous advantages for students who wish to become filmmakers, which is why the key film history classes are required for film production majors. “If you want to write a good book, you need to read classical novels,” says Dr. Carman.

In the same vein, aspiring filmmakers need to see good movies because most young filmmakers start out by imitating the past, Dr. Lee points out. “A filmmaker can get technical help,” she says, “but to tell a good story, you need to be exposed to good movies. If you want to do something new, you have to know what’s been done before.”

As Professor Carman’s father admonished her when she started college – “you should go to college to learn, to expand your mind.” That indeed is the role of film studies today – to help students understand how history, society and culture have shaped, and continue to shape, how we see ourselves, how we see others, and how we understand our world.

An archiving workshop with Alan Boyd, second from left, and the Pickford Foundation.

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Who studies film studies?

Students who choose to major in film studies, in either Chapman’s undergraduate or graduate film studies programs, “love researching or dream of working for the new Academy museum,” says Dr. Carman. Others, she says, “love movies, but find the idea of directing intimidating at the age of 18.”

Students currently majoring in film studies are pursuing a wide variety of minors, from business to psychology, history, women’s studies, anthropology and sociology. Double majors are common with theater and English.

And students in the film studies minor are majoring in everything from health sciences to creative producing, economics, art history and creative writing.

Where does film studies lead?

Many find film studies an open door to a wide variety of work in the industry. Dr. Carman has seen recent grads go to work for talent agencies or on film crews. One recent grad is a writer for Comedy Central. Another is a critic for the LA Weekly.

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Film studies majors are interested in working in film archives as well as in a wide range of other related areas.

Natasha Peralta ’15 plans to be script supervisor. Erik Castanon ’15 intends to go on to grad school for a business entertainment degree to ultimately work in talent management or development. Haley Shepherd ’16 wants to be a casting director.

They also find industry-related internships. Caitlin Manocchio ’17 has already completed two, at the Writer’s Guild Foundation Library and at Backstage Magazine in the casting department. She intends to pursue a Masters degree in library science in preparation for work as a film researcher and archivist.

Film around the world: From Hollywood to Korea

Il Cinema Ritrovato film preservation festival. And Professor Lee opens the door to the expanding world of Asian cinema by taking students to the Busan International Film Festival, known as the Cannes of Asia, in South Korea each year.

Locally, students visit various film archives in Hollywood for research and are treated to screenings of silent films with live musical accompaniment such as The Hoodlum (director Sidney Franklin, 1919) sponsored by the Mary Pickford Foundation and the Academy Film Archive.

The screening of Sidney Franklin’s The Hoodlum (1919) on 35mm featured live, musical accompaniment.

A growing range of extracurricular activities are available to students interested in film studies through Dodge College. January classes have been traveling to the Sundance Film Festival for years. More recently, film students have accompanied Professor Carman to Bologna, Italy, for the

Professor Nam Lee leads the discussion in French New Wave Cinema.

Professor David Desser (center) and director XU Haofeng (The Sword Identity – second from left) lead a panel on martial arts cinema at the 2013 Busan West Film Festival.

Meet the faculty Dr. Nam Lee is an Asian cinema specialist, teaching classes such as Survey of World Cinema, Asian Blockbusters and Film Theory and Criticism. Teaching Asian cinema to American students puts some cultural differences in stark relief. For example, she says, American students tend to be very happy. Enjoying advantages that young people in other countries do not, American students are less likely to look at society critically than their European counterparts, for example, where wars have helped shape the role of film in society.

Some students, she observes, are so conditioned by Hollywood films that when they watch films from other countries they see gaps between the storytelling style they are used to and storytelling conventions in other countries.

Before she came to the U.S. to earn her Ph.D. in Critical Studies at USC, Dr. Lee was a film critic and journalist in Seoul, Korea, where she covered film festivals around the world. The contacts she made in Korea have been invaluable in her ability to arrange special meetings for students with directors and others at the Busan

International Film Festival. In addition, Dr. Lee has brought the major Korean directors (Park Chan-wook, Stoker, Oldboy; Bong Joon-ho, Mother, The Host, Snowpiercer; and Kim Jee-woon, The Good, the Bad, the Weird and The Last Stand) to the U.S. for Chapman’s Busan West Film Showcase which introduced students and the local community to major works by Asian

or “A contextafch e what filmshtuman us about about nature, anrdworld.” ou R. NAM LEE D

filmmakers. Her goal as an educator, she says, is to help her students be open to differences and explore new possibilities in cinematic art.

In Dodge College, where interests in Hollywood mainstream filmmaking, the best films of the past, and the emerging markets of Asian cinema come together, Dr. Emily Carman brings expertise in film preservation

and in the classic Hollywood films of the late teens through the ’40s, when she notes, “movies were the mass medium” and had more of a cultural impact without today’s competition of TV, the Internet etc.

With a Ph.D. in Cinema and Media Studies from UCLA, Dr. Carman has written extensively about the studio system and media industries, including the emergence of female stars as freelance labor in the 1930s and the way in which legal infrastructures influence and regulate the content, distribution, and consumption of film and media. She teaches classes in film history as well as Survey of American Cinema, Film Historiography, and topics classes such as U.S. Postwar Cinema and Censorship.

Her experience in film archiving and preservation at Warner Bros. Archives and the Academy Archives, among other major archives, is a driving force behind field trips to major collections in Hollywood as well as the newly inaugurated summer travel course to Bologna, where students can see classic films as they were meant to be seen, with “big, enthusiastic audiences.”

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The quaint, medieval city of Braunschweig is an unlikely setting for an alien invasion or a chainsaw massacre, but it was the setting for the 2014 Cinestrange Film Festival, which celebrates science fiction, horror, independent film, and documentary.

JOHN BADHAM Saturday Night Fever

receives Lifetime Achievement Award It’s also where Professor John Badham (Saturday Night Fever) received the festival’s lifetime achievement award for his work on films like Short Circuit, War Games and Saturday Night Fever.

“I was pleased to be nominated,” says Badham, “but at the same time, I kept expecting to find out it was like one of those letters from Nigeria where someone’s jailed grandfather has left them $32 million. I talked with Joe Dante (Gremlins), who received the award last year, and he said it was okay, so I accepted the invitation.”

During the festival, Badham participated in several events, including a Saturday Night Fever party with John Travolta look-alikes as well as various Q&A panels dedicated to his films.

“A lot of professors were in attendance and had done a great deal of study about my films,” says Badham. “I remember having one discussion about corporate and governmental distrust in my films, particularly when it comes to surveillance, and how these themes predicted issues we’re facing today. I can’t remember if I was thinking about those themes when I was making those films or if they were just inherent in the material, but to have that kind of discussion with people who treat film so seriously was truly a rewarding experience.”

War Games Short Circuit

The medieval city of Braunschweig where Professor Badham received his award

BY MEAGAN O'SHEA

Though he speaks no Russian, Professor Barry Blaustein helped create the most successful TV show in the history of Russian television. Though he’s had great success as a screenwriter in Hollywood, Blaustein had never worked on a sitcom – the form of the Russian comedy Fizruk, or “Gym Teacher,” which he traveled to Russia over two summers to help create.

Fizruk features Foma (played by Dmitriy Nagiev), a low-level enforcer for the Mob who loses his job and decides to become a gym teacher. Stuck in a 90’s Russian mindset, Foma believes racketeering is still the currency of the country and struggles

“I thought I would like to do something like that, because I love to travel and experience different cultures,” says Blaustein. “So I asked him if he thought they might be interested in using someone like me,” says the veteran writer of Saturday Night Live and of such Hollywood comedies as The Nutty Professor and Coming to America. “Little did he know I had little experience writing sitcoms.”

After a successful Skype interview with GoodStoryMedia, a Russian Production Company, Blaustein was hired to develop storylines for an original sitcom for four weeks with an option for another four. Russian sitcoms air four episodes per week, with a season lasting five weeks, unlike their American counterparts which typically air one episode a week over 20 weeks.

To prepare for his new foray into sitcoms he taught a semester in TV Writing (Comedy) shortly before traveling to Russia, which he says contributed to his success working on the show.

to adjust to a society that has changed. While he teaches, he also uses the school as a front for activities like blackmail and prostitution.

Blaustein also left one job – as a screenwriter in Hollywood – to become a full-time screenwriting professor. While visiting a friend in early 2013, he was introduced to a television writer who had consulted on Russian versions of American sitcoms.

With one exception, Blaustein’s Russian colleagues didn’t speak any English. Yet working with a translator they were able to create storylines for 20 episodes.

After the first season aired, the show’s popularity escalated, quickly making it the most successful TV show in the history of Russian television. It was nominated for a Taffy Award for Best Show (the Russian equivalent to the Emmy’s) and brought on the creation of a second (currently airing) and third season, which Blaustein collaborated on over the summers of 2013 and January 2014, respectively.

Currently, Blaustein has a few irons in the Hollywood fire, but he is primarily focusing on teaching, which he finds incredibly life-affirming.

“I get so much satisfaction out of seeing a student have a breakthrough – it’s a tremendous high, as a professor.”

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Puts Filmmakers on the Same Page DYNAMIC BLOCKING AND STAGING: ACTION SEQUENCE

Static

Dynamic

After school, a 16-year-old girl wearing an ill-fitting grey hoodie is walking out of the high school parking lot, books held tight to her chest. A Jeep filled with boys roars by, whooping and hollering at her as they pass. As they round the corner in front of her, the girl notices another car, stopped outside the school. A shadowy figure sits in the driver’s seat, his eyes fixed on her. She pulls her hood over her head and continues walking, but the car follows her and then cuts her off.

Through the open window, she sees the driver staring at her. Before he can say anything, she rushes towards him, screaming and cursing.

The man puts the car in reverse and speeds away.

INDICATING CAMERA MOVES: ZOOM & JIB/CRANE

BY BRIAN HAMILTON

tudents clap as their classmate finishes presenting her storyboard, titled The Long Walk Home, for Professor Ernie Marjoram’s Storyboarding & Perspective for Production Design class.

“I like what you did,” says Professor Marjoram, “but I think we need to see the man’s reaction to her yelling at him.”

“It was hard getting it all down to one board and I wanted to show the camera moving around the car here,” she says, pointing to a long panel divided into three shots.

“That’s a great panel,” Professor Marjoram says, “but you never want to sacrifice the story for a camera gimmick.”

This was the second class assignment, where students have to break down short scenes into 18 frames or less.

“Shorter exercises are a great way to teach students how to storyboard,” says Professor Marjoram, “because students are limited in how many frames they can use. They have to edit things down carefully, focusing on the emotions and the choices the characters have to make, without losing the story.”

INDICATING CAMERA MOVES: PAN/TILT & TRUCK/DOLLY

Professor Marjoram’s career began in architecture. After submitting concept artwork for the Grammy Museum to a company called Storyboards Inc., Marjoram was asked to create posters, one-sheets, and trailers for the film industry. His work attracted the interest of Disney’s Imagineers who asked him to develop storyboards and concept art for Walt Disney World’s Disney Quest, including a virtual Pirates of the Caribbean attraction where guests could fire canons at monsters and other ships displayed on a large screen. In 2012, he was asked to teach Dodge College’s Storyboarding & Perspective for Production Design class, which he has been teaching ever since.

“This is a great class for directors and production designers because it acts like a visual map of the film,” says Shelby Hall (BFA/FP, ’16). “If you’re a director, you can use storyboards to communicate what you want to shoot and how you want it cut. If you’re a production designer, you can use storyboards to communicate the look you’re putting together for the film. Having a visual representation of the film in the form of storyboards helps everyone get on the same page.”

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ALUMNI NOTES DODGE COLLEGE

Laura Avila-Tacsan (MFA/ Film Prod. ’10) is in the last stages of post-production of her first feature film, Knockout Pout, as a producer. The film was shot in Singapore with Singaporean talent and funded mainly by an Indiegogo campaign.

❶

Alan Baxter (BFA/Writing and Directing ’02) just signed with manager Alexander Robb at Insignia Entertainment.

His TV pilot script, Escape/Artist will be shopped at production companies and networks.

❶ Stephanie Harris-Uyidi (MFA/FTP ’07) is the writer-producer and host of the series, The Posh Pescatarian: Appetite for Adventure! airing on Canadian network The Brand New ONE. Genna Bromley (BFA/CP ’14) has served as her intern for more than a year.

❷

❸

Paul Higgins (BA/Com. ’85) just launched The YTN (Youth Television Network) that produces “Positive, Safe and Quality Programming” in the areas of youth sports, the arts, music, entertainment, theater and nutrition.

Also, his company, Athletes in Motion Sports Television, will celebrate 30 years of broadcasting this year.

Lauren Hulsey (BFA/ DA ’11) is working at Cantina Creative as a composer for films such as Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Guardians of the Galaxy, Hunger Games: Catching Fire, and is currently working on Avengers 2 and Hunger Games: Mockingjay.

❷ Gabe Garza (BFA/Film Prod. ’06) is the co-creator and co-executive producer of the new Nickelodeon live-action comedy series Bella and the Bullfrogs premiering in 2015.

He previously wrote for other Nickelodeon shows including The Penguins of Madagascar, which he was nominated for an Annie Award for best writing for an animated television production in 2012.

❹

Amanda Keener (MFA/SW ’13) won 2nd runner-up in the screenplay competition of the Beverly Hills International Film Festival for her Chapman screenplay Patchwork.

❸ Rebecca Kirsch (BA/SW ’05) recently completed the first season of the Syfy drama Dominion as a co-producer. She is currently on the writing team of the upcoming SyFy series 12 Monkeys, a series adaptation of the 1995 feature film.

❻

Melissa Kosar (MFA/Film Prod. ’11) will be directing episodes for the upcoming season of ABC’sThe Middle.

Do you have a recent accomplishment you’d like to share? Email Alumni Coordinator Sorrel Geddes, sgeddes@chapman.edu, so we can share your success with the Dodge College community.

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Eddie Mikasa (MFA/ Film Prod. ’10) edited the feature film Coldwater that premiered at South by Southwest. He is currently doing commercial work.

Brendan Nahmias (BFA/ TBJ ’12) is an Associate Producer at Portal A in Los Angeles. He is gearing up for the 2014 YouTube Rewind with David Johnson (BFA/ CP ’12).

❻ Chase Ogden (MFA/ Film Prod. ’11) is now teaching at Eastern Washington University.

Bryce Sherman (BFA/ CP ’14) is now Sue Kroll’s second assistant at Warner Bros. The two met when Sherman was Kroll’s student escort at last year’s Women in Focus conference.

Courtney Teller (BFA/ TBJ ’14) is the Post Coordinator at Dick Clark Productions and has worked on shows such as The Streamy Awards, Hollywood Film Awards and American Music Awards.

Michael Van Orden (MFA/ Film Prod. ’13) wrote and produced a TV Pilot for the Interterm Pilots class titled Called to Serve that was chosen as an official selection of this year’s New York TV Festival in October.

John Woodside (MFA/ Film Prod. ’09) has shot three music videos and a feature this year and will soon start work on his second feature film.

Preston Zeller (BFA/ Film. Prod. ’12) is the VP of Operations for Next Level Profits, a boutique-marketing agency based out of SoCal. He also owns his own digital agency called Zellerhaus that received a nomination on Awwwards, which gives awards for design, creativity, and innovation on the Internet.

Bryan Ziebelman (BFA/ TBJ ’11) just finished his second season for the San Francisco 49ers as a Video Operations Assistant. He has worked on three NFC Championship games, a Super Bowl (which earned him a ring), and two division title wins.

Brenda Brkusic

ALUMNA WINS SECOND EMMY Brenda Brkusic BFA/Film Prod. ’04 recently won a Los Angeles Area Emmy Award, her second, in the Arts and Culture/History category as Executive Producer of The Hollywood Reporter in Focus: The Wolf of Wall Street, a PBS program featuring Martin Scorsese, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill and Terence Winter discussing the filmmaking process and the impact and cultural relevance of The Wolf of Wall Street.

ALUMNI SPOTLIGHT

❹ John MacDonald (MFA/ Film. Prod ’11) executive produced and directed Make Your Mark, which plays in select cities nationwide. The series is produced by Backflip Theory Productions, a company he co-founded with ❺ Bri Xandrick (BFA/CP ’11).

Many Chapman alums, including Oliver Young (BFA/ Film Prod. ’13), John Woodside (MFA/ Film Prod. ’09), Yu-Ting Su (MFA/ Film Prod. ’11), Veronica Zabrocki (MFA/ Film Prod. ’11), Sean Fitzgerald (MFA/ Film Prod. ’11), and Matt Kendrick (BFA/ Film Prod. ’11) were part of the crew.

Brkusic is also a member of the Producers Guild of America and was recently accepted into the prestigious Producers Guild Mentoring Program. Over a six-month period she will be mentored by David Eilenberg, SVP of non-scripted programming for TNT/TBS, who has been responsible for programming such as The Voice, The Apprentice and Shark Tank. Brkusic was also recently appointed to the Television Academy’s Los Angeles Area Peer Group Executive Committee. Currently she is the Executive Producer of Program Development and National Productions for PBS SoCaL. A new film she produced, Mia: A Dancer’s Journey, about the life of famous ballerina Mia Slavenska, will premiere on PBS SoCaL in November and on PBS stations nationally after the new year.

❺

37 FOR STUDENTS, ALUMNI AND FRIENDS OF DODGE COLLEGE OF FILM AND MEDIA ARTS AT CHAPMAN UNIVERSITY

FILMMAKING EXCHANGES OFFER NEW INSIGHTS

hen students cross national and cultural borders, new insights often lead to new ways of seeing the world. For students visiting from South Africa and Korea over the summer, spending time at Chapman and in Southern California elicited feelings of wonder.

Associate Dean and Professor Michael Kowalski organized the 12-day visit for the students from AFDA, the South African School of Motion Picture Medium and Live Performance. Miguel Couto was one of the directing students who enjoyed being emerged in the “creativelyfueled” city of Los Angeles.

“Coming from a place where there are only several small schools dedicated to art and entertainment, to be placed in an entire city thriving on the latter, crawling with dreams and determination, was enough to leave me in awe and desire,” said Cuoto who was particularly inspired by a tour of Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre where so many of his most admired role models had performed.

As for Dodge College, Cuoto described the film school as being “a young filmmakers dream in terms of equipment, housing, props etc. Everything about the college was advanced to the point of being almost alien to me, and any aspiring ‘filmie’ would be lucky to work within it. It is a playground fit for kings.”

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The South Korean students were part of a Cross-Cultural Filmmaking class which takes Dodge College students to make a film in South Korea and brings Korean students to make a film in California.

“The summer exchange with Busan was extremely successful and we managed to produce two excellent films, one in each country,” said Professor EricYoung, who led the exchange. “A highlight of our trip to Korea was a one-day excursion to Seoul, and I know the Korean students thoroughly enjoyed our private tour of The Walt Disney Studios during their time here.

As has always been my experience with these courses, the students formed deep friendships that I expect will last a lifetime.”

Young, who used to work for Disney as director of post-production, arranged the tour so the South Korean students could see what it was like to work on the Disney lot, where they saw various sound stages (one of which was about to be turned into a game show set), the Walt Disney Archives, the Disney Legends Plaza, and the massive foley stage.

“Simply stated, the travel exchange courses are extraordinary,” Young says.

“Though the initial focus is on making films abroad, the greater value is the students’ experience with another culture and the lasting friendships they develop with one another.”

FESTIVAL HIGHLIGHTS Jack Anderson (BFA/ FP ’14) Wire Cutters: Anchorage, LA Shorts, New Hampshire.

James Beck (BFA/ FP ’12) Green Acres: Best Student Short at Carmel, Best Animated Short at LA Comedy, Best Animated Short at Kansas City, Best Animation at Love Your Shorts, Best International Film at Greater August Town Film Festival (Jamaica), Best Student Film at San Luis Obispo, Best Student Animation at Sedona, Best Animation at Snake Alley, Best Animation at Tiburon, Audience Award at Charleston, Audience Award at Rumschpringe; Animation Torrent, Big Bear, Breckenridge, Catalina, Collinsville, Costa Rica, Dubuque, Durango, Forster (Australia), Fort Myers, Fresno, Gasparilla, Geneva, Green Bay, Hell’s Half Mile, High Desert, Hollywood Student, Idyllwild, LA Comedy, Logan, Maryland, Moab, New Orleans, Newport Beach, OC Film Fiesta, Oceanside, Orlando, Princeton, Rhode Island, River Bend, River’s Edge, Roseville Animation, Ruby Mountain, Santa Fe, Sierra Canyon, Sunscreen, Topanga, Treasure Coast, Twain Harte, Waterfront, West Chester.

Blue

Katelyn Bianchini (BFA/FP ’12), Rena Cheng (BFA/FP ’12), & Asia Lancaster (BFA/FP ’12): Blue: Best Animation at Breckenridge Film Festival, Best Animated Short at Sedona, Audience Award at Charleston, Chris Award at Columbus Int’l Film & Video, Honorable Mention at Anchorage, Special Jury Mention at Pune (India); 1 Reel

Bumbershoot, Bahamas, Blue Plum, Cleveland, Cucalorus, Dubuque, Gasparilla, Geneva, Green Bay, High Desert, Hollywood Student, Kansas City, Logan, Maryland, Nantucket, Newport Beach, Omaha, Orlando, Palm Beach, Portland, Rainier, River’s Edge, San Luis Obispo, Santa Fe, Sarasota, Sidewalk, Sierra Canyon, Sonoma, St. Louis, Sunscreen, Topanga, Traverse City, Waterfront, West Chester, Woods Hole.

Ruby Mountain, San Jose Shorts, Santa Cruz, Santa Fe, Sedona, Sidewalk, Sonoma, Sunscreen, Topanga, Treasure Coast, Tupelo, Twain Harte, Washington D.C., Waterfront, West Chester, Woods Hole.

Jean Barker (MFA/FP ’14) One More Day: DGA Student Film Award Directors Award (Women’s category); Buffalo Dreams, Fargo Fantastic.

Dan Carr (BFA/FP ’13) Pray Me Down: Best Actor at Sierra Canyon; Carmel, Collinsville, Dam Short, Fargo, LA Shorts, New Hampshire, Newport Beach, River’s Edge, Young Cuts.

Derek Dolechek (BFA/FP ’12) & Ryan Walton (BFA/FP ’12) Light Me Up: Best Animation at DaVinci, Best Animated Short at Eugene, Best Animated Short at Geneva, Best Animated Film at New Hope, Best Overall Film at Poppy Jasper, Best Animation at Rumschpringe, Best Student Animation at SENE, Best Animation at Sierra Canyon, Honorable Mention at Anchorage, Honorable Mention at Fargo; 1 Reel Bumbershoot, Animation Torrent, Athens, Bare Bones, Berkshire, Big Bear, Big Island, Big Muddy, Breckenridge, Capital City, Carmel, Catalina, Charleston, Cincinnati, Collinsville, Daytona Beach, Downtown LA, Dubuque, Fort Myers, Gasparilla, Green Bay, Hell’s Half Mile, High Desert, Hoboken, Hollywood Student, Humboldt, Idyllwild, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Knoxville, Logan, Los Angeles Shorts, Louisville, Love Your Shorts, Macon, Miami Shorts, Moving Media, Munich Student (Germany), Newport Beach, OC Film Fiesta, Oceanside, Ojai, Omaha, Orlando, Palm Beach, Paterson Falls, Philadelphia Animation, Portland, Red Rock, River’s Edge, Roseville Animation,

Gefilte Fish

Shayna Cohen (MFA/FP ’14) Gefilte Fish: DGA Student Film Award Grand Prize (Women’s category), Best Actress at St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase; San Luis Obispo Jewish Film Festival, St. Louis Jewish Film Festival.

Dan Eccles (BFA/FP ’13) Ganas: Carmel, Chicago Shorts, HollyShorts.

Michael Fitzgerald (MFA/FP ’13) If We Were Adults: Best Actress at LA Comedy, Best Student Film at New Hampshire; Anchorage, Athens, Big Island, Capital City, Carmel, Charleston, Cucalorus, Dubuque, Fargo, Geneva, Grand Rapids, Hill Country, Hoboken, Indianapolis, Kansas City, LA Shorts, Laughlin, Maryland, Newport Beach, River Bend, Rome, San Luis Obispo, San Pedro, Santa Fe, Starz Denver, Studio City, Sunscreen, Tupelo.

Carrie Frazier (MFA/FP ’14) Kink: Broad Humor, Rome.

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FESTIVAL HIGHLIGHTS

Harrison Givens (BFA/FP ’13) There Is No God And We All Die Alone: Best Comedy at Desert Rocks Film & Music, Best Comedy at Snake Alley, Best Student Film at San Pedro, Honorable Mention at Fargo; Bend, Breckenridge, Carmel, Crossroads, Dances With Films, Eugene, Houston Comedy, Iron Mule, Kansas City, Laughlin, Maryland, Omaha, Portland, River Bend, River’s Edge, Rome, Rumschpringe, Santa Fe, Sunscreen, Young Cuts.

William Johnston-Carter (BFA/FP ’14) Grange to Garage: Bahamas, Hot Springs, Santa Fe. Nicole Jones (BFA/FP ’14) The Kingdom: Carmel Andrej Landin (BFA/FP ’13) Into the Silent Sea: BAFTA-LA Student Award, CINE Golden Eagle Award, Best Student Film and Best Cinematography at Breckenridge, Best Short Film at Crested Butte, Best Student Film at Crossroads, Best Student Film at Geneva, Best Narrative Short at Landlocked, Best Picture and Best Student Film at Oceanside, Best

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Narrative Short at Prescott, Best Student Film at Rehoboth Beach, Best Student Film at Sacramento, Best Student Film at San Luis Obispo, Best Student Short at San Pedro Best Short Film at Santa Fe, Best Short Film at Sedona, Best International Film at Sunscreen, Best Screenplay at High Desert, Honorable Mention at Nashville, Special Jury Recognition at Stony Brook; Aberdeen (U.K.), Arizona, Asheville, Asiana (Korea), Bahamas, Beijing Student (China), Berkshire, Black Hills, Capital City, Carmel, Catskill Mountains, Charleston, Crystal Palace (U.K.), Downtown LA, Dubuque, East Lansing, Eastern Oregon, Ellensburg, Eugene, Gasparilla, Gig Harbor, Gothenburg (Sweden), Grand Rapids, Hill Country, Hollywood Student, Idea Fest, Indianapolis, Laughlin, Lighthouse, Little Rock, Logan, Louisville, Marfa, Maryland, Munich Student (Germany), Napa Valley,

CONTINUED

Newport Beach, Ojai, Orlando, Palm Springs, Rhode Island, River Bend, River’s Edge, Rome, Route 66, San Jose Shorts, Sarasota, Sonoma, Southampton (U.K.), Tacoma, Telluride, Temecula Valley, Topanga.

Will Phelps (BFA/FP ’13) Capstone’s Oak: Carmel, HollyShorts, Hot Springs Horror, Screamfest, Starz Denver.

Michaela Stewart (BFA/FP ’14) Five Days Straight: Best Student Film at Broad Humor.

Sarah Wilson Thacker (MFA/FP ’13) The Bright Side: ASC Student Award, College Television Award (3rd place Drama), Best Short Film at Hollywood, Best College Film at Gasparilla, Best Director at Flagship City, Best of Festival and Best Screenplay at Desert Rocks Film & Music; Dubuque, Carmel, Marina Del Rey, Ojai.

Jackie Zhou (BFA/FP ’15) Money Shot: Carmel, HollyShorts, Portland.

Zach Wechter (BFA/FP ’13) Straight Down Low: ASC Student Award, CINE Golden Eagle Award, Visionary Award at Visions; 1 Reel Bumbershoot, Bahamas, Capital City, Cleveland, HollyShorts, Kansas City, Maryland, New Orleans, Newport Beach, Santa Cruz, Starz Denver, Stony Brook, Young Cuts.

Straight Down Low

DOCUMENTARY SUCCESSES FROM COMMUNITY VOICES:

FROM PROJECT W: Culture Over Everything (Charlie Cook BFA/FP ’13, Ravi Lloyd BA/VANT ’14, Megan Mckeown BA/PCST ’15) Honorable Mention at SENE; Pan African, San Francisco Black, Thin Line.

Baila

Baila (Lauren Huff BFA/FP ’15, Rajiv Melwani BFA/TBJ ’13) Awareness Fest, Sunscreen.

Finding Home (Samantha Andre BFA/TBJ ’14, Mike Agnew BFA/FP ’13, Margot Czeropski BFA/FP ’13): Big Sky, Chagrin, Sebastopol Doc. Learning to Live (Katie Wise BFA/FP ’13, Ashley Moradipour BFA/FP ’13, Malina Fagan BFA/FP ’13) CINE Golden Eagle Award, Best Short Documentary at Downtown LA; Big Bear, Dubuque, Newburyport, Silent River, West Chester.

Under My Skin (Alex Ivany BFA/TBJ ’14, James Parker BFA/FP ’13, Kevin Wolf BFA/FP ’15, Samantha Schoenberg BFA/FP ’14) American Documentary, Bare Bones, Desert Rocks Film & Music, Thin Line.

Why We Race (Andrew Evers BFA/FP ’16, Ben Fischinger BFA/FP ’14, Kiley Vorndran BFA/FP ’13, Ryan Westra BFA/TBJ ’14) Student Doc Award nominee in IDA Awards; American Documentary, Bare Bones, DocUtah.

FROM DESTINATION AFRICA: City of the Damned (Mor Albalak BFA/TBJ ’15, Stephanie Lincoln JD/LAW ’14, Matt Rogers BFA/FP ’14, Nate Skeen BFA/ FP ’14) Chris Award at Columbus Int’l Film & Video; Africa World Doc, Austin Gay & Lesbian, Chicago LGBT, Chicago Social Change, DocUtah, Fargo-Moorhead LGBT, Global Peace, Hot Springs, I Will Tell, Long Beach Q, Miami Gay & Lesbian, Mumbai Queer (India), Out on Film, Outfest Fusion, Palm Springs Gay & Lesbian, Seattle Lesbian & Gay, Seattle Social Justice, Southwest Gay & Lesbian, Unspoken Human Rights.

Flux: Redefining Women’s Surfing (Mia Montanile BFA/FP ’15, Sarah Lee BFA/FP ’12, Chad King BFA/FP ’15) Audience Award at Oceanside; Awareness Fest, DocUtah, Florida Documentary, Newport Beach.

The L Riders (Zane Schwartz BFA/FP ’15, Eric Ward BFA/CRPR ’16, Johnny Wilcox BFA/TBJ ’15, Kevin Wolf BFA/FP ’15) Fort Lauderdale Gay & Lesbian, Frameline/San Francisco LGBT, Long Beach Q, Miami Gay & Lesbian, Tampa Gay & Lesbian.

The Pink Helmet Posse (Kristelle Laroche BFA/TBJ ’14, Ben Mullinkossen BFA/FP ’13) Audience Award for Best Kids Short at Traverse City, Best Student Film at Nashville, Honorable Mention in ASC Student Awards; 1 Reel Bumbershoot, Big Bear, Camden, Carmel, Chagrin, Crested Butte, Edmonton (Canada), HollyShorts, Hot Docs, Hot Springs, Indianapolis, Palm Springs, Portland, Seattle, Santa Fe, Sidewalk, Tribeca.

We Are The Land (Andrew Heskett BFA/TBJ ’13, Lauren Lindberg BFA/TBJ ’15, Ryan Westra BFA/TBJ ’14) ASC Student Award; American Conservation, Capital City, Chagrin, Cinema Verde, Earthport, Green Bay, Green Lens Environmental, International Wildlife, Newport Beach, San Pedro, Santa Fe, Sedona, Yale Environmental.

TELEVISION SUCCESSES: Called To Serve (Michael Van Orden MFA/FP ’13) Best Drama at ITV Fest; Blue Whiskey, Hoboken, New York Television.

Forest Keepers (Matthew Blake BFA/FP ’14, Malina Fagan BFA/FP ’14, Kristelle Laroche BFA/TBJ ’14, Ben Mullinkosson BFA/FP ’13, Siede Kohl MBAMFA/CRPR ’15) ASC Student Award, Films for the Forest, Unspoken Human Rights.

Jersey Chasers

Under the Mango Tree (Ashley Moradipour BFA/TBJ ’14, Devyn Bisson BFA/CRPR, Lauren Lindberg BFA/TBJ ’15, Julianna Madden MFA/CRPR ‘15, Katie Wise BFA/TBJ ’14) Chagrin, DocUtah, Unspoken Human Rights.

Jersey Chasers (Skylar Harrison BFA/FP ’13) Audience Award for Best TV Pilot at New Hope, Best TV Pilot at Long Beach Indie; Blue Whiskey, Eugene, Hoboken.

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Non-Profit Org. U.S. Postage

PAID

Orange, CA Permit No. 58

One University Drive, Orange, CA 92866

UPCOMING EVENTS

Chapman University Parents Weekend – February 20–21

Women in Focus – April 17

Leo Freedman Foundation First Cut, NYC – March 28

Preview Day – April 18

An insidE LooK At tHE nEW ErA oF tELEvision AMONG THE CONFIRMED GUESTS ARE

STEVE MOSKO

ED CARROLL

TED SARANDOS

President Sony Pictures Television

Chief Operating Officer AMC Networks

Chief Content Officer Netflix

Almost every day, stories fill the media about the changing landscape of television – about binge viewing, HBO streaming online, Netflix creating original programming and more. As critic Robert Lloyd asked recently in the Los Angeles Times Calendar section (Nov. 21) devoted entirely to The New TV, “How should television be defined nowadays?” In exploring what’s happened as film directors and stars take work in TV and new formats change the nature of episodic programming, Lloyd answers his own question: “Now I am inclined to define television as any moving picture – at all – watched on any sort of screen not located within a movie theater.”

Dodge College students will be invited to explore this exciting area of opportunity, and challenge, this spring in a new class, TWP 329 TV Industry Insiders, Mondays at 7:00 p.m. in the Folino Theater. Joining Professor Ross Brown to screen their shows and talk about new directions in television will be some of the biggest names in television.