The annual 5 minute Film Festival was hosted last weekend in the Benson and received excellent reviews from many of its attendees. The film line up was quite impressive this year and the voting seemed to be rather difficult when the evening drew to a close. Of course, in the end, there were several films that stood out above the rest regardless of the amount of votes or awards they garnered.
One crowd favorite that took home second place was freshman Daniel Schaffer’s video “Balloons.” The video started out with an incredibly lighthearted approach but then took a rather dark yet incredibly humorous twist at the end. The film was a part of a YouTube series Schaffer took part in called “What the What” that included several different videos along the same story arc; a normal beginning that took an interesting and surprising turn by the end. Schaffer believed what made his video so successful was the fact that it steered away from being too dark or serious like many of the other films featured in the festival and it was short and to the point.
Winning third place was a film by Rick Grace called “The Paper Man.” A film that once again followed the idea of a light hearted tale that followed a college student trying his hardest to make a move on a girl who caught his eye, but soon finds out she already has a very protective boyfriend. It was a story that almost everyone could relate to and it made for an excellent romantic comedy entry into the festival.
Another film that demonstrated superb talent was “Comic Relief,” a film by John Michael Cronin and Katie Swann that nabbed sophomore John Frizzell the best actor award for the evening’s festival. The film centered around a man doing everything he could to gain the attention and approval of a famous comedian, played by Communications Professor, Dr. Jack Shock. Even though no dialogue existed throughout the film, Frizzell’s over the top silent movie style acting along with the excellent music score made the film quite memorable.
A question and answer discussion was also held after the show with all of the directors who submitted films into the festival. Members of the audience were able to ask all kinds of questions about how the videos were filmed, where plot ideas came from and how long they spent working on their respective pieces, which certainly added to the level of interest that the evening brought about.
Overall this year’s 5 Minute Film Festival did not disappoint and showed an impressive range of videos from almost every corner of campus. Films that won awards from the evening are posted on the festival’s Facebook page so that the highlights can be viewed again and again until next year’s festival dishes up a whole new round of impressive student films.
