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Despite heavy snowfall, the 14th Annual Five College Film ‘ Video Festival was held as planned this past Friday. The festival, a collaborative effort sponsored by the Five College Film Council, is a competitive showing of films produced by students belonging to the area. At this year’s festival, held at Smith College, over twenty student-produced films were shown. Entries ranged from narrative to animated, and were judged accordingly. Since its inception in 1994, the festival has prided itself on the ingenuity of its participants. The venue challenges students to delve beneath the surface, exploring themes of diversity, identity and self-expression while dispersed through the medium of cinema. The festival also aspires to provide students with a community to meet and share their experiences, in the hopes that the community will not only coddle creativity, but drive it further. As a condition of the entry requirements, each film contains the original work of currently enrolled and recently-graduated students from within the Five College area. Films surpassing the twenty minute time limit are used in excerpt if selected, while films within the time limit are shown in their entirety. Students are encouraged to submit up to two entries for potential admittance into the festival, for the cost of a small fee. Each film is evaluated by a panel of student and faculty judges, each selected for their involvement in the Five College area. At the close of the evening, a winning film is selected from each category, and also, from each of the Five Colleges. A final, top prize of the evening is awarded to the best entry of the night. Traditionally, the festival is conducted under the cooperation of a faculty advisor and a student director. Past pairings have alternated within the Five Colleges, depending on the hosting college. For this year’s festival, student director Lizz Lyons, an undergraduate of Smith College, worked in tandem with Hampshire College professor Baba Hillman to arrange the festival’s proceedings. A few UMass entries were found littered amongst the festival’s entrance categories, although none acquired the top prize of the night. Paula Lavalle premiered first for her “Untitled” animation short, while Alex Ezorsky-Lie’s “Scratch of Death” rounded out a competitive race in the experimental category. Ben Leonberg was also present in the narrative race for his work on “Apples to Ice Cream.” Nathanial R. Brown’s “Roustabout,” a compelling documentary about the unsung heroes who make traveling carnival troupes possible, had the misfortune of skipping during its playback. Nevertheless, its brief showing made an impact on audience members, who clamored for its return. While several of the entries were arresting, both visually and in narrative, few commanded as much attention as “In My Genes,” a full-length documentary submission by Lupita Nyong’o. The eye-opening documentary lingered on the psychological repercussions of albinism in African communities. Nyong’o, a recent graduate of Hampshire College, was also awarded at last year’s festival for her work on “Decolonizing the Mind.” Other notable entries included Margaret Piacenza’s “One Day,” the lone entry in the dance on camera category, and Dawna Sirard’s “Neshomeleh,” a tale of sweet love set to the grave. Both women attend Smith College. The submissions were hardly trite, where at best they could be ranked as sophisticated works of introspection and intelligence. At worst, they could sometimes be a little heavy-handed. Each category was varied, yet a sense of macabre permeated the experimental. Even Alex-Davis Lawrence’s slick mix-up of cartoon imagery, “Priming,” was markedly morbid in direction, despite the seemingly innocuous inclusion of clips from Disney classics. Current students interested in getting involved, either with the Festival or with the Five College Film community, will find things fairly accessible. All screening events sponsored by the Five College Film Council are free and open to the public, and occur on a rolling basis throughout the semester. For upcoming events, and also for details about the Five College Film ‘ Video Festival, students are encouraged to visit www.fivecolleges.edu/sites/film/ or the Department of Interdisciplinary Film Studies in the Herter Annex for further information. Shayna Murphy can be reached at [email protected].