2017 Fall TU Film Festival showcases student talent

On Monday, Sept. 25, students busted out their lawn chairs and picnic blankets to enjoy an exciting night of movie appreciation hosted by TU’s film studies department. Interns for the film studies office manned a table providing popcorn, candy and other classic cinematic snacks for attending guests, allowing the night to take on the vibe of a drive-in theater. Many featured filmmakers were in attendance, along with actors, film teachers and even some currently ongoing film classes that were encouraged to attend the event to support their peers and further enrich their educational experience.
The evening consisted of 72 minutes of uninterrupted student written, directed and produced material that had been created over the course of the past year. Films topics ranged from a money heist poorly planned, and even more poorly executed (“Ineption”), to documentary style interviews with university students and faculty, such as in “Lysistrata” by Taylor Chukwu: a commentary on the reimagining of the theater department’s production of the Aristophanes play from the spring semester.
Not only were live action films screened at the event, but a short musical and animated picture also made their way onto the jumbo screen. Each of the films presented showed a unique relationship between different departments and majors around TU. Lisandro Boccaci’s film “116,” starred TU theater departments’ Tabitha Littlefield, and the documentary film, “This Is Craig’s Domain,” by Chris Jett, showed the inner workings of set production and assembly that takes place in various departments around the university, and shared insight as to the cruciality of sets to stage and screen productions.
Adam O’Connor, a previous TU film studies instructor turned department assistant, informed the attendees of the third annual Tulsa American Film Festival that would be happening in mid-October, and ways that individuals could volunteer and experience unique films in the Tulsa community. Events in the TAFF include adjudicated script readings, narrative and documentary film screenings and Q&A sessions with local filmmakers and creative minds. All events take place at social centers in and around Tulsa, such as Circle Cinema and Guthrie Green.
Each of the filmmakers shared their thanks for the university, their faculty advisors, film department staff and cast and crew by including special notes in their movie credits. This really illustrated the fact that film is a collaborative art form and showed a real sense of community that the University of Tulsa strives and succeeds to foster.