2007, 40TH ANNUAL HUMBOLDT INT’L FILM FESTIAL
Welcome to the Humboldt Film Festival. Forty years ago, a group of film enthusiasts from HSU set out to create an event that would bring world-class independent and experimental films to Humboldt County. The first festival attracted a little over two dozen films and the entry fee was a modest five dollars. Thousands of films and four decades later, the 40th Humboldt Film Festival continues that tradition.
This year’s festival renews the traditional emphasis on independent and experimental filmmaking, while celebrating the diversity of international film. Our theme is “Expose Yourself’ – highlighting films on the edge that express fresh ideas and themes that are raw, bold and revealing. We also continue our dedication to showcasing all genres of film and video work by innovative and emerging student and independent filmmakers.
All the works included in the festival competition have been prescreened by a student committee comprised of the Spring Film Festival class offered by the Department of Theatre, Film and Dance at HSU.
This year’s festival format is slightly different than in past years. The judges will be screening the entries live at the Minor Theatre, rather than cramped in our office. And we’re asking you, our screening audience, to participate in voting for the Audience Choice Award. The ballot is included in your program, please make sure to return it to us before you leave.
As a festival organized, coordinated, and directed by students (with help from faculty and staff), we feel that we have created an event unlike any other. We couldn’t do it without the continuing support of our generous donors and patrons like you. Thank you for being a part of the festival and helping to make the dream a reality. YOU are involved in this unique and outstanding festival!
YOU’VE BEEN EXPOSED!
FILM FESTIVAL CO-DIRECTORS
AUBREE LBABEL
Aubree Lbabei is a filmmaker, noisemaker, lover and local softball/volleyball official. She lives with a dog named Chase. She makes rad films about sad and joyful people. Her interests include authenticity, awareness, intimacy & disruption. She despises politeness.
IVY MATHENY
Ivy Matheny was born and raised in Nevada City. Moved to Arcata in 2001. Studied for a year in Chengdu, China in 2003. Ivy is majoring in Anthropology (with a focus in visual ethnographic theory) and Alternative Film Studies (with a focus in Cinematography). She works for the HSU Women’s Resource Center, and this is her second year as Co Director for HFF. She enjoys: walks on the beach, rainy days, and movies about true love.
STEVE SPAIN
Steve Spain has been known to sell blood for film. Born on Marine Base Quantico during the tail end of Vietnam, he’s been on the move ever since. Steve came to film through photography and still misses the darkroom, but he’s getting used to windowless editing suites. He graduates this Spring (17 years – and several states of being – after his first college lecture). Thanks Mom and Dad, Roxy too!
film festival faculty advisor
david scheerer
David Scheerer is an associate professor of film at HSU and an independent filmmaker who has scripted, produced and directed a wide spectrum of films, including features, national commercial spots and documentaries. Highlights include: THE MUSIC INSIDE (scheduled for a 2007 release), FEDORA (1995), YELLOWSTONE: AMERICA’S EDEN (1995/2006), and IN SEARCH OF LEWIS & CLARK (2002).
film festival winners and honorable mentions
Best of the Fest
Mercy Me
Dir. Sean Wilson
Best Documentary
Highway Amazon
Dir. Ronnie Cramer
Best Experimental
Love Story
Dir. Orr Marshall
Best Narrative
Motion Report
Dir. Verica Patrnogic
Best Animation
Phantom Canyon
Dir. Stacey Steers
Audience Choice Award
Girls Room
Dir. Maria Gigante
Alice Guy Blache AwardInterplay
Dir. Robert Todd
The Jim Demulling Speakout AwardPortrait #2: Trojan
Dir. Vanessa Renwick
The Ledo Matteoli Award for Best Immigrant Story
Alma
Dir. Yuri Makino
The Dorothy June Romano Robertisini Banana Slug Award for Surrealism
To Hellen Bach
Ishan Vernallis & Erika Chong Schuch
Emerging Genre Award for Best Experimental Documentary
Against Soft Earth
Dir. Marianna Milhorat
Bill Basquin Juror Award
Pre-Cognition Reverie
Dir. Alex Nothis
Deborah Stratman Juror Award
How to Draw Clouds
Dir. Salise Hughes
Bill Brown Juror Award
Extended Forecast
Dir. James Dingle
Honorable Mention Documentary
Radio Zine #1: Glove of Minutes; Page 2, Redemption
Dir. Michelle Cartier
Honorable Mention Experimental
Boy in the Air
Dir. Lyn Elliot
Honorable Mention Narrative
Girls Room
Dir. Maria Gigante
Honorable Mention Animation
Karaoke Show
Dir. Karl Tebbe
FilM FESTIVAL JUDGES
BILL BASQUIN
Bill Basquin started out in a small railroad town in north central Indiana. He moved to Wisconsin. Grew up. Started to take pictures. Built a lot of theatre sets. Worked for a photographer. Went to college. Drove a cab. Then moved to San Francisco in 1995 where he has since become an award-winning film director and lighting professional. He really likes the smell of vast acres of sheep shit on a damp day. His films are gritty and optimistic. He is searching for the fusion between urban and rural in his own life and he makes work that explores this point of contact.
BILL BROWN
Bill Brown makes movies about the dusty corners of North America. He has visited a UFO crash site near Roswell, New Mexico; driven the Trans-Canada Highway; snooped around missile silos in North Dakota; and gone hunting for ghosts in the hollows of West Virginia. Most recently, he followed the US-Mexico border from end to end. His films hover stylistically somewhere between ethnographic study, idiosyncratic travelogue,
and critical essay. Currently, he is struggling to pay the rent in San Francisco.
DEBORAH STRATMAN
Deborah Stratman works in a territory between experimental and documentary. In her films and frequent work in other media including photography, sound, drawing and sculpture, Stratman often explores the history, uses, mythologies and control of landscapes of varying types and scales: from Muslim Xinjiang China to gated suburban California. She is presently working on two new films about the milieu of elevated threat, patriotism, disappearance and the possibility of transcendence. She continues to solicit public responses about FEAR (to participate, call toll-free 1-800-585-1078) and teaches at the University of Illinois in Chicago.