Wednesday November 7, 2012 @ 6:30pm
Community Stories: Youth Media Arts Program features work by filmmakers who are 26 years of age or younger. It is a tradition at the Regent Park Film Festival to begin our four-day festivities by celebrating young voices with this program.
This year’s Community Stories explores a diversity of themes such as ambition, love, violence, and feelings of loss. What unites these pieces is the filmmakers’ ability to connect individual stories to the larger context in which they exist: to find social resonance in personal stories and vice versa. A discussion with the youth filmmakers will follow the screening.
This year we offer a special addition to the Community Stories: Youth Media Arts Program, which will juxtapose rising stars with established talent from the Canadian filmmaking industry. Prior to the screening, we will host a discussion with the acclaimed filmmakers Atom Egoyan, Sudz Sutherland, Jennifer Holness and Clement Virgo.
In Between Stories
In Between Stories is a short documentary that features four young artists from the African diaspora communities in Toronto, Canada. This film touches on issues including media representations of Africa, experiences of second-generation immigrant youth and the role of storytelling.
Bio: Roda Siad is an emerging filmmaker who is interested in producing socially conscious films that explore the different facets of human nature. She is completing her master's degree at Ryerson University. In Between Stories is her thesis film. In attendance
Life After High School
Life After High School is a short comedic film about guidance counsellors being so out of tune with the students of today. Mostly improvised, the film draws attention to issues in our school system today.
Bio: King is a director, musician and spoken word artist. Facing hardship as a young adult, King decided to devote most of his time to youth, whether by creating film, music or motivational speeches. In attendance
Girls Between Two Worlds
Commenting on their personal values, first-generation Canadian girls attempt to define what it means to be a hyphenated Canadian. An exploration of identity in a multicultural land, where the pull of family values and the push of societal mores sparks as many questions as answers.
Bio: Jenny Deng, Adiba Hasnat and Miranda Hersco were participants in SkyWorks' Real Change Girls Filmmaking Project 2012, a program that mentors youth to make their own documentary films for social change. In attendance
Who Killed Me
A young Congolese immigrant is murdered outside his workplace in Toronto. What will be the effects on his sister, his employer and the attending police officer? Who Killed Me elicits thought-provoking questions about survival and life as an immigrant in our society.
Bio: Amil Shivji is a fourth-year international student from Tanzania studying film at York University. He believes filmmaking is the strongest medium for bringing about social change.
Bill C31
Using whiteboard animation, this short movie scribes an easy-to-follow and critical look at Canadaâs controversial Bill C-31, breaking down its effect on refugee populations.
Bio: Polly, Harrsan and Abdul are Grade 12 students at Sir John A MacDonald Collegiate institute. They are part of the MacDonald Association of Canadian Culture and participated in Harmony Movement's Diversity Leadership Certificate Program and Change Through Equity film program. In attendance
Semi-auto Colours
This elliptical experimental film follows a gang of disenfranchised youth in Winnipeg’s West End as they dream of being gangstas and rappers. Rhythmically entrancing and dreamily poetic.
Bio: Isiah Medina was born in 1991, and grew up in the West End of Winnipeg. He is currently studying Film Production at Concordia University.
Love Poem To Canada
Young girls present an ode to a unique country, imperfect in its past faults yet great in its present openness to diversity, multiculturalism and equal opportunity. A collage of thoughts and pictures in action describe the love for what Canada was and is in its ever-changing social and cultural landscape.
Bio: This film was created as a joint effort between a Grade 11 Communications Technology Class and a Grade 12 Drama Class. In attendance
I’m Starting to Miss Him
A thoughtful and poetic expression of the sudden disappearance of Sakay’s brother Pinaskin, set against a beautifully desolate landscape in Manawan, Quebec.
Bio: Sakay Ottawaâs first documentary explored the importance of doing what one loves in life. His second film examines his feelings on the disappearance of his brother.
The Break
Jamal has a dream. He is ambitious. And he has talent. He is giving his everything to try and find his big break as a hip-hop artist, but how much does he have to give?
Bio: Dominic Desjardins is the founder of Zazie Films. His debut was as a contestant in La Course Destination Monde In attendance
Abstract Random: Mi Nah Wanna
A creative, short musical film featuring themes of anti-violence and anti-racism. Mi Na Wanna is Abstract Random’s rhythmic progressive diatribe renouncing the violent and homophobic tendencies of dance hall music. A well-timed message about love and freedom.
Bio: Abstract Random is an electro dub hop music group out of Parkdale Toronto bringing back "cool feminist political. In attendance
Performance By Abstract Random
Abstract Random is an electro dub hop music group out of Parkdale Toronto bringing back “cool feminist political”
Bio: N/A
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