FILMS: Give Me Five- RI Youth Film Festival

GiveMe5 is a youth film showcase produced by the Rhode Island Film and Television Office (RIFTO), in conjunction with the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts Education Program.

This May 18, the fifth annual GiveMe5 will occur, when teen filmmakers from around Rhode Island will showcase and discuss their 5-minute (or less) films, and receive feedback from a professional panel. In March, many of these teens met for the first time at a one day Lab, where they could write, edit, and make one minute (or more) movies under the direction and guidance of film-making professionals. Some more experienced teens helped make a documentary about the process, and that film will also be shown

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Alex Watrous, former GiveMe5participant and now filmmaker/college student and panelist.

There will be 19 films featured in all genres from music video to drama to experimental to comedy.

Featured films this year have been selected from students at: Beacon Charter School (Woonsocket), Bishop Hendricken High School (Warwick), Everett Company (Providence), LaSalle Academy (Providence), Metropolitan Career & Technical Center (Providence), Portsmouth High School, Trinity Academy for the Performing Arts (Providence), and Westerly High School.

This year’s discussion/critique panel will include Steven Feinberg (Director of RIFTO); Rob Gray (Screen Actors’ Guild); Josephine Sittenfeld (RISD faculty and filmmaker); and Alex Watrous (former GiveMe5 participant).

Alex Watrous is currently attending film classes at Rhode Island College, after graduating from Mt. Hope High school in 2011. In fall 2010 he launched Film Night, a monthly Film Festival held in Warren, Rhode Island. That fall, Alexander and his brother premiered their first large film, Pursuing Nostalgia, which was shot in summer 2010. Alexander spent the summer of 2011 working on the soundtrack album for the film I Can Fix This. While working with music producer Al Gomes, Alexander got his music into 7 categories on the Grammy ballot. Alexander spends much of his time editing videos, composing music, and directing films with his brother Elisha and many of his friends. To find out more about Alex, visit http://www.watrousbros.com

For more info on GiveMe5, call 401-222-6994, Monday-Friday, 8:30-4:30 or visit the GiveMe5 website http://www.giveme5ri.org.

If you can’t make it the May 18 event, they have some sample videos up on vimeo: (but I don’t believe these are all of the films)

http://vimeo.com/user8897624/videos

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

 Adam Gertsacov is the co-founder and co-organizer of Digital Family Summit.  He wears many hats, including those of a professional clown, an author and publisher, an artist/educator, a non-profit administrator, a P.T. Barnum impersonator, a flea circus impresario, and the esteemed hat of the Clown Laureate of Greenbelt, Maryland.