Campus MovieFest is a film festival that travels from campus to campus across the United States, and all you need to participate is a student ID. Branding themselves as ‘The World’s Largest Student Film Festival,’ the group offers students every piece of equipment you might need and one full week to make a five-minute film, sharing any story the students feel inspired to tell.
CMF began in 2001 at Emory University, when four students provided fellow classmates with all the equipment they needed to complete a short film in one week. 15 years later, over one million students participate in the festival worldwide.
On Monday, January 18, University of Alabama students of all majors were invited to pick up their equipment and get with a team of writers, directors, producers, actors, editors, camera operators and grips. At the end of the week, CMF chooses 16 films to be presented at the final showcase, and offers a spectrum of awards to the 16 finalists.
Caroline Ficken, a sophomore at the University of Alabama, participated in CMF this year as a writer and director.
“Being able to write and direct our film was such a joy, because I really felt like this film was mine,” Caroline said. "The process truly allows any student to participate, actor or film major, or not. Any student with a story to tell has the opportunity to express that, and being a lover of movies myself, I find that to be so important.”
The Telecommunications and Film department helped pair Caroline with a producer along with actors and other positions needed to make a movie. She comments that she “never met some of these people before she started working, and now she has found such wonderful new friends.”
Students got dressed up and gathered at the Ferguson Theater to watch the debut of the finalists on Thursday night, Jan. 28, not knowing if their films would be one of them.
Films received awards such as Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Story, Best Cinematography and Production Design, along with the highest scoring top four. A few of these films will move onto the national screening, and compete for a National Champion, which, by the way, the University of Alabama won in 2013 and 2014.
If Campus MovieFest sounds like something you would like to be involved in, but didn't get a chance to be a part of it this year, don't fret! CMF comes around every year, so start writing.
