FILM | South Side Festival Project

A number of our Years 10, 11 and 12 students were be involved in an industry filmmaking experience as part of the South Side Festival.

Students worked with a professional film crew (directors, cinematographer and sound directors) to devise and realise a 30-minute film, which was filmed and streamed live to Cube 37 at 7.30pm on Friday. The film was edited by the Director, Michael Beets, as it was filmed at the school, and live scored by composer Montgomery, in front of an audience of around 120 people.

The students worked phenomenally throughout the week and were praised by the crew for their creativity, willingness to learn, adaptability and collaboration. The final film, inspired by the idea of ‘slow cinema,’ was a fantastic showcase of the talent of our students. This continued to shine through in the Q&A that followed the film, in which students answered questions from the audience with maturity, reflectiveness and passion.

Congratulations to students:

Judah Black (Year 10)
Tom Ceccato (Year 10)
Zara Devahl-Malcolm (Year 10)
Elaine Dewet (Year 10)
Tiana Dewhurst (Year 10)
Marcelle Flynn (Year 10)
Gemma Gilchrist (Year 10)
Adi Johansjah (Year 12)
Sophie McKee (Year 12)
Luisa Minaya Munoz (Year 10)
Autumn Murray (Year 11)
Tilly Scott (Year 11)
Mia Simkin (Year 11)
Eri Woods (Year 11)

A big thank you to Mrs Georgie Long for her support overseeing the event, and to Ms Nat D’Ambra, Ms Jo Beck and Mrs Emily Vogt for assisting with supervision throughout the week. A special thanks to Mr Brayden Dopper, who assisted with supervision for the Wednesday twilight rehearsal and the Friday night screening, working with the students at Cube 37 who were producing a behind-the-scenes documentary. Thank you also to Mrs Marta Szczykutowicz, who stepped in at the last minute to assist with some logistics on the Friday night, as well as our IT team for liaising with the film crew to ensure technology didn’t let us down.

During Week 3 of Term 2, 15 students in Years 10-12 collaborated with Director, Michael Beets and the team at Here and Now Studios to create a 40-minute live film. As it was a live film, there was no pre-recorded footage or audio used in the project; this means that it was being filmed at the exact same time the audience was watching it. Even the music composition and editing was done in real time.

The film, titled “Turn Around” was about a group of students who break into school at night. The plot centres around a new girl with a dark secret, who tries to fit in with the others, but is ultimately rejected by all but one person. Moving slowly, the film focuses intently on the interactions between the characters, pausing on shots for long periods of time to draw the audience in, almost make them feel as if they are there with the characters. The film conveys themes of adolescence, bullying and belonging.

We only had one week to create and block out a 40-minute film before performing it live. And as we lost a lot of people randomly due to VCE classes and school production, this was not a lot of time. The process started with many acting and filming workshops, to become comfortable with constantly having a camera on us and staying in character. Some students began working on a behind the scenes documentary, so with them, the photographer and the professional camera crew, there was always a camera pointed at you, which allowed us to become comfortable with it very quickly. As for the plot, it started forming at the end of the first day but continuously changed up until the final run through on the day of the performance.

The film took many shapes before becoming the final project. We knew who the main characters would be from the start and what their roles in the film were, but the plot and the scenes changed constantly. We did a full run through on Wednesday night, then the next day the film was almost completely different, but that was kind of the point of the project. Live cinema is supposed to be very fluid and flexible, very improvisational for both the actors and the crew. It’s a completely different experience to normal cinema in that it is so much more stressful and exhilarating. You expect mistakes to occur, almost welcome them, and must adapt to them because the show depends on it. In fact, a fair few things did go wrong on the night; one camera kept cutting in and out and Michael, who was editing at Cube 37, lost contact with us at the school, which resulted in a 30-minute delay in the performance. While it didn’t all go exactly as planned, the film still turned out very well.

The experience for me was really enjoyable and very valuable. I got to try many different things, learnt a bit more about the film industry and gained new skills. I loved seeing school from a different perspective, and while running around trying to fix things was extremely stressful, it was also so exhilarating. Live cinema is so exciting and I’m so lucky to have been a part of this project.

Gemma Gilchrist (Year 10 Captain)

Mr John Simon

Campus Principal