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In addition to our extensive selection of film screenings for schools, we also bring filmmakers into the schools to meet and discuss their films with students in a smaller classroom setting. These interactive visits allow students to engage with filmmakers from around the world and give the artists the opportunity to show their films to new audiences and gain valuable feedback from a youth perspective.

If you would be interested in having a filmmaker visit your classroom, contact Keith Zwolfer at kzwolfer@sffs.org or 415-561-5040.

Recent school visits

Rajnesh Domalpalli, director of Vanaja
October 5, 2007, The Marin School
Indian director Rajnesh Domalpalli was in the Bay Area for the theatrical release of his feature film Vanaja, which screened at SFIFF earlier this year. The students had watched the first part of his film in their class then engaged in a full class-period discussion with the young director the following day. Domalpalli answered a wide range of questions, including the logistics and benefits of crane shots; the meaning of the unique way that Indians nod their heads; what to look for when choosing your actors; how to work with child actors, nonprofessionals and actors who can’t even read or write; and how to get actors to cry or go to deeper, more emotional places. Domalpalli also counseled the young filmmakers on how to survive as a filmmaker artist and emphasized what he feels is the most important aspect of filmmaking: the writing. The director wrapped up the session by asking each student what kind of filmmaker they wanted to be and what kinds of films interested them most. He was impressed by the great diversity of their responses and their interests, which ranged from psychological films to musicals, documentaries to cultural stories and non-traditional narratives. It was a revelatory discussion for the filmmaker who was surprised to discover that the teen audience is much more savvy and diverse than the movie industry leads us to believe.

Amir Bar-Lev, director of My Kid Could Paint That
October 12, 2007, Berkeley High School
The senior film students in the Berkeley High School CAS program were given the opportunity to view the documentary My Kid Could Paint That in their classroom, followed by a discussion with filmmaker Amir Bar-Lev who is also an alumnus of Berkeley High (class of 1990). The more than 50 students from two classes sat fully rapt for the feature-length film about a four-year-old girl hailed—and then doubted—as a prodigy of abstract impressionist painting. Students raised questions about the objectivity of filmmaking and journalism, the identification of modern art and issues of parental responsibility. The director ended the discussion with a brief explanation of his journey from BHS grad to nationally distributed filmmaker. After hearing about the high level of facilities and equipment now available to the students—who are each making five to six movies per year in BHS’s CAS communications program, which began in 1997—Bar-Lev informed them that the equipment they were using was actually superior to what he had used to make the film they had just seen.