MOVIE MADNESS: Fresh foreign flicks flock to Mat-Su

WASILLA — The Mat-Su College campus will soon be a hotbed of artistic expression with an all-new event for movie lovers in Southcentral Alaska.

In conjunction with the annual Machetanz Arts Festival, the college is hosting its first-ever Machetanz Film Festival, spanning six days and five continents. From May 31 to June 5, the college will screen more than 100 films made by artists from 25 different countries. Categories include student, short, animation, documentary, experimental and feature.

Festival director Felicia Desimini said a few films were shown during last year’s arts festival, but that one afternoon pales in comparison with this year’s multi-day film fest. The committee received 460 submissions, she said, and gradually whittled the list down to the scheduled 100-plus.

“The caliber of the films are life-altering,” Desimini said. “They’re just amazing.”

She said she was especially impressed with some of the animations — “they need to be working for Pixar,” she said of one group of animators — as well as the student projects.

“Our student films are just so good,” she said.

‘Find Me’

One student director, Kitty Mahoney, who graduated from University of Alaska Anchorage last fall, said she was “stoked” that her 24-minute senior project, “Find Me” made it into the festival, for more than just her own exposure.

“It’s a really beneficial thing for the Valley and for local people submitting to it to meet people outside of the Valley and, if they want continue in film, to expand their social network and exchange ideas,” Mahoney said.

Having grown up in Wasilla and spent her college years in Anchorage, Mahoney knows the Valley often gets looked down upon as place rife with violent crime, drug abuse and little to do.

“It’s sad that when I say I’m from the Valley, a lot of people in Anchorage say, ‘Oh, I’m sorry,’” she said.

But there’s always some truth to stereotypes, and Mahoney said that darker side of Valley life might actually allow more people to identify with her film on one man’s struggle with suicide.

“I think it’s something that a lot of people deal with, whether you know someone who’s attempted it or succeeded or thought about it,” she said.

The purpose of “Find Me,” though, is not to dredge up bad memories, but to bring hope.

“Oftentimes, when you’re dealing with suicide, you see the deterioration of a person’s life and mental state. …Less often do you see all the encouragement they have from their loved ones and promising relationships and things they’re looking forward to,” which is what “Find Me” aims to do, she said.

Social justice from Spain

Barcelona animator Pedro Solis Garcia is also making strides in the field of spreading awareness about important social issues.

In his second award-winning short film, “Cuerdas,” Garcia tells the close-to-home account of a boy with cerebral palsy who is rejected by most of his classmates, but befriended by a curious girl named Maria.

The story was inspired by Garcia’s own children, Alejandra (now 18) and Nicolas, or Nico (now 11).

“This film is a gift that I have made to my children,” Garcia wrote in an email translated by publicist Nora Marco.

While the story is highly personal, Garcia said the film has impacted many more lives than that of his immediate family. “Cuerdas” has received awards at more than 200 film festivals around the world, including the Goya Award for Best Spanish Animated Short Film in 2014.

“But the best achievement has been Cuerdas’s social work,” Garcia said. “Cuerdas has served to raise awareness of the importance of the integration of people with disabilities.”

Big foot, eh?

Corbin Saleken, an independent filmmaker from Vancouver, British Columbia brought “Patterson’s Wager” to completion for personal reasons as well, but more for entertainment than anything else.

“I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life talking about the movies I was never going to make,” he said in a phone interview.

The feature-length film that will be presented to Valley viewers at the festival is a merger of two storylines, the first of which came to Saleken in the form of a short story about a man gifted with the unusual ability of seeing two minutes into the future.

“I think I was thinking about useless superpowers, like what could you give someone that was just enough to mess up their life? They wouldn’t be able to do anything with it, but they’d be affected by it,” he said.

The story sat among Saleken’s things for a few years, collecting dust and, unrealized by him at the time, a host of other ideas, the chief of which was perhaps more outlandish than the first: Bigfoot.

The convergence of the ideas is purposefully slow — perhaps even unclear to some until the end of the movie — but the pacing allows for character and thematic development that is just as relevant to the film as a whole.

“The movie is really about belief and why people choose to believe in something,” Saleken said.

The title also reflects the concept of “having to bet on people we meet,” he said, gauging whether the person in question can be trusted or not.

Saleken said he was excited for “Patterson’s Wager” to make its Alaska debut, and hopes that viewers will be entertained by a new perspective and an original story.

“That's what film really is, just taking you out of your world and showing you somebody else’s,” he said.

His advice to up-and-coming filmmakers involved in the festival or otherwise was to “make the movies that you wanna see yourself.”

“There’s only one of you in the world, so cultivate that and harness that and try to create that unique voice because it's the thing that no one else has.”

Tickets

Day passes for the festival are $13.50, with full-festival passes running at $60. Friday’s showings and evening artist reception require a VIP pass, which costs $35. Single-film admission is $3.50, available at the door. All other passes can be purchased at www.glennmassaytheater.com.

For a complete list of films, visit matsu.alaska.edu/departments/fine-arts/machetanz-art-festival/machetanz-film-festival/

Machetanz Arts Festival begins

The Machetanz Arts Festival will be held Tuesday, May 31-Sunday, June 5 at Mat-Su College. In addition to artist workshops, presentations and demonstrations, the college will host a film festival with showings from 1 p.m. to about 10 p.m. each day.

Tickets for individual workshops can be purchased at matsu.alaska.edu/MAF. More information and tickets for the film festival can be purchased at www.glennmassaytheater.com under the Machetanz Arts Festival tab.

Schedule of events

Tuesday, May 31-Friday, June 3

Four-day workshop, “Sculpting the Truth” with Simon Kogan: 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

Friday, June 3-Sunday, June 5

• “Build, Program and Take Home Your Own 3D Printer,” three-day workshop with Bryan McKimson: June 3, 2-5 p.m., June 4, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. and June 5, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

Friday, June 3

• “The Zentangle Method” with Donna Jacobson, CZT: June 3, 2-5 p.m.

• Raku Firing workshop with Sandra Cook: June 3, 2-5 p.m.

• Presentation by Simon Kogan: June 3, 4:30-5:15 p.m.

• “Artistry, Photography, and the Android” with Harry Banks: June 3, 2-5 p.m.

• “Paint the Northern Lights on Silk” with Gina Murrow: June 3, 2-5 p.m.

Friday, June 3-Saturday, June 4: Two-day workshops

• “Artistic Technique, Experimentation, and Enlightenment in Encaustic Paints” with Judy Vars: June 3, 2-5 p.m., and June 4, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “Landscapes” with Carl Abken: June 3-4, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “Digital Photography Workshop: Start to Finish” with Jim Frei: June 3-4, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “Invitation to Drawing” with Tom Nixon: June 3-4, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “Intermediate Watercolor Painting” with Vladimir Zhikhartsev: June 3-4, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

Saturday, June 4

• “Sculpting a Portrait: Not the Way They Look, But the Way They Are” with Simon Kogan: June 4, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “Mixed Media Collage” with Laurel Carnahan: 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “Hand building: Ceramics” with Steven Godfrey: 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• Raku Firing Workshop with Sandra Cook: 9-11:45 a.m or 1:15-4 p.m.

• “Paint Silk like a Pro” with Gina Murrow: 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “Beginning Watercolor” with Don Kolstad: 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “Mosaic House Sign” with Karen Urroz: 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “The Zentangle Method” with Donna Jacobson, CZT: 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

• “Introduction to Aluminum Sand Casting” with Pat Garley: 9-11:45 a.m or 1:15-4 p.m.

• “Art & Science Collide” with Barb Laucius and Kathleen Nevis: 9-11:45 a.m or 1:15-4 p.m.

• “Welcome to the Wonderful World of Fused Glass” with Charlene Howe: 9-11:45 a.m or 1:15-4 p.m.

• “Printmaking: Monotype Printing with a Pin Press” with Garry Kaulitz: 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

Saturday, June 4-Sunday, June 5

• Writing workshops and writers panel discussion: 9:30 a.m.-6:30 p.m.

Sunday June 5

• “Artistry, Photography the iPhone and iPad” with Harry Banks: 9-11:45 a.m or 1:15-3:45 p.m.

Contact reporter Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.