Students to debut ‘homework’ at film festival

Amanda KIng

A new class of students is ready to debut its handiwork at the seventh-annual AHA Film Festival, and multimedia co-instructor Joe Fatheree couldn’t be more pleased with the way the community has embraced the event.

The festival winds up the yearly multimedia program that is a joint partnership between Teutopolis High School and Effingham High School.

“There are really very few places that celebrate academic excellence,” Fatheree said. “We stand for hours at a football game and pack the gym for basketball at the state finals, but this is the only event I know of where over 1,600 people line up for the chance to applaud kids’ homework ... We really have a community that celebrates academic excellence.”

To be fair, this “homework” Fatheree speaks of is more demanding than the average English essay. It’s the end product of almost eight months of hard labor demanding creative drive and technical know-how, and the end result is a conglomeration of beautiful images and riveting stories that has drawn a packed house at the Rosebud Theatre — and before that the Heart Theatre downtown — for the last seven years.

Teutopolis High School senior multimedia student Amy Nosbisch put it simply:

“This is like the Academy Awards for us.”

Nosbisch will premiere two films at the April 10 festival — which will be her first — and her excitement shows. But even some of her classmates who were in the class last year are still clearly anticipating the big event.

“You screen the movies in class, and you get a chuckle here and there, but there’s nothing like that feeling when you get a room full of 1,600 people and those little chuckles turn into roars,” said Effingham High School senior Keith Sutterfield, who experienced the feeling firsthand at last year’s festival.

Sutterfield will screen two of his films this year and, despite his prior festival experience, he said he and his classmates will probably “be in the back biting our nails” watching for the audience’s reaction.

And that is what has most of the program’s 42 students so excited: the audience reaction.

“I’m nervous,” said Teutopolis junior Josh Seibert. “You’re sharing your hard work and wondering, will people appreciate it or will they ask, ‘What was that?’”

It’s a natural feeling for students who have pored over their films, spending hours upon hours writing, scripting, filming and editing. They’ve become quite attached to their work.

“The movie is a part of yourself — you put so much time and effort into it,” Nosbisch said.

Audience reaction is also key in determining the sought-after people’s choice award, presented at the end of the festival along with an overall juried award and others for writing, cinematography, acting and animation.

The 25 films vying for those awards this year cover a wide spectrum of genres. There’s Sutterfield’s “Stuck,” a comedy about a group of friends that get stuck in a car in a fun twist of Karma. And EHS senior Abby Detwiler’s “Captivating,” a twist on a fairytale about a girl who meets a prince and discovers through her godmother’s attempts to change her that it’s best to be herself. Or Nosbisch’s “Faded,” a tribute to a grandmother with Alzheimer’s.

Add to that mix a couple romantic comedies, a handful of light and dark dramas, two music videos, a horror flick, enough comedies to keep everyone laughing, and two animations, and the end result is a variety of films that multimedia students promise will offer “something for everyone.”

The sheer number of students who have worked all school year to produce that variety — 42 to be precise — present the program with its “biggest challenge” said co-instructor Craig Lindvahl. Each student, and each film, present unique challenges, both creative and technical, that keep Fatheree and Lindvahl scrambling to stay ahead of their students.

But that, too, has become an important part of the class, with students like Teutopolis junior Michael Williams saying he values the independence the class gives him to learn on his own.

Lindvahl agreed.

“It’s a testament to their skill — everything they learn,” Lindvahl said of his students. “They work together, and they mentor each other.”

For Fatheree, the sometimes chaotic nature of the class is also one of its strengths. In fact, one of his favorite parts of his job is the opportunity to “take all that creative genius and put it in a big melting pot.”

“I see that every day,” Fatheree said. “This (film festival) is giving the community the opportunity to see that.

Tickets for the AHA Film Festival are currently on sale. Cost is $5 each or $35 a piece for VIP tickets. The show starts at 6:45 p.m. April 10 at the Rosebud Theatre, Effingham, and is sponsored by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences and Midland States Bank.

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