Fall 2024 Student Film Festival Puts Spotlight on Emerging Filmmakers

L-R: Salvatore Blandina, VP, Cinema Arts Club; Roberto Cohetero Flores, Moussa Doumbia, Treasurer, Cinema Arts Club, and MVRP Foundation Rising Star awardee; Jem Monzon-Reyes, MVRP Foundation Rising Star awardee; David Hantman, VP, MVRP Foundation; Alison Rosen, President, MVRP Foundation; Jerome Gayman. President, Cinema Arts Club.
L-R: Salvatore Blandina, VP, Cinema Arts Club; Roberto Cohetero Flores, Secretary, Cinema Arts Club; Moussa Doumbia, Treasurer, Cinema Arts Club and MVRP Foundation Rising Star awardee; Jem Monzon-Reyes, MVRP Foundation Rising Star awardee; David Hantman, VP, MVRP Foundation; Alison Rosen, President, MVRP Foundation; Jerome Gayman, President, Cinema Arts Club.

December 11, 2024

On Sunday, December 8, the Fall 2024 Borough of Manhattan Community College (BMCC/CUNY) Film Festival, Welcome 2 Hollywood, took place in the BMCC Tribeca Performing Art Center’s Theater 2 at the college’s Chambers Street campus.

Students who are aspiring documentarians, commercial filmmakers, music video producers and feature filmmakers screened their original work. The event gave them an opportunity to network with peers and engage in conversation with esteemed directors and producers who shared career and creative insight.

The judges who volunteered their time for the event were Kazembe Balagun, Executive Director, Maysles Documentary Center; Marco Niro, Production Designer with credits inducing the ABC show 9-1-1, and Becky Lamming, video editor and BMCC alumna (Video Arts and Technology, 2023) who is a multiple past winner in the BMCC Film Festival herself.

About 130 friends and members of the BMCC community attended the event. Fifty-four films were submitted and 35 played in competition.

Media Arts and Technology Professor and documentary filmmaker Anastassios Rigopoulos—who advises the BMCC Cinema Arts Club—led the event.

The winners are as follows:

Roberto Cohetero Flores, Salvatore Blandina, Clara Riso, Jerome Gayman, Moussa Doumbia
Roberto Cohetero Flores, Salvatore Blandina, Clara Riso, Jerome Gayman, Moussa Doumbia

Best Fiction Film 

One More for Safety, directed by Michael Schnick; 

Honorable Mention: Osmose, directed by Jenna Ferayo and Sam Wang

Best Documentary

Ebony, directed by Sean-Josahi Brown; 

Honorable Mention: Punk to Protest –– Writing Is Activism with Alvin Eng, directed by Ken Dai

Best Animation

Honest Answer, directed by Sally Weitzner

Best Client-based Film (Commercial or PSA)

Un Altro Caffé, directed by Salvatore Blandina

Best Montage or Experimental Film

Can This Happen to a Normal Woman? by Clara Riso

Marlon Martinez (honorable mention, editing)
Marlon Martinez

Best Music Video

El Pérez: Trabajando, directed by Andres Mao Vivas

Best Directing

Jenna Ferayo and Sam Wang for Osmose

Best Acting

Michael Schnick for On More for Safety

Best Screenplay

Michael Schnick for One More for Safety

Best Cinematography (tie)

Salvatore Blandina for Un Altro Caffé and Dreams

Julian Craig for Flutes and Forests

Ken Dai, Isaiah Washington (winner, Viewers Choice Award for The Nerves Reminded Me)
L-R: Isaiah Washington and Ken Dai

Best Sound

Ken Dai for Punk to Protest –– Writing Is Activism with Alvin Eng

Best Editing (tie)

Mekhi Lee for Wurst Behavior and Clara Riso for Can This Happen to a Normal Woman?

Honorable Mention: Marlon Martinez for Golden Touch.

Viewers’ Choice Award 

The Nerves Reminded Me, directed by Isaiah Washington

The Michael Vincent Rosen-Pipitone Foundation’s MVRP Rising Star Award

Moussa Doumbia and Jem Monzon-Reyes

The Rising Star Award is presented by the Michael Vincent Rosen-Pipitone (Rosen-Pipitone) Foundation (MVRP) at each BMCC Film Festival in memory of the late Michael Vincent Rosen-Pipitone, a BMCC student and talented actor, writer, artist and comedian.

Thumbnail image: Sofie Nesanelis and Michael Schnick in still shot from the fiction film One More for Safety directed by Michael Schnick

 

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

  • On December 8, the BMCC Film Festival, Welcome 2 Hollywood, took place in the BMCC Tribeca Performing Art Center’s Theater 2

  • The judges were Kazembe Balagun, Executive Director, Maysles Documentary Center; Marco Niro, Production Designer and Becky Lamming, video editor and BMCC alumna (Video Arts and Technology, 2023)

  • Media Arts and Technology Professor Anastassios Rigopoulos and the BMCC Cinema Arts Club coordinated the festival which screened 35 films in competition

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