The Loyola film department showcase is the culmination of senior students’ hard work throughout the entire year. Each senior is required to write, produce, and edit their own films for the showcase on Sunday, April 26, at the Broad Theater from 12 p.m. to 4 p.m. The event is free and open to anyone interested in seeing student films.
With the help of their professors, each senior can bring their films from concept to reality. One of these professors, Nathan Tape, highlights the values this showcase has for his students every year.
“Filmmakers are often so close to their own work that it becomes difficult to evaluate it with complete objectivity. In many ways, sharing a film with an audience is the true final step in the creative process,” Tape said. “Observing how viewers respond, what resonates, what confuses, and what lingers, offers invaluable insight into what the film communicates. As I often say, once your work is in front of an audience, they reveal what you’ve truly made.”
Additionally, the film department has another event for its sophomore students called Script to Screen, inspired by a film class.
In this class, the students work as a group, using a student-written script to carry out a film production from conception to completion. Some roles they adapt in the class are production designer, assistant director, or director of photography. This gives every student a chance to showcase their talents in a leadership role.
The Script to Screen showcase is held on May 1, in the Communications and Music Complex at 5:30 p.m. This event is also free and open to the public.
Claire Kantrow, a junior showing her film “Farewell, Louise” at the showcase, appreciates the support the film department shows, no matter what you are producing.
“It’s good to celebrate those little wins because for us, it’s not so little,” Kantrow said. “This industry is hard and exclusive, and a screening/mini celebration of our hard work moving towards that is imperative for the students to feel empowered, motivated, and proud of themselves thus far.”
Another professor, Miles Doleac, the chair of the filmmaking department, comments on how vital it is for the hard work of these students to be shown on the big screen.
“Movies are meant to be shared,” Doleac said. “I think it’s critical that the final step in our program allows students to present their films in an actual movie theater before an audience of friends, family, strangers, and fellow artists and to feel that audience respond to the work in real time. That experience is what movies are all about.”
