Article by Ryan Abner
Its film season at Minarets High School and, as a school known for its filmmaking, tech, and media programs through Slickrock and California media festivals, it's no surprise that the high school has started a film festival of its own.
The Southgate Film Festival has been a tradition at Minarets for over three years. The event was first created by alumnus Cole Shattuck as a way for students from not only Minarets but also neighboring schools to get experience in producing short films and videos. “Southgate is a great example of Go Big, Go Pro, Go Now! It is a student-run film festival that showcases student work on a BIG screen” said Patrick Wilson, the school’s director of the charter.”It really is a great example of students helping students show off their work!”
This year, like many previous years, the production of the festival and judging submissions is part of a Senior Legacy project for Mandi Villanueva and Austin Mitchell, senior officers in Minaret’s own Media Club. It will be held at the Tower Theater in Fresno on March 18, 2020 with a showing of all accepted submissions as well as an award ceremony. “My main inspiration for wanting to run Southgate was the fact that I had the opportunity to watch to other seniors go through that process and use their passion for media and film to have an impact on the community,” explained senior Mandi Villanueva.
Submissions are due on Jan. 31 and the categories include sports highlights, short films, public service announcements, comedy, and swede, a popular form of spoof videos made popular in California film festivals where trailers or scene segments are recreated with the lowest production value possible.
Previous years have seen an abundant submissions with small film communities growing from participating, as well as running comedy spoof series of the office sparking from the festival’s annual premier. With the festival’s community growing more and more each year, many are waiting to see if the category list will expand to more recently popular things, like travel edits or animated stories.
For any more information on how to get involved with the festival or to see rules and dates, you can visit their website here. tiny.cc/southgatefilmfestival