A wise person once said “if you want to influence another’s mind, speak from your mind; if you want to touch another’s heart, speak from your heart; if you want to change a life—tell a story.”
Grand County youth will have an opportunity to immerse themselves in cinematic story-telling during Moab’s first-ever Tumbleweeds Film Festival for Children and Youth, Friday and Saturday, May 9 and 10 at Star Hall. The two-day event, organized by the Utah Film Center, will showcase the festival’s most popular youth films and offer free filmmaking workshops.
“When you empower kids to create their own narratives, they own the media rather than being passive consumers of popular culture, and I think that’s why it’s good to bring film to children,” said Sallie Hodges, the local outreach coordinator for the Utah Film Center.
Since its inception in 2010, Tumbleweeds Film Festival has become a popular event in Salt Lake City. This year marks the first time the Utah Film Center is taking its festival to another location.
“We know a lot of people can’t easily travel to Salt Lake or other places where there are kids’ film festivals, so we thought we’d take that experience on the road,” said Holly Yocom, the Utah Film Center’s executive director. “And we’re already doing screenings in Moab and it’s been so successful that we feel like Moab’s our second home.”
The festival opens Friday May 9 with the Academy Award nominee feature film “Ernest & Celestine.” Based on a Belgian book series by Gabrielle Vincent, Ernest & Celestine tells the story of two unlikely friends: a young mouse in an underground land where cautionary tales of bears are told and all mice are destined to become dentists, and a bear. The two set out against the odds to prove their friendship is possible.
“Ernest & Celestine” is near and dear to all of our hearts because we curated it, so we helped bring it to Utah,” Yocom said.
Saturday’s films include a variety of short films and independent features including an animation, a documentary, and “Zip & Zap and the Marble Gang.”
“’Zip & Zap’ is kind like a mix a modern day Goonies and Harry Potter, if you will,” Yocom said. “The kids absolutely love it. I was lucky enough to see it with 800 students in Ogden and they were screaming, they were cheering; there was a sense of community being built.”
“Zip & Zap” is the festival’s one foreign-language film. To enhance young viewers’ appreciation of foreign-language movies, an out-loud reading of the subtitles is played through individual headsets for those who want reading help. The limited number of headsets are offered on a first-come, first-served basis to young people only, the festival Web site states.
Two mini filmmaking workshops put on by Spy Hop, an award-winning youth media-arts and education center based in Salt Lake City, are offered to give youth, starting at age 7, the other side of the digital story-telling experience .
“We use digital media as a tool to get kids talking about what they love, express themselves, and also to learn to collaborate and communicate with each other, which is a key skill for any age,” said Virginia Pearce, Spy Hops director of marketing and community programs.
In the two-hour classes in which the kids produce a 90-second to two-minute film, they will get a taste of different filmmaking components, including music, acting, stop-motion animation, editing, and camera work.
“You can see a light go on in their brains, you’ll spark some kind of creative vision and they’ll start to think about media in a different way,” said Jeremy Chatelain, Spy Hop’s musical arts instructor.
To expand the use of digital story-telling as an empowering learning tool, the festival is partnering with the filmmaking educators Adobe Youth Voices and SHIFT, to put-on a free, two-day teachers’ workshop. Local educators can learn how to integrate the filmmaking process into their class-room instruction. Participants will learn how to use equipment that is already available through the schools to produce public service announcements, documentaries, instructional videos and personal narratives.
Tumbleweeds Film Festival brings youth movies and free workshops to Moab
For more information, including show times, workshop registration and festival passes, visit utahfilmcenter.org/moab
Films shown May 9 and 10 at Star Hall, 125 East Center Street.
Individual movie tickets (available at the door beginning Saturday, May 10) $3.00
All-Access Pass: $10.00
Family Pass: $35.00
Spy Hop Workshops (free)
Saturday, May 10 at the MARC, 111 East 100 North – Moab, Utah
Ages 10+ – 10 am–12 pm
Ages 7-9 – 2-4 pm
AYV/SHIFT Teachers Workshop (free)
Friday, May 9 and Saturday, May 10 at The MARC, 111 East 100 North – Moab, Utah
8:30-5:00
“We know a lot of people can’t easily travel to Salt Lake or other places where there are kids’ film festivals, so we thought we’d take that experience on the road. And we’re already doing screenings in Moab and it’s been so successful that we feel like Moab’s our second home.”
