Sunscreen Film Festival Offers Film School and Acting Workshop

The Sunscreen Film Festival is entering its fifth year in 2010. The past half-decade of the annual event has seen rapid growth and popularity, with a 600 percent increase in attendance from 2006 to 2009. Hosted by the St. Petersburg-Clearwater Film Society, the Sunscreen Film Festival was founded – at a kitchen table – by Tony Armer and Derek Miner, in 2005.

 

The primary goal of the Sunscreen Film Festival, according to their website, is “to encourage the creation, production, and exhibition of independent film in Florida through its educational programs and public screenings, thereby increasing awareness and support of local filmmaking as a cultural and economic asset.”

 

With this goal in mind, in 2008 the Sunscreen Film Festival began its Actor's Workshop, a multi-day, multi-panel discussion, instruction and audition process hosted by a Hollywood casting agent, director, and acting coach. In 2009 the film festival offered its first Film School program. Over the course of two weeks and using local actors and top-of-the-line equipment, ten students wrote, produced, directed, shot and edited two short films, Claire and Cookies & Torture, to be screened at the festival.

Following on these successes, the Actor’s Workshop has become a year-round program, and the Film School has returned for a second year with its 2009/2010 season. Two classes are beginning this month, Film School for Moviemakers and Actors, and Acting for the Screen.

Acting for the Screen will instruct students on the Meisner and Judith Weston techniques, with improvisation and camera technique, instructed by Dave DeBorde, professor of cinematic arts at Southeastern University and an award-winning filmmaker whose work has been screened at over 50 film festivals around the world. The course begins January 30th and consists of four full-day classes over the next four months, culminating in a screening of the student-actors’ scenes at the Sunscreen Film Festival in April.

Film School for Moviemakers and Actors will teach filmmakers how to take off-the-shelf equipment and make a movie out of original stories. Instructed by Dave DeBorde and advised by Tom Garrett, assistant professor of communication at the University of Tampa, joined by handful of industry professionals, participants will learn how to write and pitch a script, set up production schedules, plan and shoot shots, direct actors, work with lighting and sound, edit and assemble rough-cuts, insert credits, and more. The course begins January 23rd, and also consists of four full-day classes over four months, culminating in a special category screening of the students’ films at the festival.

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