5th grade says "...and Action!"

It was at a casual Birthday dinner for a friend in East Village, Manhattan, when Marc meet public school teacher Emily Abedon the first time. And so it happend that they developed the idea to make a filmproject with Emilys 5th grade in Brooklyn.

There are movies everywhere: On your cell phone playing, on TV airing, on the web streaming and in the theater screening. Just to name a few places where we get in touch with the medium film everyday.
All this films want something from you: the want to inform you, make you listen, entertain you, make you laugh, make you dream, make you cry, or just want you to drink more Coca-Cola.
Film is a wonderful medium, but also a seducing one.
We want to show kids how film works. What does it take to make a movie? How easy or how difficult is it?
This workshop was supposed to demystify film on one side, but also to introduce the art of filmmaking as a great hobby or job to spend time or a lifetime with.
What does it take to create emotion in the audience? What is the job of a Director of Photography? What is a producer doing? How is it to be an actor, with 30 people around you, awaiting you do present the perfect performance?
Filmmaking is fun. And filmmaking is hard.

In this workshop Marc explained to the class in easy words and a fun way how a film is created, from the first idea till the premiere. But the best way to learn something is to do something.
And this is why the classroom turned into a filmstudio.
A week in May 2008 was the time where eleven and twelve year old kids from Brooklyn developed a video documentary and wrote the script for a short fictional piece till every student become a busy crew member. Bryan and Shauib became Sounde-Recorder, Jarmaine the Camera-Assistant, Chance the Director, Sean Script-Continuity, Make-Up-Artist was K´la and Hadiyatou, Dimitrius and Jose the two Directors of Photography, just to name a few.

And here you go. Please have a look at the two films, produced and directed PS 139 Brooklyn. You can find them at the top of this blog.

Very big thanks to the wonderful teachers Emely Abedon and Anne Murphy who made this possible with so much love and power!
And many thanks to the support from the industry:

THE WHITEHOUSE NEW YORK Trish, Jojo, Corina and Ethan
NUTMEG AUDIOPOST Frank Verderosa
SMOKE & MIRRORS
ADAM BENN
TAMBERELLI VIDEO RENTAL
PARANOID US

Lets do it agin next year!!