I Spilled Beer On My Professor At The ACTC Film Festival

The ACTC Film Festival is a yearly event that takes films made by students from Minnesota schools such as Hamline University, St. Katherine University, Augsburg College, Macalester College, and University of St. Thomas, and gives them exposure. The event  takes place at the St. Anthony Main theater.

The entrance of the St. Anthony Main Theater

This year was a mixed bag of films. While Augsburg put out some really good narrative films (my favorite submissions all came from Augsburg... yes I am biased), other colleges made some really good documentaries, and some other schools made really horrible films that should not have made the cut.

Film Festival pamphlet and schedule

Of the few films that were legitimately good, my favorite has to be Augsburg student Nial Nelson-Hopkins' CHESSDOGS (which you can check out here). It was also one of the audience's favorite films as well; the reaction and applause was immense.  I made my cinema debut in another Augsburg student's film. I play a 90's gangster that uses laundry detergent as a dumbell in Casey Bargsten's Puppet Passion (the link is not the version that Bargsten showed, but it's close enough). This was a fantastic film. The audience really received it well; they laughed at the right moments and died down during the drama. Another Augsburg student, JC Calubayan, submitted his film Black Sun, Red Sky to a wonderful reaction. This director has a knack for composition. His work reminds me of Terrence Malick (especially this specific film). Black Sun, Red Sky was definitely the most beautiful film at the festival. 

Filmmaker Casey Bargsten at the reception.

I had a huge problem with two films specifically. One of these films won a very undeserved award for a really problematic and almost offensive documentary. Chia Lor's "A Hmong" Scar: Translated Bodies of the Hmong Diaspora was promising at first (except for the comical opening that I felt bad about laughing at), but it quickly devolves into something the filmmaker did not handle with sensitivity. The film starts out with an interview with a Hmong soldier that now lives in America. He shows the audience his scars from war and does begin to cry while talking about the atrocious things he saw during the war. This is, unfortunately, immediately discredited by the next two people the director talks to. There is a woman in traditional Hmong dress and a man who is dressed in a button up and slacks. The filmmaker asks them what it means to be Hmong. They reply with "you have a rice cooker and drive a Toyota." I could not believe that it ended on that note. I feel that to sum up a culture with those two factors is disgusting. If the film was about the Americanization of Hmong people it would fit, but that's not what the film deals with.

Hamline University student James Zimmerman also submitted a comedy film called Quest for Youth. This film is about a scientist that has found the formula for everlasting youth. The jokes are mostly about what ingredients are put into the youth serum. The humor of this film is that of a middle school boy; it's crude and dumb. Eventually the scientist drinks the youthful concoction and turns into a child. The next five minutes of the film is the child running around the house and screaming. The laughs from the audience did not last long. 

Overall the festival was very enjoyable. I got to meet with filmmakers at the reception and tech-talk as well as converse with professors about projects I am working on at the moment. I also spilled beer on Augsburg professor Stephen Clark, so I don't think I can hang out with him anymore.


The reception of the ACTC Film Festival. Filmmaker Alex Behrns, on the left, ruining my picture.