My experience at the Visions Film Festival was a very fun one. I came into the festival with no knowledge of what a film festival would be like and an extra pass Luqi gave me around my neck. The first block I attended was the video race screening. Since I didn't participate in the actual race, it was really a shock to dive in to the video race results. I was left with the inescapable feeling that I still don't understand "film student humor" and am not sure I ever want to. The whole theme of the race and the resulting videos were a bit too abstract for me, and I ended up feeling like I was watching the film version of someone else's inside joke. The laughter in the audience was a constant reminder that I wasn't a part of this group of competitors. That said, I was also impressed with some of the results knowing that the groups had a limited amount of time and only one take to shoot their entries.
The second block I attended was one that I clicked much more with - the short film block. My absolute favorite was the intense middle-school action drama about trading Pokémon cards. I'm not usually a fan of child actors, so I was really surprised when I was so into the film. It was just so nostalgic and the production value was so good that it really sold the narrative. I wasn't as enthralled with the film about the slave getting a scholarship to college by being forced to fight by his master. I think the reason this film fell short for me was that I just didn't buy it's narrative because of the actors. I'm sure this may have been unintentional, but the boy's acting style changed the direction of the film and made me really confused. I heard from someone else who watched this block with me that the film was based on an excerpt from a book, and that it was much different than they had pictured it.
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