Finding Felix
The Impact of International Cinema in Childhood Autobiographical Memory
Finding Felix Project
- The Finding Felix Project
- Berlin, Germany
- The Finding Felix Project is a work for screen and publication from Katy Kavanaugh, a curator and filmmaker (katykavanaugh.weebly.com). Funding from Stanford University, The Freie Universität- Berlin and DAAD allowed her to return to the Berlin Film Festival's 35 year-old Generation (formerly Kinderfilmfest) to collect evidence of the directive impact that international films seen in childhood can have toward shaping the breadth of a person's view of the world and the decisions they make. This investigation focuses on one eleven year-old film festival-goer whom Kavanaugh met while serving on the Kinderfilmfest's international jury in 2001. Ten years later, Kavanaugh wants to know how a childhood full of international films influenced Felix's life so far. Meanwhile, with help from Media Consultant Tina Toepfel and Gintare Malinauskaite, PhD History at Humboldt Universität, Felix has been found and is now in post-production. To help meet its completion goal, please consider contributing via our fiscal sponsor, Cinefemme.net. https://cinefemme.net/projects/finding-felix/
Tuesday, August 4, 2020
Tuesday, August 13, 2019
Final Interviews 2019
Vincent Förster and Moritz Klein formed a friendship around international cinema. Shown here first in their first 2011 interview followed with their February 2019 interview. Their experience meeting as young teens, initially as young jury members and then as young journalists, in 2006 at the Berlinale sealed a bond around reflection on film and discussion. Through this rough clip, it is clear to see how their lives and cinema have influenced each other.
Saturday, March 11, 2017
Friday, September 4, 2015
The Children's Filmfest at the Mill Valley Film Festival is 20 year old.
The Children's Filmfest at the Mill Valley Film Festival is 20 years-old this year.
With ground work done in 1993 with my first program, Films for People 4 and UP, the festival allowed me to return from my year at the Chicago Children's International Film Festival to establish the Children's Filmfest in 1995.
I wrote the following in an application for a role as a Learning Designer with a firm I've admired since learning so much about it in graduate school. This paragraph is a "Little darling" that I had to do away with from that text, but couldn't part with it because its history is so dear to me and my development as researcher, filmmaker, designer - contributor.
The Academy Award Winning film, “The
Fantastic Voyage” (US1966) curated for the newly established Children’s
Filmfest at the Mill Valley Filmfest did as I had designed it to do: it
generated wonder about the human body. This was evident in vibrant conversation between the young audience, the
director, Richard Fleischer, and his medical consultant. “Is it really that loud
in the heart?” a seven year-old boy asked. Fleischer responded that he had used actual recordings of
the heartbeat and put himself inside the sound in a sound booth so he could
understand what it would be like inside a heart. He imparted his creative
combination of Science and Art. I didn’t follow up on this boy -I wouldn't doubt it if he went into Medicine-but I did keep
contact with one very impressive child who I met while serving on an award jury in
2001. Felix had spent his childhood seeing films and participating in conversations with directors at the Berlin Film Festival’s
children and youth section, more than ten years later I sought evidence of its impact. That
story is here, "Finding Felix."
Monday, February 9, 2015
Sunday 8 Feb 15 LA MAS GRANDE CASA DEL MUNDO
Sunday 8 Feb 15
The German word stille is
apparent this morning. A Sunday
morning in the middle of Berlin is stille as I ride through Mitte to the HKW for a 10am film, sunshine and blue
sky after a stormy night.
The Biggest House in the World, LA MAS GRANDE CASA DEL MUNDO
Two female co-directors and lead actress reflect the all
female focus on screen. “Where is
the papa?” a girl asks during Q&A.
It is explained this is normal to have grandmother, mother and daughter
since father is away working somewhere else. A knowing chortle ripples through
the crowd.
Beautiful high desert landscape with hills, sagebrushed
ravinesand rocky crags presented patiently as the young girl charged with
tending family sheep enter the frame.
Economic casting served the film, reflecting the sparse
population; three children, a mother, grandmother and an old medicine man lent
themselves gracefully to the camera in this rugged landscape.
The film had been work-shopped in five or more festivals
since 2009 a force of determination…and an encouragement for me and FINDING
FELIX.
Yesterday, I met Felix’s (Finding Felix) mother, Erica, as
it seems magically regular that I do at the beginning of each festival. Warmth and respect for her superceeded
my unfinished film sheepishness (pun intended) as I greeted her. She is an introverted mathematician who
loves international cinema; the only artform, she said in our 2011 interview,
that she likes.
I’ll go to the market to request a meeting at UniFrance…the
leader in European film export of films for young audiences to the U.S.
Later today, the Ukrainian film board will give a state of
their nation presentation at their market stall. I will attend.
The Americans at the IFP Stand gave an excellent panel on
documentary markets.
I’ll attend Kulinarishes Kino for Gary Meyer’s new Eat,
Drink, Films Festival. The Korean
film tonight is appropriately named OMNIVOROUS FAMILY.
Was happy to see Berkeley’s Alice Waters receive an award
recognizing her ten years of contribution to the Kulinarische Kino along with
Carlo Petrini. Waters in turn paid
tribute to Tom Luddy who introduced her to French Cinema and Marcel Pagnol for
whose film her Chez Panisse is named.
Friday, February 6, 2015
Berlinale 2015: Generation
Berlinale 2015, Day 1
It is a pleasure to be in Berlin again for the film festival; this time, once again, as an American resident. Despite my many years participating in this festival, each year begins with a new approach.
My great discovery is not focusing on the films but on attending the market on the opening days:
It’s the start of the festival, people are fresh and ready to receive. My purpose is doubled this
year as I support Gary Meyer’s new film festival Eat, Drink Films, opening in
the Bay Area this October.
It is delightful to ask for films for food, wine and children. Most
delightful are the faces of the human film archives who are the distribution
companies, as they scroll through their mental lists of films with food, wine
and children! As interested as I
am to find out about new culinary films, I am very pleased to note that so far,
new films for young audiences are more abundant.
PRINCE by Sam de Jong |
Americans in the line-up, showing a considerable increase in the past few years:
GOLDEN KINGDOM by Brian Perkins
KUMA HINA short by Dean Hammer and Joe Wilson.
14Plus for fourteen and older:
14Plus for fourteen and older:
DIARY OF A TEENAGE GIRL
by Marielle Heller with Kristen Wiig
by Marielle Heller with Kristen Wiig
ONE & TWO by Andrew Droz Palermo
Shorts
Shorts
BLOODLINES by Christoper Nataanii Cegielski
SQUIRREL by Tomas Vengris, US/Greece
Co-production films from Afghanistan and Irak make an important show in the program.
HADIATT IDI (Irak/GB/Niederland/USA) tells the story of a
boy remembering his parents’ death.
MINA WALKING by Yosef Baraki |
MINA WALKING (Kanada, Afghanistan) shows the turning point for a 12
year-old girl in a country dominated by men, who holds everything in her family together but knows there is something else.
www.berlinale.de/de/das_festival/sektionen_sonderveranstaltungen/generation/index.html
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