February 14, 2016. Providence, RI. Media Smart Libraries and Providence Children’s Film Festival (PCFF) teamed up to host the public event Be a Cinema Detective: Discover, Explore, and Inspire Through Film. This free event, held at the Metcalf Auditorium in the Rhode Island School of Design Museum, was an opportunity for kids, parents, educators, and librarians to engage in an enhanced viewing experience by digging deeper into films, exploring different genres, and learning film criticism strategies.
Anisa Raoof, Executive Director of PCFF, welcomed the sizable crowd who braved record cold temperatures, and provided an overview of PCFF and highlights to this year’s film festival. Eric Bilodeau, Director of Programming for PCFF followed by speaking about what it means to be a cinema detective and PCFF’s goal of bringing this type of film appreciation and critical discussion programming into Rhode Island schools. He then showed short animation clips illustrating different techniques and had the audience learn about the features children might see to help them identify the different animation styles. Bilodeau’s clips included Bottle by Kirsten Lepore, Papa Cloudy by Akiko McQuuerrey, Marcel the Shell with Shoes On by Dean Fleischer-Camp, and Western Spaghetti by Pes.
Bilodeau then turned to documentaries and the audience learned that the essence of documentary film is one person explaining reality to another. The clips shown included Bianca Giaever’s amusing eight minute short, The Scared is Scared, and the perspective-bending Dragon Watching: A Documentary, created by local teens involved in the AS220 Youth Studios.
Sarah Yahm, an educator and doctoral candidate at Brown University, followed with an introduction to PCFF’s growing Film Hub, an online resource designed to increase access to high quality independent and international children’s cinema. In addition to a listing of past festival films, the Film Hub provides film guides for parents and educators that include contextual information, discussion questions and hands-on activities. Yahm modeled how to use the film guides with the audience for the lovely animated film, The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore, and the 2015 PCFF Audience Choice winner for best short film, Just Breathe. The audience enjoyed the opportunity to use the film guides to enhance their viewing experience.
Participants learned how librarians and educators could use the resources in the PCFF Film Hub to promote film appreciation and help children develop critical thinking skills. Yahm said, “there are two pedagogical goals -- teaching film literacy (how to be a cinema detective) and critical thinking/social, culture, and emotional literacy (since our films cover a wide range of important social topics--race immigration, discrimination, etc.)...The great thing about these guides for teachers and librarians is that they’re modular and can be used piecemeal.”
By the end of the morning, the audience had warmed up to the idea of being a film detective and declared the Valentine’s day event a sweet experience. A number of Media Smart Libraries cohort members and community members then went on to enjoy other films through the duration of the 2016 Providence Children’s Film Festival.