Shooting for the stars: The Princeton Film Foundation

For those University students devoted to film pursuits, the genre can seem to fall between the cracks. Unlike rivals Harvard and Yale, Princeton has no film major and offers only a few classes related to video production — such as VIS 311: Introductory Video and Film Production and VIS 412: Advanced Film and Video Practice. If a student wishes to incorporate video production into his or her major, the only way to do so is to major in art and archeology in the visual arts program and specialize in video as his or her primary studio.

Yet, according to Matt Bacal '01, president of the Princeton Film Foundation, "there is a lot of interest on campus in filmmaking." Many students attend summer programs in filmmaking at New York University or the New York Film Academy, take the video classes offered at Princeton and are left searching for other opportunities to pursue their interests while undergraduates.

Groups have tried before to meet this need and failed. When Bacal arrived on campus, the Princeton University Film Foundation was in its last year of existence. Princeton Filmmakers, a similar group, had died a few years earlier. This left the University community with no filmmaking support organization.

Jade Welsh '00, Jane Han '02 and Bacal found themselves in this position last year and decided to have a go at forming a yet another film group at the University. What they came up with was PFF, which Bacal describes as a "way to get everyone interested in film [at Princeton] in touch with each other."

"I don't think we'll ever see an actual film major at Princeton," Bacal admitted, "and I don't know that, if we succeed in making an organization that's really strong and is doing work, there's a need for a major."

PFF's predecessors failed because of organizational instability, Bacal said, which is why the founders of this newest incarnation made creating a solid base their first priority. During the summer, they wrote a constitution for PFF, including an outline of operating, election and committee-formation procedures, as well as a system for choosing scripts.

When they returned to school in the fall and set up a booth at the activities fair, more than 100 individuals signed up. "We have really talented writers, really talented actors, really intelligent people in general and to make a film you need people with all those different talents," Bacal said.

At the moment, the board is actively engaged in a fund-raising drive targeting the University's alumni in Hollywood. They hope to raise $30,000, most of which will go to the purchase of equipment such as digital cameras, an editing system and microphones.

"We want to get our own equipment so that we can start people working on little projects and slowly gain a base of students who are experienced with the camera, with editing, with all aspects of production," Bacal explained.

Of the money raised, $10,000 will be placed in a USG-reserve fund designed for student organizations, where it will gain interest at a higher rate than outside funds. The film organizations that developed and dissolved before this, Bacal said, "didn't have equipment that was their own equipment and they didn't have a reserve fund so there was nothing stable for the next people who came along to hold on to."

The goal of the foundation is two-fold — to further filmmaking pursuits at the University and to increase awareness of opportunities in the entertainment industry for University graduates. PFF plans to begin fulfilling the first part of this goal both with the purchase of production equipment and the scheduling of film-related events around campus.

As far as production goes, the board hopes next year to produce one digital short film each month through the fall. The members plan to spend more time in the spring creating a short with a higher production value that will be shot on real film.

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PFF's members have already begun organizing film events. This fall they arranged a lecture by computer science researcher Ben Shedd, who won an Academy Award for his work in developing IMAX features. Planned for this spring is a student film festival that will showcase films created by University students during the summer.

In late February, PFF is holding a screening of Han's documentary on slam poetry, which is currently nearing the end of editing.

Han received a Martin Dale '53 prize to produce the documentary last summer, and the screening event will involve both a showing of the film and a live slam, which will feature most of the poets from the documentary. "That's going to be the first big event we're going to do a lot of publicity for," Bacal said. "Slam poetry is so exciting, and I think it could be a special thing for people here."

As well as increasing the amount of production-related activity on campus, PFF seeks to increase students' awareness of career opportunities in the entertainment industry and put them in contact with industry alumni. "It's such an exciting industry," Bacal said, "and there's the opportunity to do quite well, and right now people just don't know that much about it."

"A lot of people in the arts feel left out of the whole on-campus recruiting and what to do to go into a career in acting in Hollywood or writing or producing," he continued. "There really isn't a lot of guidance in that area."

PFF hopes its existence will make alumni in the entertainment industry more eager to come back to campus and share their experiences, which in turn will lead to more Princeton graduates entering the entertainment industry.

"Princeton students are really intelligent," Bacal remarked. "They work hard. They're smart, and they'd be a huge asset to Hollywood . . . I think that creating stronger bonds with the alumni will help people know that opportunity is out there, and they don't have to go consulting or I-banking."

"There's a quote by Goddard: 'Photography is truth. Film is truth 24 times per second,' " Bacal said. For him, this captures PFF's focus and purpose. "There's just something magical about film. It's a medium that combines so many areas of creativity. I like film because it lasts — you have a record of the whole experience. It stays."

"I'd love to be able to share that with people," he said.