Oceanside gears up for film festival

All of Oceanside should have reason to be excited for April 27 this year. It marks the day of the district’s annual Film Festival, but this year’s submissions show a marked improvement over previous years.

According to Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum Robert Fenter, who helps run and organize the festival, the quality of the student submissions — which come from every school in the district — has increased dramatically, employing techniques that many of the judges never expected to see in student films.

The festival involves sixth graders from all of the elementary schools, as well as students from Oceanside Middle School and the high school. In the high school, many of the submissions come from students in Audrey Miller’s Broadcasting class — one of the newer classes at OHS.

“We’ve been able to do this film festival because of the program that’s in place,” Fenter said. “This is an all-schools kind of festival.”

The festival, held on April 27 in the high school auditorium, awards the student filmmakers based on the decision of a panel of judges made of up teachers and officials from all of the schools. The winners in each category receive a Foovie — a special award created just for the festival. There is also a “Best in Show” category, which is chosen by the audience the night of the festival.

Many of the students who entered into the film festival also made submissions to the Locust Valley Film Festival, which concluded late last month. Out of the 51 finalists, 11 were from Oceanside, and the school won five different awards. Zack Feldman, a junior, won first place for Best Documentary for a short film he made about Anthony Peruffo titled “Anthony.” Peruffo, who is autistic, is the manager of the OHS football team and was named Homecoming King earlier this year. Feldman’s film captures that story.

The broadcasting class helped Feldman realize that his real passion was film, instead of music, which was what he originally wanted to pursue. It also helped him realize how fun filmmaking can be.

“If I’m having fun, I’ll do it,” he said. “If I’m not going to have fun doing it, why am I doing it?”