SVFF 2013: HOT SHOT STUDENT FILMS—The Evening Class Interview With Hemingway Elementary School Teacher Scott Slonim

In early January, the Sun Valley Film Festival (SVFF) actively sought submissions for its new Hot Shot film category dedicated to filmmakers under age 18. Films of any type, feature, documentary, or short were welcomed. "We wanted to support and encourage young filmmakers on their journey into this business," said Ted Grennan, Executive Director of SVFF, "so we added the new Hot Shot film award category this year to recognize their efforts." Grennan confirmed when we spoke that SVFF tried to model the spirit of the festival on the family-friendly spirit of the Valley.

Of the 13 entries accepted into SVFF for the Hot Shots line-up, Skating Partners and Time Travelling Kids were from Ketchum's Hemingway Elementary School, so I phoned Teacher-Advisor Scott Slonim to congratulate he and his Fifth Grade Class on their achievement.

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Scott Slonim: Thank you!  The kids are so excited.

Michael Guillén: Tell me about Hemingway Elementary.

Slonim: We're part of the Blaine County school system, which includes four elementary schools between Bellevue, Hailey and Ketchum, and there's a fifth one a little farther away in Carey.

Guillén: Is this student filmmaking program common to all the elementary schools or particular to Hemingway?

Slonim: My class is named "Engineering Technology" and so I get to teach all the kids in the school from kindergarten through Fifth Grade. The Engineering Technology curriculum is broad. There are so many different things a student can do. They can pick something and if it fits they can go deeper into it. But to answer your question, all the schools do video of some sort.

Guillén: You're in charge of this activity at Hemingway and it sounds as if you've enthused your students in such a way that they're producing competitive product?

Slonim: It's available at all the schools but at Hemingway we tend to do the video well; whereas at Bellevue they tend to a little more NASA.

Guillén: How long have you been with Hemingway?

Slonim: This is my eighth year.

Guillén: And how did this program get started with you at the helm?

Slonim: During my first year at Hemingway, Picabo Street (the Olympic gold-winning skier) was doing commercials for Chapstick and she heard about a program called Panasonic Kid Witness News (KWN) and asked, "Why isn't my school in this program?" This program had a long waiting list to get into but suddenly we were being called up and asked if we wanted to be in it. So Picabo helped our school get involved with Panasonic who gave us a camera, a microphone, and some other equipment and invited us to be in their program. The next year we made our first videos. I'd never made a video before. I really didn't know what I was doing.

Guillén: How fun!

Slonim: It was fun. The kids made three different videos that they wrote and produced. They did everything; all I did was oversee the project. We won one of the categories in the Panasonic contest and that took us to New York City, paid for by Panasonic. That's when we started entering contests.

Guillén: So you've been submitting videos into contests across the country?

Slonim:This is our seventh year entering the KWN contest. As I find other appropriate film contests for my students, we'll either make a new video to enter or use an old one that's already made and submit that one. The year after we won KWN, we made a video for a site called eSchool News and we won that one as well, which allowed us to take three girls to Washington, D.C., paid for by eSchool News.

Guillén: So you are consciously using these video technology tools to teach these young kids community outreach? And teaching them how to build community?

Slonim: Yeah. Basically, in my class my Third Graders design and build toys in small groups. They'll write a commercial for it, we'll film the commercial, and then they'll learn how to edit it in iMovie. My Fourth Graders make recycled commercials by doing the same process. My Fifth Graders made videos to compete in KWN, but they don't do it during school. They make them during lunch recess, before school and after school. They have to actually apply to do it.

Guillén: How did Hemingway Elementary become involved with the Sun Valley Film Festival?

Slonim: One of the films that SVFF accepted—Time Travelling Kids—was one of the top three finalists for Boise State University, as part of the Idaho Leaf Project. The other film SVFF accepted—Skating Partners—was made for KWN, but KWN only accepts one video and we had made three, just because the kids wanted to do it. What we do in that instance is that the whole school watches the videos and then they vote on which one goes to KWN. I actually entered all three of those videos into SVFF and they chose Skating Partners.

Guillén: That's great. I have to commend you on this project, Scott. It's a wonderful way to teach children to express themselves. Are the Hamilton Elementary videos available for streaming online?

Slonim: Yes, they are. If you go to the Blaine County School District's website, on the left there's a tab where you can select EduVision.TV, which will bring you to all of the schools' videos. Towards the middle of the page there's a drop-down menu where you choose Hemingway Elementary and it will bring up all of the videos made by my students.

One other thing: we also do a live news show every morning at 8:00 that's broadcast live to the internet. We have green screen and different cameras and the kids run and produce the whole thing. If you go to the Blaine County School District website and select Hemingway, you can watch our live news show.

Guillén: My goodness! You have these kids on career track.

Slonim: Well, what I like is that it gives them an experience with public speaking. They become camera-comfortable. There are kids in the Fifth Grade program who at the beginning of the year say they only want to be behind the camera, but after they watch the show one time they're like, "Can I be Anchor One?" So if you have a chance, watch it. It's a lot of fun.

Guillén: Will do.

Slonim: Well, thank you very much for including us in your coverage of the festival.

Guillén: My pleasure.

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Hemingway Elementary Fifth Grade Class, Picabo Street, Sagebrush, Scott Slonim, SVFF, Ted Grennan,

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SVFF 2013—The Evening Class Interview With Executive Director Ted Grennan

You have to love the intimate displacements of the modern age. From my desk in San Francisco I phoned Ted Grennan at his relatively new desk in central Virginia (he's just moved his family from Los Angeles to north of Charlottesville) to talk about his involvement with the sophomore edition of the Sun Valley Film Festival (SVFF), where we'll both be converging this coming weekend. Here, there and everywhere.

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Michael Guillén: Ted, can you tell me a bit about your background and how you've come to helm the Sun Valley Film Festival?

Ted Grennan: I was in Sun Valley a couple of years ago. I had just been fired off a story I had sold to Fox Searchlight and didn't have anything else to do that summer. I loved that you could walk into a movie theater in Ketchum and Sun Valley and get a beer and/or a glass of wine and watch a movie. I called a friend of mine up and said, "Wouldn't it be fun to have a film festival in Sun Valley?" She said, "There's film festivals everywhere." "Yeah," I said, "but there isn't one in Sun Valley." Which wasn't completely true—there used to be the Sun Valley Spiritual Film Festival a few years back—but I meant a festival in a broader sense. I contacted a couple of people—Sabina Dana Plasse, Rick Kessler, and the Sun Valley Resort—and though this wasn't an original idea by any means, it was good timing. We launched in the fall and slotted the festival in for March.

Guillén: Hollywood's connection to Sun Valley has historical precedent. So I'm surprised that a festival of this caliber hasn't been proposed before?

Grennan: They had a film festival in Sun Valley about 10-12 years ago that we didn't learn about until we were well underway with our festival. We actually got some kind and supportive emails from some of the people who had been involved with that original inception of the festival. They did it one year and—though it was a good idea—the timing wasn't with them. I really don't know much else about it other than the emails we received wishing us good luck.

Guillén: But you feel the timing is with you? Can you speak to why now is the right time to launch the Sun Valley Film Festival?

Grennan: Timing is everything, though I don't know if there's always a reason for it. The key to the good timing was that the Valley was not only receptive but incredibly supportive. We had over 75 volunteers in our first year and most of them who are able are returning this year. Further, the Valley has fantastic venues—the Magic Lantern, the Opera House, the nexStage Theatre—which are great places to sit down and have a beer or a glass of wine and watch a movie. And although Sun Valley's not next-door, it has a proximity to Los Angeles by way of a short flight to Sun Valley. It's not that far to get to, but once you get there it feels like it is a real destination.  [Alaska Airlines, one of SVFF's main sponsors, offers non-stop LAX-SUN flights all winter long.]

Guillén: I wasn't able to attend last year's edition of SVFF, but it appears the effort was worthwhile, the feedback from audiences was positive, and you engineered a strong programming coup by engaging the Weinsteins. Are you furthering that collaboration this year?

Grennan: We are. The Weinsteins are coming back with three films this year. Lionsgate is coming back with a film or two. National Geographic has been the most pleasant surprise for us. They're such a fit for Sun Valley anyway and there's a local population of National Geographic guys—Greg Carr; Bob Poole won the One in A Million Award last year for War Elephants—and National Geographic considers Sun Valley a good home for them and they're coming back this year in a much larger capacity. They're launching two new television series that they'll be unveiling at SVFF and they're also holding a press conference where they'll be making a really exciting announcement in conjunction with the African Wildlife Federation (AWF). In fact, SVFF was the genesis for AWF and Nat Geo working together on a project revolving around a film-centric idea. So we're really grateful to have Nat Geo involved with an event that shares a lot of Nat Geo's values.

Guillén: Wonderful accomplishments! Now to backtrack just a bit, I understand you come from a screenwriting background?

Grennan: I do. Sometimes I get paid for it. Sometimes I don't.

Guillén: As do we all. So I've had my eye on this year's new development: the Screenwriter's Lab with Will McCormack; an event that everyone I've spoken to is planning on attending. It seems obvious to me that this will help to distinguish SVFF. On that train of thought, what do you consider the brand of SVFF? With proliferation of film festivals being something of a hot button issue, what is it that you think will set SVFF apart as a unique event?

Grennan: Frankly, it's the destination. It's Sun Valley and what it has to offer as a location. As for the festival's tone? It's family-friendly, as the Valley itself is family-friendly. We've tried to model the spirit of the festival on the spirit of the Valley. Let alone—as you mentioned earlier—Sun Valley's historical connection to Hollywood.

Guillén: Do you offhand know if the Sun Valley Resort has an archive of materials relating to its association with Hollywood back in its heyday?

Grennan: One of the richest in America! It's extraordinary. For example, they've got the most extraordinary photograph of Marilyn Monroe getting off of the Snowball Special where she's wearing these little pompoms on her toes. They've got a great photograph of Clark Gable up on the mountain next to Henry Kissinger. Jimmy Stewart. The Kennedys. It's extraordinary the amount of photographs they have in the special archive room they have in the Resort. I think it's an American treasure. We're just now getting about 12 pictures from the Resort to put up on our website.

It's actually an interesting story—I don't know if you know, stop me if you do—but the man who launched Miami Beach in the '20s, Steve Hannigan, was hired by W. Averell Harriman to help develop a winter resort. In fact, Hannigan was responsible for naming the resort Sun Valley. He was the original starfucker. He advised that if Sun Valley really wanted to open itself up as a ski shangri-la, they needed to invite up all of Hollywood's startlets and their hangers-on and so that's exactly what Averell did. He established a train called the Snowball Special that ran from Los Angeles' Union Station into Sun Valley. Everyone came and brought their family, friends and managers and the only thing Averell asked for in return was to photograph them while they were eating, drinking, skiing and they used all those photographs for their original ad campaign to sell Sun Valley.

Guillén: Fascinating. That's an early example of what film festival studies would term the "spectacular dimension" of a film festival; the necessary celebrity presence with its attendant red carpet premieres. Will SVFF be able to offer any of that this edition? Have you secured any talent to help promote the festival?

Grennan: Jodie Foster's coming! Geena Davis is likely coming. And we have some other celebrities who have expressed an interest in coming to the festival this year: Joshua Leonard, Will McCormack. One of the things I learned last year was about being ready for that celebrity presence. We had entered into arrangements to bring Guy Pearce to the festival to accompany one of his films and to provide PR for the film and Guy. The publicist called me up and she said, "We should bring Guy up and this, that and the other" and I had to tell her, "Look, you know what? We love the film but we're not ready for Guy. I'm not going to be able to put on the dog for him." She laughed at me but said, "You're smarter than I thought." I didn't want to let Guy Pearce down. I realized it was a great opportunity and it would have been fun for him to have attended the festival, but—as the girls in the office put it—we didn't have the bandwidth to handle it.

Eventually the stars will come as SVFF grows forward. Jodie Foster is an old friend of my wife's and she comes up to Sun Valley frequently; but, I didn't invite her last year because I wasn't sure how the festival was going to turn out. I asked her to come this year and she was lovely to accept the invitation. As SVFF begins to establish itself, it will naturally attract films and the actors within those films.

Guillén: Absolutely! I firmly believe that Sun Valley has the solid potential to become a true destination film festival, which—amidst festival proliferation—seem to be the festivals that are actually working and surviving.

Grennan: We had several hundred submissions this year and have ended up with a great line-up. We've really lucked out. Trevor Groth, the Director of Programming at the Sundance Film Festival, is coming up to SVFF and he's going to do a talk. But he was also kind enough to build a slate of films for us composed of films that crossed his desk at Sundance. Some of those films were admitted into Sundance but others he didn't think were right for Sundance but felt would be great for SVFF. He gave us films he really liked that we've incorporated into the festival.

To go back to your question about what will individualize SVFF on the festival landscape, we have an award that we call the Vision Award. It's our festival's top award and it recognizes the producers in this field of filmmaking who are ultimately responsible for making a film. In terms of the amount of films and where they were coming from this year, that Vision Award turned out to be an important angle that has proved quite productive for us: recognizing producers and what they actually do to help create a picture from conception to screening. This year we're featuring Jim Burke who produced The Descendants (2011). He's coming up to open our Coffee Talk series this year. These guys are the gas in the tank that keep the thing going and, as I said, I really think that a lot of the films that came to us this year are a direct consequence of our focus on producers. Alaska Airlines has been very generous this year in providing a special-flight budget to bring in more filmmakers. For example, this year we're bringing in documentarian Barbara Kopple from New York. At least, everyone's committed if not confirmed.

Guillén: Well, Ted, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me this morning. Any final thoughts regarding your hopes for this year's edition of SVFF?

Grennan: I said last year when we opened up this festival that it takes a village to do it. And it has. It's taken the entire Valley. We've had so much support from the Valley and Boise. There's a spirit in Idaho that's unique in the West. We were allowed to capture some of that at SVFF last year and—given the momentum that we have this year—I'm anticipating a lot of more of that will happen this year.

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Barbara Kopple, Bob Poole, Greg Carr, Jim Burke, Jodie Foster, Sagebrush, SVFF, Ted Grennan, Trevor Groth, W. Averell Harriman, Will McCormack,

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