Entering a film competition

As I walked into a dark but loud room, I was instantly greeted by Saniya Ibrahim, the Youth Outreach Coordinator at New Vision Partners. New Vision Partners, a nonprofit interfaith organization, hosted their 2nd annual Interfaith Film Festival last Sunday. The theme of this year’s films was “For the Common Good.” The film festival was held at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena.

There were five film submissions from different high school or college students, myself being one of them. The festival started off by showing various films from local filmmakers, and then they showed the student films. Many of the films were introduced by Steve Wiebe, the Executive Director at New Vision Partners. One of the films presented was “The Foolishness of God” by Karen Hayes, which explored a forgiveness journey with Desmond Tutu in Africa. New Vision Partners also exhibited a short film “The Belief,” which was sent from Iran by a filmmaker by the name of Amir Vahedi. He wasn’t able to attend the festival, but he was awarded the Humanitarian Award for going out of his way to submit a film.

Between films they served a different assortment of snacks and beverages.  While eating my chocolate chip cookie, my nerves were at an all time high. After this break the students would be presenting their films, and I was not ready for that. Anyway, with the help of my friends my nerves calmed down, just a bit.

Lori Margaret, the Interfaith Programs Director at New Vision Partners, presented the five short films from the students. The filmmakers were Maisune Abu-Elhaija, Zehra Siddiqui, Evan Hansen, Alanis Galang, Ishaan Jain, Noor Said, and myself. Each of us spoke a little bit about our film, and then they were shown to the audience. We all created a film which we felt best portrayed people of different faiths coming together for the common good. Among the audience were the three judges.

After all the films were shown, the judges left the room to deliberate. While they were gone, the other filmmakers and I sat on a panel where we answered a few questions about Interfaith and what it mean to us. “Interfaith work has taught me not only about different religions, but I’ve learned to appreciate and understand them as well,” said filmmaker Zehra Siddiqui, from Glendale High School. “I’ve learned that we all have a common goal, and that is to be good people.”

Making a film isn’t easy, and especially when it’s your first time making one by yourself. Taking Cinematography here at Clark, I felt that I have learned enough to carry out and execute a film all on my own. The hardest part for me was coming up an idea. I wanted to do something creative, but also something I could properly execute. I asked my family and friends, but they weren’t much help. After many restless nights, and lots of thinking, I came up with an idea. I wanted to feed the homeless.

Now that the hardest part of the project was over, I needed to properly execute this project. Once I knew what I wanted to do, I was very excited to see this project through. I got some of my friends and family together and we made homemade bagged lunches. We packed the bags with turkey sandwiches, granola bars, some cookies, and water. Making the lunch bags was really fun in itself, with silly conversations consisting of “Hey, you got mayo on my shirt!” or “You’re out of mustard.”

Once we finished making the sandwiches, we wrote inspiring quotes from different religions on the bags. We had quotes from different faith traditions, hoping to inspire the people we were going to feed. We packed the lunches, and the mission was to feed as many homeless people as we could.

We first went to Eagle Rock to see if we could find some homeless people. With a camera in one hand and a lunch bag in the other we set off on foot. As we walked around the streets of Eagle Rock we tried to find people to feed. Luckily we found one nice man who shared his story with us. He told us that his temper got the best of him, and that is the reason he is out on the streets. His story was very inspiring and seeing how grateful he was for the lunch really warmed my heart. We also spoke to another man, who wasn’t comfortable being filmed, but we gave him a lunch anyway.

We didn’t find any other people in Eagle Rock on this day, and as some of my friends had other things to do, we decided that we would try again the next week. I was upset that we didn’t find many people, and I was kind of doubting this idea. But I genuinely wanted this idea to work out, because I knew if it were done right, it could be really great.

And so the following weekend I decided to go into Los Angeles. This time I didn’t have that many people with me, and my mom and brother helped me make the lunches. Thankfully in L.A, we found some people who were willing to speak to us and were okay with being filmed. Most of the people we spoke to we asked if they had any advice. One man said, “Be kind to one another, as you would want to be treated. One must treat others the same way. Even to non-humans too, be kind to animals.” He was very nice and he wished us a happy Palm Sunday.

Another man we spoke to spoke of discrimination. “There is a lot of discrimination in this country, and I am one of the victims of this discrimination,” he said. He was a very educated man and had a lot to say. But somehow something went wrong and he ended up homeless. Speaking to these people really opened up my eyes and showed me that everyone has a story and struggles.

I was content with the interviews we had gotten, and I had enough footage to create my film. So the next part was piecing this story together. Having prior knowledge on how to edit helped during this stage, because I was editing at home and by myself. I used Avid Media Composer to edit my film, but I can’t say that everything went smoothly.

I was thoroughly stressed in all stages of editing, and I had a lot of trouble exporting the project. Eventually I figured out the problem, and exporting was long but successful. I then uploaded the project onto Youtube and submitted it to New Vision Partners.

When the judges came back, my nerves were now on full blast. I could feel the tension in the room, filled with hopeful parents and anxious students. Steve Wiebe was the one who announced the results, and he started with the 3rd place winners. “And the winner for 3rd place…Farah Ali!”, he announced with excitement. Applause filled my ears as I went up to accept my award, a certificate and a check for $250. I didn’t really think I would win, and so when my name was announced I was a bit hesitant.

Second place was awarded to Ishaan Jain for his great film, “A Donation of Tolerance,” which was a fictional story that showed the beauty of interfaith work, and he got a $500 scholarship. The first place winner was Maisune Abu-Elhaija, for her incredible film, “#ForGood,” and for her creative film she was awarded a $1000 scholarship.

In an email interview, Lori Margaret, the Interfaith Programs Director at New Vision Partners, said that the program allows high school students to create short films around a certain theme that highlights their vision, insights, sensitivity and understanding of that topic. “Our Interfaith Film Festival is a wonderful opportunity to showcase the work of local filmmakers who are using their craft to open minds and increase understanding by showing a different perspective,” she said. “Students submitted films which reflected camaraderie, collaboration and commonalities that we all share and can use to make the world a better place — together.” Margaret said that this entire process is an exercise in empathy, creativity, and learning to craft a message using the powerful medium of film.