La Voz

Media Credit: Gabrielle Barnett (Left to right) Michael Chance and Car Nazzal attend the screening of Cinequest's short film competition.

Media Credit: Gabrielle Barnett (Left to right) Michael Chance, Jacob Rangel, and Car Nazzal attend the screening of Cinequest's short film competition.

De Anza College students Car Nazzal and Michael Chance competed in Cinequest's seventh Student Shorts Films Competition March 4 and 5 at downtown San Jose's Camera 12 Cinema.

The competition consisted of 15 shorts directed by students from around the world. Schools represented in the program were New York University, Florida State, Columbia College, San Jose State, UC Berkeley, Munich Film School and the Academy of Art University. Car Nazzal's "Truth of the Matter" and Michael Chance's "The Reason" were the only two shorts representing a community college. They proved to be up to par.

"I'm going to dream myself out of the country … What are you going to pack?" are the only captions in Nazzal's surrealist short "Truth of the Matter." In these three minutes and 26 seconds, two women, Christine Tupou and Nazzal are sitting in the rain drinking tea. They are holding frames around themselves as they are drinking; there is water raining on them and the table. The framed pictures on the walls behind are called "known images" like a honeycomb and pictures of people, said Nazzal. "The frames represent the frame of mind they currently have." "In order for the characters to understand each other's perspective, they must first emerge from their respective worlds and relate to one another. In doing so, they are able to better understand their own frame of mind."

The film's inspiration mainly came from surrealist Italian and French films like Jean Cocteau's French fi lm "The Blood of a Poet" and Italian fi lmmaker Frederico Fellini's "Eight and a Half," Nazzal said.

"Well, I was watching 'Cops' one night," said director of "The Reason" Michael Chance, "and I was interested in their personal life and their stories." His short focused on a rookie cop questioning his veteran partner about why he is still in the service. Chance chose the title "The Reason" because the short was about that cop's reason, he said. The fi lm illustrates that we are all driven by the support of our families.

During the question and answer segment of the Cinequest program, Chance was praised for the shot that he fi lmed in the refl ection of broken glass. "That shot was beautifully done," said an audience member.

"Woo! De Anza! Yeah!" shouts Chance, when asked what school he's from. Both films showed off the talent in De Anza's film program.

"I've never felt so comfortable working in a program," Nazzal said. "It's the only reason why I'm in film; they gave me a lot of support. I wouldn't have entered my fi lm, but they persuaded me and helped me out a lot."

Article Tools