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1 :::: Arts :::: Community :::: Bulletin Board :::: Mind/Body/Spirit |
Croton Falls
teacher
imparts ‘spirit’
of
filmmaking
By Adriane Tillman
|
Photo courtesy of Chris Mignanelli
Kennedy Catholic graduate Chris Mignanelli holds a sound boom during the filming of a scene for “Sitting Pretty,” a 70-minute movie being produced by his eighth grade students at St. Joseph’s.
Chris Mignanelli runs his film production company, DatMiznags Production, based in Yorktown, under the power of the Spirit.
The Spirit drove Mignanelli’s latest film “The Trip There,” about an unlikely pair of people who serendipitously fall in love on a road trip through the working of the Spirit.
Mignanelli, who graduated from Kennedy Catholic High School in 1995, says his film company is dedicated to exploring the workings of the Spirit in everyday life. He defines the Spirit as the Holy Spirit, but said people imagine the Spirit in many ways, including as the Buddha, the Godhead or the Source.
Now Mignanelli, a teacher at St. Joseph’s School in Croton Falls, imagines that same Spirit working in an ambitious full-length film that his eighth grade elective class in film production is helping to create.
Mignanelli says the spirit of family characterizes the young students’ journey to create a 70-minute film. The 22 students must collaborate, concur on ideas and recognize leaders within the class in ways they have never done before, which is a maturing process for the 10-year old students.
“The glamour fades away quickly and the hard work settles in,” Mignanelli said. “That’s why they feel such great ownership over it.”
The students got their first taste in film making in fifth grade when they produced 20-minute clips for Mignanelli, who has taught the pupils for the past four years. He attributes his strong relationships with the students and their families as a reason the class is able to undertake such an ambitious project as filming a 70-minute movie.
“It’s not something that seven and eighth graders would normally tackle, but they can because they’ve done it before and no one is telling them that they can’t,” Mignanelli said.
While Mignanelli oversees the process as executive director and will eventually edit the film, the students are in charge of writing, directing, casting and filming the movie. Another group of students is in charge of writing and producing music to accompany the scenes.
“We make part of it about kids our own age so it’s something that we can relate to,” said eighth grader Keriann Eliseo, who helped write the script.
Called “Sitting Pretty,” the movie tells the story of a popular, indomitable fifth grade girl, Becca, who hits her head in a volleyball game and falls into a coma and then wakes up as a high school student. It’s a modern-day version of Rip Van Winkle, a Washington Irving tale about a man who falls asleep for 20 years and wakes up after the American Revolution still hailing King George III, which the students had read in a literature class.
Film director and eighth grader Madeline Rubican said the film is supposed to impart to viewers the importance of not taking life for granted. While the movie follows Becca’s stark start in high school and the friends who surround her, it ends with a twist and a spiritual lesson.
As the students embark on their own filming adventure, Magnanelli continues to produce short clips at his production company that he runs with his brother, Matthew, who served as the producer for “The Trip There.” In addition to the feature film, the brothers have produced five short clips.
The brothers invite the public to host private viewings of “The Trip There.” More information can be found on their Web site, thetripthere.com
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