In the all-so isolated campus and community where we walk on broken glass when trying to find new things to do that entertain us outside of classes, there was an exciting event happening on Sonoma State’s campus. Where the usual student can find no new exciting adventure to embark on, or find an inviting new anything, there was talk about student films being made with free rentable state-of-the-art equipment. This hype has had Sonoma State’s campus and the community wondering what has been going on. 

If you have been hearing this talk about self-made movies and free equipment to make films, you were hearing about the Associated Students Productions annual Campus Movie Festival event. 

For those out of the loop, Campus MovieFest (CMF) is the world’s largest student film festival and a premier outlet for the next generation of filmmakers, established in 2001. The whole industry was founded when four students at Emory University took upon themselves to provide their fellow students with everything they needed to create their own films. The equipment provided included a film camera and an Apple laptop. 

 Here at Sonoma, CMF started Wednesday, Oct. 2, holding the launch where students signed up and picked up all the equipment they could possibly need to make their own film. 

The line this year for the launch was record-breaking with students waiting and standing in a line that went out the door of the Multi Purpose Room in the Student Union. After the students had a week to make their films, they turned them in to be judged and be shown at the finale. They could even be considered to be in the top films that were at the Cannes Film Festival.

Associated Student Productions picked judges from all realms of Sonoma State and had them narrow their finale films to 20. The Campus MovieFest Finale was on Friday, Oct. 18 in the Cooperage. The Cooperage was packed with student filmmakers and their friends. 

There was a lot of chatter from anxious student actors and student directors hoping and waiting to see their films with everyone. Even for people who did not make a short film, it felt great and inspiring being in that room with so many people invested in student productions. 

“The Campus MovieFest team and ASP would love to thank you all for coming out tonight and supporting all our fellow student film makers,” said Elena Hubbard, student event coordinator. Thanking everyone for coming, Hubbard explained to the audience that it was one of the hardest years for judging and she was very excited to get the films rolling. As the films began to play at the finale in the Cooperage one couldn’t help but to notice how intrigued the audience seemed to be with each film and how into the whole finale everyone was. The audience laughed at the hilarious scenes in some the films but were also appropriate when films of sentiment were playing. 

The winner for best comedy was “Naht yo Drank,” with great laughs throughout the whole film. The winner for best drama was the suspenseful “Ame Dangeruex.” The best picture went to “The Tale of Shinderella” with the cast including some of the facilities personnel and Miss Sonoma County, Ashley Kimball. The best actress award also went to Kimball and the best actor award went to Paul Martinez for “How to be Cool 101.” The last award, the audience choice award, went to “So Close So Far.”

“With almost 100 groups registering and renting equipment ASP plans to bring back Campus MovieFest every year,” said Hubbard, making it one of their annual events due to the high demand of students and faculty that find this event worth the students’ time and effort, as well as the faculty that encourage the students to take advantage of this opportunity and even give extra credit to those that participate. 

Congratulations to those who won and best of luck on the endeavors to becoming the next Golden Globe winner.