Filmmakers showing work at the Cleveland International Film Festival traveled to Denison first to guest lecture in two cinema courses.
Founders of 2.35, a Brooklyn-based production house, Spencer Gillis and Nicole Cosgrove screened and discussed their award-winning short films with students in Prof. Jesse Schlotterbeck's courses. The producer of Cosgrove's “Glinda” and Gillis' “Sweep,” James Daly, was also present. Discussion focused on preselected class topics such as sound design in Film Aesthetics and Analysis and low-budget filmmaking in History of Cinema. Over lunch with cinema majors, Gillis, Cosgrove, and Daly shared their considerable experience working in the camera department on feature films including “Blue Valentine,” “Salt,” “Shame,” and “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.” Conversation ranged from how to adapt to changing weather during an outdoor film shoot to the challenges of cat wrangling on the set of “Inside Llewyn Davis.”
“As a senior who will be graduating and pursuing a career in film, it was a pleasure to meet Spencer, Nicole and James to see what kinds of work they are doing, how they've navigated their own careers, and hear about the struggles and successes they've met along the way,” said Gina Ezzone ’15. “It's easy to feel discouraged nearing graduation, but I think these young filmmakers were incredibly inspiring and I was really impressed by their work - their sense of pacing, story-telling, ambiguity, and sound design. These are all things I'm interested in learning and developing in my own work as a student filmmaker, and meeting the three of them was exciting as we all could share our mutual love of film.”
Gillis commented, “Discussing our films with the Aesthetics and Analysis students was exciting. They really understood the work we were trying to do, particularly in sound design, and applied it to what they had already learned in class. As they described how the sound enhanced the tone of the film or told the story better, you could definitely see how our discussion was building upon a great foundation of classroom experience.”
On discussing the creative process with cinema majors, Gillis said, “We tried to treat them more as fellow filmmakers than students. One thing any filmmaker loves is to dive into discussions about films and the practice of filmmaking, and they were no exception.” He added,”There is always something to learn from hearing another filmmaker describe their process, no matter if you are in film school or a seasoned veteran. We all shared stories of obstacles overcome on set and our influences.”
The photograph above pictures James Daly, Nicole Cosgrove and Spencer Gillis.
