Dodgeville’s Andrea Nelson is the subject of “Portrait of a Boxer.” And yeah, she could definitely take you
If you ask me (note: nobody is), the student short film competition is where WUD’s Mini_Indie Film Festival truly gets its namesake. Sunday afternoon at the Union South Marquee, the third consecutive showcase saw nine submissions from UW undergrads and graduate students alike. Submissions spanned a variety of genres, subject matter and yes, production quality, but one thing is for certain: the University of Wisconsin has its fair share of homegrown filmmaking talent.
Among the competition’s highlights was Christian Wilson’s Spray, documentary short that follows a local graffiti artist around Madison, giving glimpses of his creative process and his personal insights on urban art. Spray showed a remarkable level of visual maturity in a young filmmaker, capturing bright colored paints as well as the art form’s inherent improvisation, and all against the backdrop of urban decay. Graffiti remains an illicit art form obviously, and Wilson never shies away from that reality. Night scenes with “taggers” look grainy and underexposed, but much of Spray’s photography went unmatched by any other festival entry. And get a load of that animated end credits sequence.
A surprising festival entry was Matthew Eggert’s Blaming God, an experimental short that immediately differentiated itself from competing entries’ narrative structures. If I were to guess from the audience’s exasperation and minimal applause, Eggert’s foray was not well received, but avant-garde cinema is a criminally overlooked corner of the medium. The pixelations in Blaming God’s images are as troubling as they are haunting; Eggert slows down a nameless face as it babbles words into the camera lens beyond the point of recognition, and the ensuing hypnosis lulls you into a rhythm that’s abruptly punctuated with distorted closeups of Halloween masks. It’s extremely encouraging to see young filmmakers try their hands at such an opaque form of cinema, as experimental film really shows the potential of the art form. I, for one, am glad my former old Comm Arts TA showed our class selections from The Cremaster Cycle. The nightmares ain’t so bad no more!
A clear crowd pleaser was Filmmakers, the short from Matt Siriouthay, James Menor, and Derek Damrow. Filmmakers tells the story of the three actors and their struggles to devise a festival submission of their own, chronicling the follies of the creative process and the hilarity of those lapses in inspiration. Damrow’s performance as a doofy clod was met with big laughs, but it’s Siriouthay, who also wrote, edited and directed the short, that’s the real standout. As faux director in the gang’s short film, Siriouthay plays an ambitious young film student with big ideas, if only he could learn to shut out the self-criticism for five minutes. Filmmakers spins its wheels in its back half, but it offers enough introspection and humor to make for an enjoyable nine minutes. The short film placed second in the competition, but if Siriouthay finds himself discouraged, he need look no further than Filmmakers’ own advice: there’s always the porn industry to fall back on.
Taking first prize was Nora Hertel’s documentary Portrait of a Boxer: One hand in the ring, One hand in the dirt, a snapshot of former Dodgeville boxer Andrea Nelson. As her trainer tells us, Nelson was once among Wisconsin’s few great women boxers, and it’s in the contrast between her past and present lives that the film finds its sincerity. Hertel draws a lot of self-reflection out of her subject and with a considerably economical use of time, however much of Nelson’s story is spoken to the camera by Nelson herself and can feel very direct. Its interview-styled aspects aside, Portrait of a Boxer successfully mines the trauma of Nelson’s past relationships and her struggles with substance abuse while providing some hope and clarity for her future. And as Nelson tell us, a little landscaping always helps her stay on the beaten path.
Placing third, Cheyenne Lentz’s bizarre romance Landlord featured a young lonely renter with a crush on, yes, her much older landlord. Landlord’s conceit is amusing, and several deadpan moments really hit their mark. Its brief four minutes however just feel like squandered comedic potential. Other entries included Jamie Brandmeier’s Your Christmas Scene, more of a music video but still one that sports an impressive command of stop motion animation; Brandmeier composed the film entirely out of nearly 2,500 still photographs. What did you do today?