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St. Olaf filmmakers among top finalists in national competition

By Kari VanDerVeen
November 27, 2007

They had to wait nearly three hours to capture footage of a passing train and relied on fast food to get through the night, but it all paid off for a group of St. Olaf College filmmakers.

ChangeInside
Chris Ganza '10 (left) and University of St. Thomas student Carl Thompson '11 stand in an alley off Division Street where the team found the graffiti that inspired the film's name.
A three-minute film the group created in just 24 hours to enter in Apple, Inc.'s Insomnia Film Festival earned a place among the top 25 entries. Their film was ranked No. 18, placing it in the top 1 percent of the nearly 2,000 entries submitted in the national competition.

The St. Olaf students' film, titled Change Inside, follows a homeless man as he watches coins that would be precious to him wasted by others. He sees a man in a business suit place a coin on a train track, a young woman toss a coin into the water to make a wish and a hurried young man tell a coffee shop server to "keep the change." While it pains him to see the coins go to waste, the homeless man knows how to put his money to good use. Just like the woman in Mark 12:41-44, he gives the only two coins he has to the church. In doing so, he gives more of what he has than the other members of the congregation who are placing checks and dollar bills in the collection plate.

River's Edge Films, the team that created the film, is comprised of St. Olaf students Nate Haustein '10, Samantha Mariotti '09, Alec Johnson '10 and Chris Ganza '10 and University of St. Thomas students Jack Knudsen '10, Bobby Knudsen '10 and Carl Thompson '11. The short film was made on the St. Olaf campus and in the surrounding Northfield area, including popular spots like the riverwalk and the James Gang HideAway coffee shop.

Each element of the film is original, including writing, directorial decisions and musical composition. The film was originally titled Change Matters, but by chance the group saw graffiti written on a building in an alley off Division Street that said "Change Inside." They changed the name of the film to Change Inside and posted photos of the graffiti on a Facebook page for the film, which garnered more than 600 supporters.

Creating a masterpiece in 24 hours
Apple's Insomnia competition, open only to high school and college students, gives competing teams 24 hours to write, shoot, edit, score and upload their films. The films had to incorporate at least three of the required elements posted on Apple's web site at the beginning of the competition. The River's Edge Films team pulled it off, despite glitches such as a technical failure during the filming of a passing train that required a nearly three-hour wait for the next train.

The public rated the films, and industry professionals screened the 25 with the highest ratings, which included Change Inside. Celebrity judges -- who included writers, directors and producers from feature films such as 3:10 to Yuma, Hotel Rwanda, Sleepless in Seattle and Walk the Line -- announced the winners Nov. 26. The public's top choice and the judges' top choice received a prize package that includes computers and software for editing future films.

Second St. Olaf film
Another group of St. Olaf students -- the Hilltop Studios team -- also competed in this year's Insomnia Film Festival. Their dramatic short, titled Nothing Gold Can Stay, follows the dream of a young woman as she reminisces about times spent with her boyfriend. After observing their love gradually fade away, she awakes to the realization that she has fallen out of love. The Hilltop Studios team is comprised of St. Olaf students Mike VanDelinder '08, Ohmar Coughlin '08, Jeremy Gustafson '08 (of mockumentary "Harry Putter" notoriety), Ted Eschweiler '10 and Bryan Belcher '10, plus University of Minnesota student Shawn Horton. Colin Weaver '10 composed an original soundtrack.

Contact Kari VanDerVeen at 507-786-3970 or vanderve@stolaf.edu.