Baptista sweeps awards at film festival
May 13, 2015
At the sixth annual Doppelgänger Film Festival, senior Bailey Baptista topped off the night by earning three awards while junior Robert Alvarez followed closely with two awards.
“The film festival went great. Our main goal was to entertain the crowd and be ourselves and I think we succeeded,” video production teacher Mario Enriquez said.
The first category of the festival, for commercials/public service announcements, had two nominees, both touching on topics that relate to our modern day world. Sophomore Isaac Alanis won with his video “Think before you drink,” which warned students on the hazards of drinking alcohol.
Following the commercials/PSA videos was the movie trailer category, with three nominees. The first trailer, “Besieged” by Sean Rojas, had the typical Liam Neeson plot, but without the kidnapping. Next was “Butch Kill” by Mustafa Barlas, which was a fun action trailer. One trailer in particular that stood out to the crowd was junior Anthony Chang’s “Revenge.” Chang took on the challenging approach of animating LEGOs, which earned him the award for best movie trailer.
The next category was student-made music videos. Songs such as “Madness” by Muse and “Out of my League” by Fitz and the Tantrum were used in the creation of the videos. Junior Robert Alvarez incorporated filters and added kaleidoscope effects to produce his video with the song “Cocaine Model” by ZHU, which impressed the audience and resulted in a win for best music video.
Three short films were nominated, including Baptista’s “Darkness Rises,” junior Brendan Houng’s “New Horizon,” and sophomore Marissa Umeh’s “Tookie.” Although all the short films had a similar theme, Baptista’s horror film captured the audience’s attention with jump scares and a freaky plot, which won him the award for best short film.
The out-of-the-box category included any films that did not fit the criteria of the previous sections. Baptista won again with another stunning video, titled “Continuum.” Along with an exciting chase that involved jumping through space and time, his cinematic techniques were crisp and the diversity of his filming locations complimented his plot, winning Baptista his second award for the night.
Finally, the individual awards were announced: best editor was awarded to Alvarez and his music video on the song “Models,” best writer was given to senior Lauren Perez and her out-of-the-box film “Darkness,” and best actress and actor award were awarded to sophomore Fiona Plunkett, who starred in “Tookie,” and senior Parth Dhamelia, who was featured in “Continuum.” Best director was presented to Baptista for his film, “Darkness Falls,” giving him his third and final award of the night.
“I really didn’t expect to win three awards,” Baptista said. “I’m just happy and humbled that people enjoy watching what I enjoy creating.”
