Blog Post no. 1
April 10th, 2026
An Interview with the Programmers:
How AmsFF Selects its Films
By Jasmine Yi Carder
This year's festival has been unique in its scope. Aside from an increased number of venues and submissions, our team is also triple the size of previous years, with members divided among three groups: marketing, programming, and the core team. I belong to the marketing team, charged with the outward-facing image of the festival, while the programming team curates the contents of the festival itself. This would be my first time attending one of their meetings and learning about the selection process.
When I arrived at Melody's apartment---she leads our programming team---I had no idea I was walking in on such an important day. The entire team was there, along with Emma, our festival director. The meeting had only started half an hour earlier, but already hundreds of colored sticky notes carpeted over half the studio, most of them were haphazardly sorted into rows and columns, while some were still heaped in piles scattered around the room. It took me a moment to pick my way to a clear patch.
While the others were busy with their notes, Melody and Emma ran me through the basics of what I was looking at. In the end, the festival had received 183 short films---the most of any year. Of these, around 40 were eliminated due to technical issues (missing subtitles, length, and so on), leaving 143 films to be narrowed down to roughly 35 to 40. Prior to that day, each member of the team had watched and reviewed the submissions on a shared FilmFreeway page. In the hour before I arrived, each member had picked their top 40 films, based on their reviews, and written them down on color-coded sticky notes: pink for films they were willing to fight for, green for ones they liked, and yellow for maybes. The final selection is whittled down from these.
·✶·
“You don't need the most expensive camera or the best sound or the best editing, but if we can see that there's someone's crazy talent behind it, then that's more important than, oh, it just looks really great.”
So what's the actual criteria for selection? Is it just how many pink sticky notes a film has, or are you guys trying to curate for theme already?
Melody: I think we start initially with what we like the most, and what we can agree on. Because if everyone really loves a movie then I think it's automatically in, and then we just kind of trickle down to the more questionable things.
Emma: Yeah, but we started in November. I think that's when we all pitched what was most important. Like, what are we looking for when we're looking at all the movies? And with that criteria we made this top 40. In that criteria we're looking at creativity, we're looking at...
Melody: Potential. Technicality.
Emma: Potential is the most important thing. That's the top one because we're trying to see what students can do with what they have. Because that's really what student films are about, right?
Melody: You don't need the most expensive camera or the best sound or the best editing, but if we can see that there's someone's crazy talent behind it, then that's more important than, oh, it just looks really great.
So, the artistry of the filmmakers?
Melody: Yeah, yeah. The potential, I think, is the best way to put it.
And then, what were the other ones?
Emma: Creativity... technically, but those aren't as important as potential.
Melody: Story. Writing.
Emma: Overall feeling, like if the movie had impact. I think that we find that really important.
Melody: And pacing as well.
Emma: Pacing, yeah, pacing is really important.
Melody: How long does it feel to watch?
So, were there any trends in the submissions? During our last board bonding you mentioned that last year there were a lot of films about people losing their grandmas. Were there any niche topics like that this year?
Emma: A lot of car crashes---a lot of movies about car crashes.
Melody: Nature and technology. Social media.
Emma: People going back to nature.
Melody: People going back home. International students.
Emma: Yeah, a lot about migration.
By then, the other members were finishing their sorting and had begun migrating over to the big wrap-around couch, where the three of us were sitting.
Including Emma, the team was comprised of six members:
Emma Byvanck---director of AmsFF and one of its founders, AUC graduate, Dutch, from Amsterdam. Melody Boorsma---programming lead, HKU graduate, member of the Freaky Film Collective, Dutch and Spanish. Kaavya Malhotra---programming outreach, AUC graduate, Indian. Borja Sanchez de Prado — programming operator, former intern at the Austin Youth Film Festival in Texas, Mexican, from Mexico City. Raluca (Lola) Cocor---programming outreach, cultural anthropology student at UvA, Romanian. Gia Tuệ Trịnh---programming secretary, media and culture student at UvA, Vietnamese.
As for me, I'm the marketing secretary, a recent UCU grad, and Asian American.
Emma called the team over to talk more about the trends they had noticed.
The group (speaking at once): [The most stuff on migration.] [Anti-capitalism.] [Yeah, anti-capitalism.] [Yeah. Love.] [Immigrants.] [Migration.] [Migration. And digital glitches.]
Emma: A lot of mixed media. I love that. Our trailer matches that so well. I'm so happy for us.
It sounds like, based off the trending themes, that a lot of the submissions are very politically oriented.
The group: Yeah. Yeah.
Emma: We as a festival believe that everything is political. Because there was a whole controversy. I don't know if you followed it, but a bunch of film festivals are saying "we're not political, we're not political."
Kaavya: Which is just so crazy.
Melody: Of course it's political.
Gia: But that's not to say that we care about politically-charged films just as a reaction to the controversy. Apolitical framing of cinema and art at large has always been there. We've talked about that at length in some meetings and agreed that we are all against this "depoliticization".
Emma: So we're trying to do the opposite of that.
And how many of the films would you say are fiction, entirely fictional, versus... autobiographical or documentary?
Melody: I think minority is fiction.
Emma: Yeah, minority for sure. There's so many like documentary, essays...
Melody: Experimental dance films.
Kaavya: Experimental stuff. Yeah, So many.
The group: We've had a lot of dance [films].
We became distracted as Melody's cat, Micha, jumped off the couch and began grooming herself in the middle of the (now very elaborate) sticky note chart. At that point, Emma brought up their next bullet on the agenda: contacting some industry professionals (film professors, directors, programmers, and activists) who would also take a look at the films.
Emma: So, two weeks from now we have industry professionals, who are filmmakers or heads of other film festivals, who are gonna help us choose the best of program.
Melody: At the very end of the festival we have a selection of the films that we thought were the best of the other four blocks. It's a bit like an award kind of thing.
Emma: That's going to be at FC Hyena on Sunday night. That's our biggest location.
Okay, so what are the blocks? How is it broken up?
Melody: There are four blocks of one and a half hours each. So the amount of films per block depends if there are longer or shorter films. Then we have a half an hour Q&A afterwards.
And the jury picks the best of the blocks?
Melody: There's two groups [of jurors] who watch two blocks, and they advise us on what they think is best, and then we make a selection. We don't have an award or anything, but it's kind of like a special shout out to films that we really love.
Looking at the floor, at least a dozen films had collected multiple pink sticky notes. One in particular, which had been mentioned several times already, had a pink note from every member. But at the same time, many films were represented by only a single one, meaning that while there were a few clear favorites, the strongest votes were still far from unanimous.
Can people talk a little bit about what made your favorite films stand out?
Lola: I think the vision, the political take, but also the sort of aesthetic inventiveness and the fact that they have, in a way, the space to push what they do technically and visually. They're the kind of movies that you don't really see in other places---the, you know, freedom of the topic... I also liked that they were camp and punk and absurd, and that they push visually and they push with their own vision. Also, the way in which they revive and bring to form the heritage of cinema that you don't really see---especially in the surrealist movements and some avant-garde influences. Yeah. And wanting to make not a movie for the audience, but a movie for the sake of the story and for the sake of your own vision.
Borja: I like the scrappy spirit of a lot of movies. Like, maybe they didn't have the best cameras or a very high budget but with the materials that they have, they were able to craft something truly unique and special and creative. That was really wonderful.
Kaavya: I think for me it was the experience of genuine emotion---whatever it is. Yeah, when I leave the vibe of "I'm watching this movie to rate it," but instead kind of enter like, "oh I'm just laughing for real," or feeling it in my heart for real, then I feel very attached to the movie.
Emma: Um, I think for me, also similar to Kaavya, really feeling emotion; like feeling impacted by what I saw. But also I really enjoyed... just the creativity of seeing a story being told in such a way that I've never seen before. And also a feeling of being seen, because I feel like there are a lot of topics that are super relatable for us, but that aren't portrayed often in films. And these students' films are showing it, you know?
Such as...
Emma: Topics that are very heavy, that we're experiencing a lot, but then that aren't often shown. I mean, this whole digital era fear, the anxiety around that, and growing up with that, I think it's pretty relatable.
Kaavya: There's also a very coming-of-age energy to a lot of these films, which I think older filmmakers don't necessarily feel, or aren't as emotionally in touch with. I feel like students really understand that experience of... for example, student migrants in the Netherlands or something, and they're living and working here while they haven't come to terms with their migrated state yet. It's an intense situation to be in, you know? So I feel like the way they explore it while they're making their peace with it is also such a beautiful thing, which maybe other generations can't represent as well because they're not as connected to that experience.
Melody: For me, it was playfulness. I feel like with a lot of student films, it's the last time, or the only time, that you're making something where you're not gonna get funding, so there are no requirements; there's no audience that you have to give a shit about. You're just making something that you want. And that really comes across because, for a lot of filmmakers---especially the graduation films---you can really tell that they've put everything into it. They're like, "I'm just gonna go crazy. I'm gonna make absolutely 100% what I want," because you never know when you can do that again. So that I really, really liked. In a lot of films, it's a lot of playfulness, a lot of daring, some crazy positions, because they know they can.
Kaavya: And not necessarily a desire to be understood.
Melody: Yeah, exactly, which is quite nice. It's really for them. And we're just part of it, I guess, going along for the ride.
Okay, and just a clarification, it sounds like a lot of your guys' criteria was about the artistry of it---how well it was made. There weren't any, I don't know, content related criteria, right? Like, "this film has a really interesting message or this film makes a really good point." How much did that factor into it?
Melody: It kinda is in there in a way. I mean, potential, impact, vision---it's all about the message.
Lola: Yeah, my top movies are all... most of them are political and very critical, but in a playful, surprising way. They push boundaries and they don't just want to look at it straightforwardly and get an easy message to an audience, but to find new ways of taking the world and making it into something.
Gia: Most of my top choice have a very good balance in terms of style and content. Some films don't really tell much, but they see the potential in how a concept is expressed visually.
Melody: Borja, how was that for you? Because I think from the team we're the most fiction loving people.
Borja: Yeah, yeah. I connect with fiction a lot and I really enjoy fiction. But there are still a lot of non-fiction works that were impactful and enjoyed as well.
Do you think you chose more fiction than...
Borja: Definitely, I think in my higher rated ones there tends to be more fiction and experimental ones---movies that do something different with the format and the formalism of it all. I guess, yeah, I tended to rate fiction higher than non-fictions that are only about getting a certain message across. I can be quite... I guess, more critical of movies that are about a certain message, because it's complex and maybe it's a bias that I turn more of a critical lens on, but I feel it's important that a message be communicated very well and in a very effective manner if a film is just about getting that message across.
Melody: Yeah. Sometimes I see the message, because they're very clear about their message, but I'm like, "you didn't really communicate it well". Like yeah, I agree with you, environmental damage is bad, but I don't like the way you're telling me about it.
Kaavya: Yeah, I mean, I think if you make it too direct, it just becomes a bit reductionist, you know? It becomes a bit oversimplified, where you're just like, okay, this is it, and then this is it---there's nothing else you're trying to convey or let anybody feel.
Melody: There's no space to think. You're already doing the thinking for me.
Kaavya: Exactly.
Melody: So, yeah, message is important, but... I think every movie has kind of a strong message. I think it's everything around the message that supports it.
Emma: Also, before we began watching, I was like, "Guys, let's repeat the vision of the festival." As a reminder, we said, "Okay, let's discuss again our vision and make sure we have this in mind while we're programming." We wrote down these five points: that we want it to be obviously made by students---so DIY to some extent, but also just clearly made by students; focusing on uncomfortable but important subjects, and this is often, yeah, just political, so things that probably wouldn't make it commercially but can make it at our festival; accentuating voices that are often unheard; potential over quality; and finding balance with representing as equally as possible.
So, in the whole process there weren't any movies that were really just style without any specific message? It was more about choosing who said something important better?
The group: Well, the [...] one [referencing the movie with the most pink notes]. It's our top choice and there's no message. There's no message.
Melody: It's true, it's so true. We love that one but there's no... there's no story.
Gia: It's very, very stylized. It's just style.
Borja: It's exceptionally made and creative and also very short.
Emma: It's fun. It's funny.
So being well-made trumps pretty much everything else in terms of messaging?
Kaavya: I mean, it's not about it being over other things, but rather... I think that there's a lot of messages to be told, and if you choose to tell them in a very, well... kind of what Melody was saying earlier. Everything has a message, you know? It's not necessarily about the message after a point, because you can have a message and then choose to deliver it very differently. And I feel like that's why you start focusing a lot more on how you deliver it, because you can talk about something... like, for me, for example, I think gender and feminism, as important as it is, is very overused in a lot of ways. Sometimes I feel like it's hyper-reduced, and so I would watch some movies which are obviously about gender and the feminine struggle and I'd be like, "Okay, I've heard this 300 bazillion times before," and it's not giving me anything new. And then I'd watch some other movie where I'd be like, "Oh, this is also about exactly the same thing," but the way they've chosen to explore it changes everything---I connect with it completely.
Gia: It's quite a "medium is the message" situation [quoting Marshall McLuhan].
Okay guys, I have to go soon. Any final remarks?
Melody: It's fun because we do it together.
Emma: What I hope everyone feels is that even though the film festival is very hierarchical in how we are within our groups, we're trying to have it so that everyone is on the same level with programming. Melody and I keep making jokes about taking over the program, but the fact is, we're making this program together.
We laughed, but I could see that what Melody and Emma said rang true. Throughout the hour I'd been there, it was clear that they were all passionate about the festival and were having a blast discussing the films together. It felt more like a friend group hanging out than a hierarchical organization, which is one of my favorite parts of working with all of them.
After I left, the group chose 34 films. This is still a rough draft, so to speak, as the team still needs to consult the directors themselves before finalizing the line up. Soon, I'll be able to see some of these movies at a private screening for the AmsFF members. For the rest of you though, you'll just have to wait until May to find out what's been selected ;)
Melody: I think we start initially with what we like the most, and what we can agree on. Because if everyone really loves a movie then I think it's automatically in, and then we just kind of trickle down to the more questionable things.
Emma: Yeah, but we started in November. I think that's when we all pitched what was most important. Like, what are we looking for when we're looking at all the movies? And with that criteria we made this top 40. In that criteria we're looking at creativity, we're looking at...
Melody: Potential. Technicality.
Emma: Potential is the most important thing. That's the top one because we're trying to see what students can do with what they have. Because that's really what student films are about, right?
Melody: You don't need the most expensive camera or the best sound or the best editing, but if we can see that there's someone's crazy talent behind it, then that's more important than, oh, it just looks really great.
So, the artistry of the filmmakers?
Melody: Yeah, yeah. The potential, I think, is the best way to put it.
And then, what were the other ones?
Emma: Creativity... technically, but those aren't as important as potential.
Melody: Story. Writing.
Emma: Overall feeling, like if the movie had impact. I think that we find that really important.
Melody: And pacing as well.
Emma: Pacing, yeah, pacing is really important.
Melody: How long does it feel to watch?
So, were there any trends in the submissions? During our last board bonding you mentioned that last year there were a lot of films about people losing their grandmas. Were there any niche topics like that this year?
Emma: A lot of car crashes---a lot of movies about car crashes.
Melody: Nature and technology. Social media.
Emma: People going back to nature.
Melody: People going back home. International students.
Emma: Yeah, a lot about migration.
·✶·
By then, the other members were finishing their sorting and had begun migrating over to the big wrap-around couch, where the three of us were sitting.
Including Emma, the team was comprised of six members:
Emma Byvanck---director of AmsFF and one of its founders, AUC graduate, Dutch, from Amsterdam. Melody Boorsma---programming lead, HKU graduate, member of the Freaky Film Collective, Dutch and Spanish. Kaavya Malhotra---programming outreach, AUC graduate, Indian. Borja Sanchez de Prado — programming operator, former intern at the Austin Youth Film Festival in Texas, Mexican, from Mexico City. Raluca (Lola) Cocor---programming outreach, cultural anthropology student at UvA, Romanian. Gia Tuệ Trịnh---programming secretary, media and culture student at UvA, Vietnamese.
As for me, I'm the marketing secretary, a recent UCU grad, and Asian American.
Emma called the team over to talk more about the trends they had noticed.
·✶·
The group (speaking at once): [The most stuff on migration.] [Anti-capitalism.] [Yeah, anti-capitalism.] [Yeah. Love.] [Immigrants.] [Migration.] [Migration. And digital glitches.]
Emma: A lot of mixed media. I love that. Our trailer matches that so well. I'm so happy for us.
It sounds like, based off the trending themes, that a lot of the submissions are very politically oriented.
The group: Yeah. Yeah.
Emma: We as a festival believe that everything is political. Because there was a whole controversy. I don't know if you followed it, but a bunch of film festivals are saying "we're not political, we're not political."
Kaavya: Which is just so crazy.
Melody: Of course it's political.
Gia: But that's not to say that we care about politically-charged films just as a reaction to the controversy. Apolitical framing of cinema and art at large has always been there. We've talked about that at length in some meetings and agreed that we are all against this "depoliticization".
Emma: So we're trying to do the opposite of that.
And how many of the films would you say are fiction, entirely fictional, versus... autobiographical or documentary?
Melody: I think minority is fiction.
Emma: Yeah, minority for sure. There's so many like documentary, essays...
Melody: Experimental dance films.
Kaavya: Experimental stuff. Yeah, So many.
The group: We've had a lot of dance [films].
·✶·
We became distracted as Melody's cat, Micha, jumped off the couch and began grooming herself in the middle of the (now very elaborate) sticky note chart. At that point, Emma brought up their next bullet on the agenda: contacting some industry professionals (film professors, directors, programmers, and activists) who would also take a look at the films.
·✶·
Emma: So, two weeks from now we have industry professionals, who are filmmakers or heads of other film festivals, who are gonna help us choose the best of program.
Melody: At the very end of the festival we have a selection of the films that we thought were the best of the other four blocks. It's a bit like an award kind of thing.
Emma: That's going to be at FC Hyena on Sunday night. That's our biggest location.
Okay, so what are the blocks? How is it broken up?
Melody: There are four blocks of one and a half hours each. So the amount of films per block depends if there are longer or shorter films. Then we have a half an hour Q&A afterwards.
And the jury picks the best of the blocks?
Melody: There's two groups [of jurors] who watch two blocks, and they advise us on what they think is best, and then we make a selection. We don't have an award or anything, but it's kind of like a special shout out to films that we really love.
·✶·
Looking at the floor, at least a dozen films had collected multiple pink sticky notes. One in particular, which had been mentioned several times already, had a pink note from every member. But at the same time, many films were represented by only a single one, meaning that while there were a few clear favorites, the strongest votes were still far from unanimous.
·✶·
“We wrote down these five points: that we want it to be obviously made by students---so DIY to some extent, but also just clearly made by students; focusing on uncomfortable but important subjects, and this is often, yeah, just political, so things that probably wouldn't make it commercially but can make it at our festival; accentuating voices that are often unheard; potential over quality; and finding balance with representing as equally as possible.”
“We wrote down these five points: that we want it to be obviously made by students---so DIY to some extent, but also just clearly made by students; focusing on uncomfortable but important subjects, and this is often, yeah, just political, so things that probably wouldn't make it commercially but can make it at our festival; accentuating voices that are often unheard; potential over quality; and finding balance with representing as equally as possible.”
Can people talk a little bit about what made your favorite films stand out?
Lola: I think the vision, the political take, but also the sort of aesthetic inventiveness and the fact that they have, in a way, the space to push what they do technically and visually. They're the kind of movies that you don't really see in other places---the, you know, freedom of the topic... I also liked that they were camp and punk and absurd, and that they push visually and they push with their own vision. Also, the way in which they revive and bring to form the heritage of cinema that you don't really see---especially in the surrealist movements and some avant-garde influences. Yeah. And wanting to make not a movie for the audience, but a movie for the sake of the story and for the sake of your own vision.
Borja: I like the scrappy spirit of a lot of movies. Like, maybe they didn't have the best cameras or a very high budget but with the materials that they have, they were able to craft something truly unique and special and creative. That was really wonderful.
Kaavya: I think for me it was the experience of genuine emotion---whatever it is. Yeah, when I leave the vibe of "I'm watching this movie to rate it," but instead kind of enter like, "oh I'm just laughing for real," or feeling it in my heart for real, then I feel very attached to the movie.
Emma: Um, I think for me, also similar to Kaavya, really feeling emotion; like feeling impacted by what I saw. But also I really enjoyed... just the creativity of seeing a story being told in such a way that I've never seen before. And also a feeling of being seen, because I feel like there are a lot of topics that are super relatable for us, but that aren't portrayed often in films. And these students' films are showing it, you know?
Such as...
Emma: Topics that are very heavy, that we're experiencing a lot, but then that aren't often shown. I mean, this whole digital era fear, the anxiety around that, and growing up with that, I think it's pretty relatable.
Kaavya: There's also a very coming-of-age energy to a lot of these films, which I think older filmmakers don't necessarily feel, or aren't as emotionally in touch with. I feel like students really understand that experience of... for example, student migrants in the Netherlands or something, and they're living and working here while they haven't come to terms with their migrated state yet. It's an intense situation to be in, you know? So I feel like the way they explore it while they're making their peace with it is also such a beautiful thing, which maybe other generations can't represent as well because they're not as connected to that experience.
Melody: For me, it was playfulness. I feel like with a lot of student films, it's the last time, or the only time, that you're making something where you're not gonna get funding, so there are no requirements; there's no audience that you have to give a shit about. You're just making something that you want. And that really comes across because, for a lot of filmmakers---especially the graduation films---you can really tell that they've put everything into it. They're like, "I'm just gonna go crazy. I'm gonna make absolutely 100% what I want," because you never know when you can do that again. So that I really, really liked. In a lot of films, it's a lot of playfulness, a lot of daring, some crazy positions, because they know they can.
Kaavya: And not necessarily a desire to be understood.
Melody: Yeah, exactly, which is quite nice. It's really for them. And we're just part of it, I guess, going along for the ride.
Okay, and just a clarification, it sounds like a lot of your guys' criteria was about the artistry of it---how well it was made. There weren't any, I don't know, content related criteria, right? Like, "this film has a really interesting message or this film makes a really good point." How much did that factor into it?
Melody: It kinda is in there in a way. I mean, potential, impact, vision---it's all about the message.
Lola: Yeah, my top movies are all... most of them are political and very critical, but in a playful, surprising way. They push boundaries and they don't just want to look at it straightforwardly and get an easy message to an audience, but to find new ways of taking the world and making it into something.
Gia: Most of my top choice have a very good balance in terms of style and content. Some films don't really tell much, but they see the potential in how a concept is expressed visually.
Melody: Borja, how was that for you? Because I think from the team we're the most fiction loving people.
Borja: Yeah, yeah. I connect with fiction a lot and I really enjoy fiction. But there are still a lot of non-fiction works that were impactful and enjoyed as well.
Do you think you chose more fiction than...
Borja: Definitely, I think in my higher rated ones there tends to be more fiction and experimental ones---movies that do something different with the format and the formalism of it all. I guess, yeah, I tended to rate fiction higher than non-fictions that are only about getting a certain message across. I can be quite... I guess, more critical of movies that are about a certain message, because it's complex and maybe it's a bias that I turn more of a critical lens on, but I feel it's important that a message be communicated very well and in a very effective manner if a film is just about getting that message across.
Melody: Yeah. Sometimes I see the message, because they're very clear about their message, but I'm like, "you didn't really communicate it well". Like yeah, I agree with you, environmental damage is bad, but I don't like the way you're telling me about it.
Kaavya: Yeah, I mean, I think if you make it too direct, it just becomes a bit reductionist, you know? It becomes a bit oversimplified, where you're just like, okay, this is it, and then this is it---there's nothing else you're trying to convey or let anybody feel.
Melody: There's no space to think. You're already doing the thinking for me.
Kaavya: Exactly.
Melody: So, yeah, message is important, but... I think every movie has kind of a strong message. I think it's everything around the message that supports it.
Emma: Also, before we began watching, I was like, "Guys, let's repeat the vision of the festival." As a reminder, we said, "Okay, let's discuss again our vision and make sure we have this in mind while we're programming." We wrote down these five points: that we want it to be obviously made by students---so DIY to some extent, but also just clearly made by students; focusing on uncomfortable but important subjects, and this is often, yeah, just political, so things that probably wouldn't make it commercially but can make it at our festival; accentuating voices that are often unheard; potential over quality; and finding balance with representing as equally as possible.
So, in the whole process there weren't any movies that were really just style without any specific message? It was more about choosing who said something important better?
The group: Well, the [...] one [referencing the movie with the most pink notes]. It's our top choice and there's no message. There's no message.
Melody: It's true, it's so true. We love that one but there's no... there's no story.
Gia: It's very, very stylized. It's just style.
Borja: It's exceptionally made and creative and also very short.
Emma: It's fun. It's funny.
So being well-made trumps pretty much everything else in terms of messaging?
Kaavya: I mean, it's not about it being over other things, but rather... I think that there's a lot of messages to be told, and if you choose to tell them in a very, well... kind of what Melody was saying earlier. Everything has a message, you know? It's not necessarily about the message after a point, because you can have a message and then choose to deliver it very differently. And I feel like that's why you start focusing a lot more on how you deliver it, because you can talk about something... like, for me, for example, I think gender and feminism, as important as it is, is very overused in a lot of ways. Sometimes I feel like it's hyper-reduced, and so I would watch some movies which are obviously about gender and the feminine struggle and I'd be like, "Okay, I've heard this 300 bazillion times before," and it's not giving me anything new. And then I'd watch some other movie where I'd be like, "Oh, this is also about exactly the same thing," but the way they've chosen to explore it changes everything---I connect with it completely.
Gia: It's quite a "medium is the message" situation [quoting Marshall McLuhan].
Okay guys, I have to go soon. Any final remarks?
Melody: It's fun because we do it together.
Emma: What I hope everyone feels is that even though the film festival is very hierarchical in how we are within our groups, we're trying to have it so that everyone is on the same level with programming. Melody and I keep making jokes about taking over the program, but the fact is, we're making this program together.
·✶·
We laughed, but I could see that what Melody and Emma said rang true. Throughout the hour I'd been there, it was clear that they were all passionate about the festival and were having a blast discussing the films together. It felt more like a friend group hanging out than a hierarchical organization, which is one of my favorite parts of working with all of them.
After I left, the group chose 34 films. This is still a rough draft, so to speak, as the team still needs to consult the directors themselves before finalizing the line up. Soon, I'll be able to see some of these movies at a private screening for the AmsFF members. For the rest of you though, you'll just have to wait until May to find out what's been selected ;)