This year, some guests will travel over 15 hours to attend the Syracuse International Film Festival, where films will be shown from countries that haven’t been included in several years. A number of Canadian documentaries, an Italian film and almost 30 more will be exhibited at the five-day festival.

Held every October in Syracuse, the festival attempts to expose its audience to films that it wouldn’t normally encounter. It began Wednesday night and will end Oct. 18. The movies are shown at different locations around the local area, including the Palace Theatre and the Everson Museum of Art.

In 2003, Syracuse University professor and current program coordinator for the Visual and Performing Arts School’s Film program, Owen Shapiro, along with his wife Christine Fawcett-Shapiro, decided to bring celebration of film to central New York. This decision materialized into the Syracuse International Film Festival, a constantly evolving celebration of domestically international film. However, this year’s festival will feature content from regions that haven’t contributed in the past.

“We’re looking for films that engage the audience, not necessarily films that you would see in the mall cinemas, although some of them might be. And when we’re looking for international films, we’re looking for films that would probably never be in Syracuse if not for the festival,” said Shapiro, the festival’s artistic director.

Contributing countries vary from year to year, but the festival always displays plenty of international content. Fawcett-Shapiro said Israel and China typically contribute a great deal of content because of their large cinema industries.

The festival allows audiences to interact with more than just the movie being shown on the silver screen. Interactive question-and-answer sessions between the audience and special film festival invitees such as Pixar Executive Vice President for Music and SU alum and Grammy award-winner Tom MacDougall are among some special events.

Another opportunity for viewers to engage in the film in a more dynamic way is through this year’s silent film viewing, Shapiro said.

“Every year, we identify a silent movie and we commission a contemporary composer to compose an original score for the film and then the score is performed live with the film,” Shapiro said.

This year’s silent film will be the 1920 adaptation of ‘The Mark of Zorro,’ with a score composed by Mark Olivieri. Conducting the orchestra will be Le Moyne College professor Travis Newton, and the orchestra will feature some music students from SU and Le Moyne College.

In addition to being part of the orchestra, students from Syracuse area institutions take part in the festival in different ways including producing films for the festival and getting to interact with the actors and directors there.

Every year, the SU faculty selects the best student-produced films, which are then showcased at the film festival.

While current students play a huge role in the film festival, involvement doesn’t stop at graduation, as evidenced by SU alum Joe Lynch who is showing at this year’s festival. Lynch, now a director of horror films such as “Everly,” attributes much of his success to the foundation he got at SU.

“I have such an affinity for the university and what it did for my career and cinematic well-being. I learned not just the benefits and the attributes of looking at a film a certain way, but I was actually able to make movies,” Lynch said.

Lynch credits faculty members such as Shapiro, who was his professor, with encouraging him to not give up on his dream of making horror movies even if some consider the genre to be “not serious.”

Said Lynch: “Stories are stories, it doesn’t matter what genre — so the more that we can expose film students and cinema students to great movies, not just great dramas but great horror movies and great sci-fi movies and great comedies — maybe they’ll be inspired too.”

Published on October 15, 2015 at 12:52 am

Contact: slgozins@syr.edu