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VideoVersity—what is it?
By Leslie Chapel
Whalesong Contributor
VideoVersity,
the Ketchikan Campus and community film series, just wrapped up
its third
successful semester. The theme of this semester’s films was
“Dining Out,” a.k.a “Food and Culture,” with
titles including Eat, Drink, Man, Woman directed by Ang Lee of Crouching
Tiger, Hidden Dragon fame; Big Night, the tale of two Italian brothers
who immigrate to post-WWII America to open a restaurant, Babette’s
Feast, the Oscar winner for Best Foreign Film of 1988; and the season
finale, Like Water for Chocolate, probably the most popular Latin
American film ever. Each film deals with food and eating in a variety
of cultures. VideoVersity films are free and open to the public,
with desserts catered by local restaurants & chefs and Raven’s
Brew coffee for sale during intermission.
VideoVersity is the brain-child of Assistant Professor
of English Rod Landis. The inspiration came from Professor Landis’
involvement with two prior film associations: Ketchikan International
Film Addicts, which was spearheaded by former UAS-Ketchikan Librarian,
Bob Warner, and Incandescent Movie Fans, hosted at Ketchikan’s
Main Street Theatre. Both of these organizations flourished and
faded, leaving a gap in the community. This gap, and Landis’
desire to see quality films shown on a large screen followed by
post-film discussion, brought about the birth of VideoVersity.
Professor Landis enlisted the help from many facets
of the university and community to form the committee that made
it happen: Eric Hummel, Assistant Professor of CIOS, for technical
and audio/visual assistance; Matt Olsen, Distance Education Coordinator,
for movie rights and film research; Kathleen Wiechelman, UAS-Ketchikan’s
Librarian; Wendy Girard for public relations; Patti DeAngelis, Assistant
Professor of CIOS, for setup and dessert coordination along with
Sher Schwartz and Leslie Chapel; Marty West, Training Coordinator
for setting up the connection to Raven’s Brew Coffee and Clare
Patton and Taylor McKenna, adjunct faculty in Humanities. The films
are chosen by a selection subcommittee, based on criteria set by
the VideoVersity committee-at-large. Criteria included: length (no
film over two hours), variety (a selection of genres and time periods),
format (DVD is preferred) and rating, with the understanding that
some,screenings may privilege general audiences, and others may
restrict them.
While VideoVersity has had strong community attendance,
two things that were part of Professor Landis’ vision have
not yet evolved as hoped: strong student attendance, and post-film
discussion. To realize these things, two steps have been taken.
One, VideoVersity will be offered as a one-credit speech course
during Spring Semester 2003. For this credit students will attend
all film showings and participate in post-film discussion, culminating
in students performing the scholarly introduction to the final film
of the Spring Semester, as well as hosting the post-film discussion.
The theme for the Spring Series is “Hollywood’s Take on
the Hero.” The titles chose to represent this theme are: Aliens,
starring Sigourney Weaver and directed by James Cameron, The Man
Who Shot Liberty Valance, a western starring Jimmy Stewart, John
Wayne, and Lee Marvin, King of Hearts, the tale of a WWII explosives
expert set down in the middle of a village populated by inmates
of an insane asylum, and Chariot’s of Fire, the story of the
1924 Olympic long-distance runners Eric Liddell and Harold Abrahams.
Professor Landis’ hope is that VideoVersity will
continue the legacy of fine films and great discussion in Ketchikan
well into the future. He feels that the long-term success of this
film series maybe tied to its development as a credit-bearing course,
while at the same time keeping VideoVersity grounded as an activity
eliciting strong community involvement.
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