PAH in the Press

Elko Daily Free Press, 03/18/2007

Young Filmmakers: Coppola’s PAH-fest a big success

by Jared DuBach, Free Press Lifestyles Editor

ELKO – The first ever PAH-Fest (Project Accessible Hollywood) has come and gone in conjunction with last week’s National Cowboy Poetry Gathering, but it certainly has left it’s mark on some area residents, including a group of young filmmakers from the Elko Boys & Girls Club.

Illinois cowboy poet David Sandahl won first place in the mobile flicks category of the competition, while Peter Church won first place in the cell phone art category and Bobbie Jo Roberts won first place in Web cam art. Church is from a ranching family near Elko. Roberts is a recent graduate of Great Basin College with a degree in theater.

Sandahl won $1,000 for his piece, while Church won $400 and Roberts won $200.

Boys & Girls Club Executive Director Fernando Vargas was presented with the Bugsy Kahn Award on behalf of Team Boys & Girls Club. PAH-Fest creator Christopher Coppola said in a previous interview that the award is given to the creator or creators who demonstrate a willingness to go the extra mile, or demonstrate a certain daring with their project and are willing to be different.

The award features Las Vegas-founding gangster Bugsy Siegel wearing a Mongolian-style hat. Siegel represents the daring and vision of transforming Las Vegas from open desert. The hat recognizes Genghis Kahn, who formed one of the largest empires in the world’s history.

Vargas said he, his daughter and three adult volunteers with the club monitored the children as they interacted with their PAH-Fest film coach last week. According to Vargas, the team shot about 24 collective hours of footage, and ended up narrowing it down to the six-minute film.

The story the team presented – and was later given the “green light” to produce – is based upon the life of one of the club’s members. It is the tale of a child and his or her siblings as they experience their mother remarrying, going through spousal abuse, and then moving to the Elko area to start a new life.

Involved in the project were club members Joey Tanner, D.J. Valdez, Laura Flores, Taylor Williams, Heather Rose and Elia Cobian. Williams was a leading actress in the film and said the experience of making the movie was “a lot of fun.”

“It was hard, though, and it was only six minutes,” Williams said.

Tanner was the camera operator for the production. He said he had no prior experience to working a video camera and being part of the project is something that definitely benefited him.

“It’s something that I would like to do as a career,” Tanner said. “I had a lot of fun.”

Vargas said since the children involved had such a good time making the film, and also seemed to benefit from it through teamwork and exposure to a new art form, the club is looking into purchasing video and editing equipment for others in the club to use.

The entries in each category of PAH-Fest, including the video by the Elko Boys & Girls, can be viewed online a www.pahfest.com.