The 43rd season of the renowned Thomas Edison Film Festival (TEFF) will premiere with a screening, a virtual discussion with filmmakers, and films available to view on-demand, presented in collaboration with Princeton University’s Lewis Center for the Arts.
Presented by the Thomas A. Edison Media Arts Consortium and Princeton’s Program in Visual Arts.
Feb. 16: In-Person Premiere
TEFF’s in-person premiere opens at the James Stewart Film Theater at Princeton on February 16 at 6:30 p.m. with a reception, screening of seven award-winning films, and an audience Q&A. Guests include:
- James Hollenbaugh, filmmaker (A Life Like This, recipient of Stellar Award for DEAI and recipient of the 2024 Edison Innovation Award)
- Bimpé Fageyinbo, poet and performer (Freedom for Freedom, 2024 Stellar Award for Experimental)
- Gabriel Kurzlop, lighting director & post-production (Freedom for Freedom, 2024 Stellar Award for Experimental)
- Julia Anderson, producer (250km – double room – 2024 Stellar Award for Narrative)
- Chehade Boulos, filmmaker (Tracing Imperfection, recipient of Stellar Award for Documentary)
Feb. 17: Livestream Discussion
On February 17 at 4:00 p.m. (ET), a live-streamed discussion with filmmakers will be hosted by Festival Director Jane Steuerwald, Festival Associate and juror Henry Baker, and Curator, Emerita, of the National Gallery of Art Margaret Parsons.
Join the discussion on Zoom
Meeting ID: 852 1624 5806
Passcode: 094361
Feb. 16-23: Watch Films On-Demand
The seven films, representing experimental, animation, documentary, screen dance and narrative genres by filmmakers from the U.S., France, Australia, and Armenia, will also be available to view on-demand February 16-23 on the festival website.
Watch the premiere on-demand (link available Feb. 16)
Tickets & Details
The in-person premiere and live-streamed discussion are both free and open to the public. No tickets or registration required.
Directions
Get directions to the James Stewart Film Theater, located on the first floor at 185 Nassau St. in Princeton, NJ.
Accessibility
The James Stewart Film Theater is an accessible venue. The theater has spaces for wheelchair and companion seating in the top row. A mechanized lift provides access to all levels in the theater for a wheelchair or a patron with a mobility disability. See an event staff member in the theater for assistance using the lift. Please plan to arrive at least 15 minutes in advance of the event start time for this assistance and for best choice of seating locations. Visit our Venues and Studios section for accessibility information at our various locations. Guests in need of access accommodations are invited to contact the Lewis Center at 609-258-5262 or email LewisCenter@princeton.edu at least one week in advance of the event date.
Featured Films
The following films will be shown in-person at Princeton University on February 16:
A Tiny Man
by Aude David and Mikaël Gaudin, Montpellier, France
Stellar Award Animation; 10 min.
Displeased with his wife’s body, a man sneakily administers a mysterious serum supposed to make her lose weight quickly. But following a sleight of hand reversal by his wife, it is he who swallows the beverage and starts to shrink.
Tracing Imperfection
by Chehade Boulos, Pompano Beach, FL, USA
Stellar Award Documentary; 8 min.
As master conservator Naoko Fukumaru demonstrates kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing pottery using gold, she recalls how learning the practice has taught her to embrace her own imperfections as it’s mended her own life.
Impossible Image
by Karen Pearlman and Richard James Allen, New South Wales, Australia
Stellar Award Screen Dance; 8 min.
Impossible Image remixes the anarchy and gender play of women of the 1920s, with the fury, irony, and sly humour of dancing women in the 2020s. Cutting together contemporary action and archival footage Pearlman creates a montage of rage, hilarity and feminist protest echoing across 100 years.
Between Earth and Sky
by Andrew Nadkarni, Brooklyn, NY, USA
Global Insights Stellar Award; 25 min.
Renowned ecologist Nalini Nadkarni studies “what grows back” after a disturbance in the rainforest canopy. After surviving a life-threatening fall from a tree, she must turn her research question onto herself to explore the effects of disturbance and recovery throughout her own life. Between Earth and Sky is also shortlisted for the 2024 Academy Awards in the Best Documentary Short category.
A Life Like This
by James Hollenbaugh, Harrisburg, PA, USA
DEAI Stellar Award – Excerpt; 43 min.
A documentary portrait, highlighting the lived experiences and creative work of four outsider artists working and living with disability in Central Pennsylvania. Artists with disability, both mental and physical, consistently face discrimination, inequity, and underexposure at both local and national levels. This film aims to de-stigmatize an underrepresented demographic of artists as it tells the four unique stories of Malcolm Corley, Adam Musser, Sybil Roe Thompson and David Nolt who create as a means to communicate and express how art shapes and impacts their lives.
250km
by Hasmik Movsisyan, Yeravan, Armenia
Narrative; 22 min.
When a war suddenly breaks out, a 14-year-old boy finds himself faced with a decision that could save his family, with no time to think, he embarks on a treacherous 250-kilometer journey to safety.
Freedom for Freedom
by Yuri Alves, Newark, NJ, USA
Experimental; 4 min.
Poet Bimpé Fageyinbo delivers a powerful ode to the memory and spirit of Harriet Tubman, while evoking the urgency of real freedom for Black people, then and now.
