Following a successful premiere on campus in February, the Thomas Edison Film Festival (TEFF) returns to the James Stewart Film Theater at Princeton University with a screening of 10 award-winning short films as the Festival prepares to tour around the country. Featuring short films by current Princeton students Madeline McDonald ’26 and Luke Shannon ’24, as well as Princeton alum Dawn Luong ’23, the program includes narrative, animation, screen dance, experimental, and documentary genres and represents the work of filmmakers from Belgium, France, India, Japan, Taiwan, and the U.S. The screening, which begins at 7:30 p.m. on March 28, is hosted by Festival Director Jane Steuerwald and presented by the Thomas A. Edison Media Arts Consortium and Princeton’s Program in Visual Arts. The screening is free and open to the public with no tickets required, and the Film Theater is an accessible venue.
The Thomas Edison Film Festival is an international juried competition celebrating all genres and independent filmmakers across the globe. For 40+ years, the Festival has been advancing the unique creativity and power of the short film by celebrating stories that shine a light on issues and struggles within contemporary society. The Festival was founded in 1981 as Black Maria Film Festival and originally named for Thomas Edison’s West Orange, New Jersey film studio dubbed the “Black Maria” because of its resemblance to the black-box police paddy wagons of the same name. Renamed in 2021, the Festival’s relationship to Thomas Edison’s invention of the motion camera and the kinetoscope and his experimentation with the short film is at the core of the Festival.
The Thomas Edison Media Arts Consortium also showcases the New Jersey Young Filmmakers Festival and the Global Insights Collection, an archive of films focusing on the environment, LGBTQ+ subjects, people with disabilities, international issues, race and class, and films with themes of social justice.
Featured Films
The ten films being screened on March 28 include:
Blue Hour, a narrative film by J. D. Shields and Maya Korn of Los Angeles, California, depicts how two personal journeys intersect when a struggling young photographer is hired for a cheap last minute portrait gig. The unfolding photo session, while transient, leaves an indelible mark on both women.
Still from the film “Lightbreak” by Luke Shannon ’24
Current visual arts senior Luke Shannon’s animated film, Lightbreak, is a generative light algorithm studying reflection, refraction, and materiality. Shannon’s senior exhibition for the Program in Visual Arts is currently on view through April 5 in the Lucas Gallery at 185 Nassau Street.
Island, an experimental film by Jack Cronin from Canton, Michigan, presents an enchanting and lyrical filmic postcard from Isle Royale National Park on Michigan’s Lake Superior.
A recurring mysterious sound from mountains in the Himalayas is heard only by two curious young shepherds in Stenzin Tankong’s narrative film, Last Days of Summer. Unable to convince the villagers of the ominous nature of the sound, they journey into the unknown to unravel the mystery. Tankong is an independent filmmaker with roots in India and Montpellier, France.
In the animated film Beautiful Figures by Soetkin Verstegen of Brussels, Belgium, thoughts ripple over the pages of a personal notebook, kept during a stay at different science labs in Zürich. They float from one to another, like a mind map of unfinished ideas on memory, medical imaging, cells, and aging.
A surreal night shift of a female prison guard turns into a juggling fiesta, celebrating diversity and the solidarity of women in Bold, a film made by New Yorkers Alla Kovgan and Miko Malkhasyan in the screen dance genre.
Film still from “The Bellmaster” by Madeline McDonald ’26
Princeton alum Dawn Luong’s short animation, unspoken moments, explores the moments in life where some things don’t need to be said to be understood. Luong, a member of the Class of 2023 and an Engineering major, lives in Chicago, Illinois. Unspoken moments also won a Jury’s Choice Award in the NJ Young Filmmakers competition in June 2023.
Madeline McDonald, a sophomore at Princeton studying in the Program in Visual Arts, will present her documentary, The Bellmaster, a behind-the-scenes look at one of the largest instruments in the world – the carillon. These thousand-pound bells have been part of the human soundscape for thousands of years and the Bellmaster of Princeton University, Lisa Lonie, offers a masterful demonstration of the instrument as well as the history of Princeton’s carillon. McDonald also entered her film in the NJ Young Filmmakers competition this summer and won a Jury’s Choice Award.
In The Old Young Crow, a narrative film by Liam Lo Pinto of Japan and New York City, an Iranian boy befriends an old Japanese woman at a graveyard in Tokyo.
Oolluo Tseng’s animated film, ATM, tells the story of a money machine, a poor man, and cat food. Tseng hails from Los Angeles, California, and Taiwan.
Festival Program & Sponsorship
Venues interested in scheduling a screening should contact Festival Director Jane Steuerwald at Jane@TEFilmFestival.org. The festival offers programming options ranging from a custom-curated program to an online film presentation by the festival director, including a Q&A and dialogue with the audience.
In addition to the support provided for the 2024 season by the Lewis Center for the Arts, the Thomas Edison Film Festival receives support from New Jersey State Council on the Arts; the Charles Edison Fund – Edison Innovation Foundation; the Hudson County Office of Cultural and Heritage Affairs and Tourism; the Hoboken Historical Museum; Big Sky Edit; Sonic Union; the Puffin Foundation; Lowenstein Sandler, LLP; the NBA; Fairleigh Dickinson University; University of Delaware; NJ Motion Picture and Television Commission; East Brunswick Tech School of the Arts, Adobe Systems, Inc.; and Microsoft through TechSoup.org.
Visit the Thomas Edison Film Festival website to learn more about the festival and Thomas A. Edison Media Arts Consortium. To learn more about the Lewis Center for the Arts, the premiere screening, and the more than 100 public performances, exhibitions, readings, screenings, concerts and lectures presented each year, most of them free, visit the Lewis Center website.
