Contest for phone 'filmmakers'

The prize for this "film festival" is for "best student film shot entirely with a camera cellphone," for presentation, of course, on a 1-to-2-inch screen, eSchoolNews reports. High school and university students throughout the US are eligible to enter their 30-second films for a $5,000 prize. "It might seem like an attention-grabbing gimmick, but [Ithaca College's Roy H. Park School of Communications, Dean Dianne] Lynch leaves no doubt of the contest's academic purpose. In today's media marketplace - where cell phones can take pictures, play music and games, be a personal secretary, or connect to Web sites - it's all about thinking small and mobile" at a time and in a country where it seems to be all about thinking big: "bigger houses, bigger cars, bigger portions at the local fast food joint," etc. The deadline for film submission is January 10. Winners will be announced at the end of the month. But Ithaca College isn't the first in this space, the Associated Press reports. For example, there's MTV's "Head and Body," a series of programs for phones; last year's Zoie Films festival, which dubbed itself "the world's first cell-phone film festival"; and, in Paris last fall, the Forum des Images's Pocket Film Festival.