Bonus: Experiential Learning Scholarship Final Essay

Hi Experiential Learning Committee, my name is Kristin Storck and I attended the Cannes Film Festival Maymester Program! I would just like to say how grateful I am from the bottom of my heart for your help in making this life altering experience possible. It's taken me a while to write this, because I didn't know how exactly to put into words how these truly were some of the best four weeks of my life. From discovering one of my now absolute favorite films, Bull, and then immediately meeting the director, Annie Silverstein, right afterwards, to the eye opening and inspiring experience of meeting and seeing the short films of eight up-and-coming LGBT filmmakers at the LGBT Emerging Filmmakers Showcase, to being one of the last three people let into the premiere of Robert Egger's The Lighthouse, a film I have anticipated seeing for months, this festival was full of powerful and life changing moments.

However, the greatest challenge I faced during this program was definitely the fatigue. I didn't realize how intense and jam packed each day would be at the festival, how I would have to cope with little sleep and fear of missing out on events going on at every hour of the day, but I survived essentially 12 days straight of non-stop excitement and stress. After the festival too, I was surprised to find more difficulty than I thought in balancing my travel explorations and free time with my class assignments. However, I think this pressure was for the better in readying me for how the industry actually is and pushed me to be a better and faster writer.

That brings me to my next point about how all of this has impacted my future goals and career path. One of the classes we took was about writing film critiques. Our professor, Dr. Kohn would write 'read' at the top of the best reviews so that the writer would share their work with the class. Dr. Kohn wrote 'read' on all of my reviews and I shared all of my writing with my peers. I didn't realize how fulfilling it would feel to hear my professor and other student's feedback on these pieces, and I didn't realize I have a real talent and a unique voice when it comes to critiquing film. This has made me strongly consider going back to my journalistic roots (I was the co-editor of my high school's newspaper and originally was a journalism major) and made me realize that there's more out there for me than just the intimidating and at times overwhelming film industry. I am actually gaining more experience in this area writing for the magazine Avant Youth here in Atlanta, and I think this is definitely a new career path I'm opening up to.

However above all, I think what Cannes made me realize is the true talent and voice I also have when it comes to filmmaking and storytelling. It made me realize that the competitive and artificial nature of the corporate rat race in the studio system side of the industry really isn't for me. I've discovered what I truly want to do: navigate my way through the world of independent film where there is definitely less funding but ultimately more creative control. I have been developing a script for the past couple months that I am planning on directing this coming fall. Originally, I was just going to produce it, but I've decided that this story is ultimately just too personal and I need to push myself to actually do what I want to do: direct. A lot of the people who have agreed to work on this project with me I bonded with during this study abroad and I am so grateful to have found these new, stronger, life-lasting friendships and invaluable professional connections. Wish me luck! I hope to submit the final product to festivals (maybe Cannes, who knows lol). Thank you for granting me this funding and essentially giving me the push to not shy away from my drive for artist expression. Thank you for helping affirm in me I have what it takes to make what I want in this world.