Congratulations to Wilson students “Stefano Jacobo, Kajee Sullivan, Nicole Kim, Owen Williams, Sochetra Kosal, and Soleil Speciale” on their win for STN’s (Student Television National’s) 2024 Sixty Second Horrorfest. Last October, Wilson’s Photo & Video students participated in STN’s Horrorfest. The Horrorfest is an annual national film competition where students from around the country participate in a challenge where they must make a 60-second short film about a previously chosen prompt. The prompt was released on October 1st with the theme “TECHNOLOGY CAN BE AN EVIL THING.” The plot rules are “Your Protagonist can only communicate through technology–Facetime, Texts, Zoom. You name it!”. The Cinematography Rule is to “Use the eerie flow of a screen to light at least one scene.” Contestants had 24 days to finish their short film before the results were announced on Halloween.
The short film was created by Wilson students Sochetra Kosal, Stefano Jacobo, Owen Williams, Nicole Kim, Kajee Sullivan with Soleil Speciale as the sole actor in the feature. The film surrounds a girl who is getting ready to meet a guy, and as she begins to put on makeup before leaving she becomes insecure. She goes to her phone and gets wrapped up in face editing filters, and the film ends with her real face being changed as well, transfiguring her face into something unrecognizable.
One of the members of the victorious team Kosal, had a couple comments about his team’s win and the creation process, saying that it was “not the smoothest process because of the time crunch” and that in the future, they would plan ahead because timing is a big factor in filmmaking. The competition is entirely done by students, so other than giving feedback, teachers aren’t allowed to assist their students in any way. The group initially didn’t think they would win due to the nature of their horror film being more about the message and less about scaring the audience. When developing the idea for the film, Kosal said, “I didn’t want to go the traditional route with a jump scare factor. I wanted to implement some sort of message. Our message tackles the beauty standards in today’s society and how that can affect a person’s image or perception of themselves.” Because of their unique plot point, the group was extremely shocked to see that they won first place in the competition, but overall, they were all extremely grateful. “At the end of the day, I’m still really happy that we won first place. It’s a really big achievement for us as a group, and I’m proud of us.”
