Female Filmmakers Take Center Stage at The Lindsay’s WIFM PGH Showcase
On April 9, attendees at The Lindsay Theater & Cultural Center in Sewickley were treated to a wide array of work created by local, female, Pittsburgh filmmakers. The Women in Film & Media Pittsburgh Showcase featured thirteen short films from eleven local artists. They ranged from documentary to horror to comedy to drama. Each new selection introduced the audience to a voice they may not have known prior to the screening.
Women in Film & Media Pittsburgh (WIFM) is a local, film-focused non-profit whose goal is to support women in front of and behind the camera. They encourage nuanced female portrayals in film, video, and other screen-based media. Behind the camera, they offer a robust educational component to get more women comfortable taking up space on a film set. And then there are events like this screening, which are a celebration of the industry happening in and around Pittsburgh and an opportunity for these women to support one another in their next project.
“One of the things I love about Pittsburgh is the strong and diverse independent film community we have here,” says Wendy Whittick, WIFM board secretary and a local filmmaker whose short was featured at the event. “In particular, the quality and depth of the films produced by women in Pittsburgh is inspiring. I’m proud to have the opportunity to share their work.”
After the films screened, several filmmakers participated in a Q&A hosted by Rishi Sethi, who organizes the Emerging Filmmakers Showcase program at The Lindsay. Sethi began by asking the women to explain where the initial inspiration for their film came from. A few of the projects were made under a time constraint. Alyssa Pearson’s Hammer Handed Hitchhiker was part of the 21 Days of Horror competition. In this case, Pearson and her crew were given requirements for the film: the urban legend genre, a chain, and someone had to die by a hammer.
“Thus,” Person smiled, “I created that.”
By that, she means a slasher stoner flick where a group of young adults find themselves in the midst of a real-life urban legend in the form of a hammer-handed hitchhiker.
Courtesy of WIFM Pittsburgh
Another filmmaker, Lauren Keller of Dark and Stormy, also created her work under constraints. She wanted to push herself to make a film that was shorter than a minute.
“Unfortunately, I failed,” laughed Keller. “That movie is longer than a minute.”
Haley Jenkins produced Chasing Infinity, a film that was made as part of the 48 Hour Film Project. It’s exactly as it sounds. Over the course of 48 hours, a team of creatives makes a film from scratch. The score, the script, the editing, everything happens in 48 hours.
On the opposite side of things, there’s the project from mother-child duo Kristen Lauth Schaeffer and Ro Schaeffer. A Girl Takes a Walk in the Forest began as a desire for the pair to make something together. In its final form, it’s a gorgeous reflection on the art of creation and the sometimes years-long process required for an object to come to fruition. The Shaeffers estimate that A Girl Takes a Walk in the Forest took about three years to complete.
As the Q&A was winding down, an audience member asked what advice the panel would give fellow filmmakers and what they enjoy the most about making a film. Many of the women echoed the idea that the community that’s built on these sets is crucial to finding joy in the intense marathon that is making a movie.
Perhaps the wisest piece of wisdom of the evening came from the oldest director. Pauline Greenlick had three films in the program, all telling stories of life in Uganda in the aftermath of the Lord's Resistance Army insurgency. She’d spent most of her adult life as a teacher and, in retirement, picked up a camera. Rather, she gifted a camera to her husband, who never touched it, so Greenlick eventually claimed it as her own. Her advice was simple:
“Don’t give up. Get a camera in hand and just go out and shoot.”
The thirteen films in alphabetical order:
A Girl Takes a Walk in the Forest (5 min): Directed by Kristen Lauth Schaeffer & Ro Shaeffer.
• A Mother’s Muse (7 min): Directed by Genesis Nelson.
• B*tch for Council (4 min): Directed by Mikie Palermo.
• Chasing Infinity (9 min): Produced by Haley Jenkins.
• Connie Amongi (6 min): Directed by Pauline Greenlick.
• Dark and Stormy (2 min): Directed by Lauren Keller.
• Edges (4 min): Directed by Delaney Hathaway.
• Embracing Their Reality (5 min): Directed by Jessica Wasserlauf.
• Hammer Handed Hitchhiker (8 min): Directed by Alyssa Pearson.
• Last Cup of Coffee (12 min): Directed by Wendy Whittick.
• One Day in the Life of Eddy (2 min): Directed by Pauline Greenlick.
• Opio (5 min): Directed by Pauline Greenlick.
• She’s Great! (8 min): Directed by Stacia Paglieri.
Follow me on BlueSky, Instagram, TikTok, Letterboxd, YouTube, & Facebook. Check out Movies with My Dad, a podcast recorded on the car ride home from the movies and I Think You’ll Hate This, a podcast hosted by two friends who rarely agree.
Support your local film critic!
~
Support your local film critic! ~
Beyond the Cinerama Dome is run by one perpetually tired film critic
and her anxious emotional support chihuahua named Frankie.
Your kind donation means Frankie doesn’t need to get a job…yet.