PAH-Fest comes to Grants

By Jim Tiffin
Cibola County Bureau

GRANTS — When the Public Access Hollywood Festival, or PAH-Fest, comes to town Wednesday, area residents can participate in two of the competitions during the four-day festival for up to $200 in cash prizes for each event, said Doug Bocaz-Larson, film and theater arts instructor at New Mexico State University-Grants campus.

This is the second year for the PAH-Fest in Grants, which was founded and brought to the area by filmmaker Christopher Coppola and Bocaz-Larson.

PAH-Fest was created so that anyone can take their digital cameras, cellular telephones or any digital recording device, make digital films and compete in a festival.

"It gives the public access to Hollywood,"Coppola said last year.

The "Cell Phone" and "Your Tech" competitions on Friday is open to anyone and registration and entry in the contests is anytime between 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., at the Mining Museum in Grants.

Coppola, who since bringing PAH-Fest to Grants last year, has conducted PAH-Fest events worldwide, will select a secret topic and those who enter one or both of the competitions will do a two-minute film with their own cell phones or any other digital recording devices, Bocaz-Larson said.

The contests will probably be merged next year into one contest because anyone with a cell phone may also enter the Your Tech, competition, Bocaz-Larson said.

"But you can only enter the Cell Phone competition with a cell phone," he said.

"These are pretty much one-shot efforts so they will be shot, submitted and then the winners will be announced Sunday night," Bocaz-Larson said.

The final event of the four-day festival is the awards ceremony at 6 p.m. in the banquet room at the Best Western Inn in East Grants.

Film and television producer and actor David Carradine is slated to be presented the "Keeping the Torch Lit" at 6 p.m., Wednesday at the Double Six Art Gallery.

PAH-Fest events

• June 6 — Start of Mobilflix where teams have already chosen to digitally film local mini-movies from ideas that have been submitted to the festival's Web site: www.PAH-Fest.com. Anyone who wishes to enter this movie category must have their own equipment and will be in the "Outlaw" division. Registration and competition information is at noon in Room 123 at NMSU-Grants, in Martinez Hall.
  
  
• June 7 — Filming day for Mobilflix.
  
  
• June 8 — Competition day for the Cell Phone and Your Tech categories. Those individuals who wish to compete with cell phones or digital recording devices will receive a secret topic and will have to make a two-minute film to be submitted no later than Saturday.
  
  
• June 9 — All movies are required to be submitted by the end of this day and it is the start of this year's Studio Tour with the Cibola Arts Council. Various artists throughout the region hold open houses to which the public is invited and several are present and demonstrating their art techniques such as painting or sculpting.
  
  
• June 10 — A previously planned Technology Treasure Hunt, will not be part of the festival. It has been canceled. The awards ceremony is at 6 p.m. in the banquet room at the Best Western Inn. Various cash prizes will be given to film winners.

Further details on all events are listed on the PAH-Fest Website.

To contact reporter Jim Tiffin, call (505) 287-2197 or fax (505) 287-2581.