Welcome Renata Kazin, a sophomore film major in the Roy H. Park School of Communications at Ithaca College. For the past semester, she has been working on a student film with her peers in her Cinema Production II course. They have recently completed shooting scenes for the film, which is titled From the Outside, that she shot entirely on the IC campus. She considers the film to be a parody of college life, so if you are interested in checking it out, it will be premiering in the Park Auditorium this Wednesday. In order to give you a little peek into what the film is about, I thought it would be interesting to begin by asking her a little bit about herself, why she chose IC, what inspired her to study film and of course some details about the film! Without further ado, I introduce to you the one and only Renata Kazin!
Name: Renata Kazin
Major: Cin. Photo/ Cinema Production Co.
Hometown: Yorktown Heights, NY
Favorite recent release: “Whiplash” (2014)
Most memorable movie watching experience: “The Shining”
Her Campus Ithaca College: For our readers, could you give us a little background about yourself? Where is your home-town? What do you like to do? And what brought you to Ithaca College, specifically the Park School of Communications?
Renata Kazin: I’m from Yorktown Heights, which is sort of like a medium sized town outside of New York City. It’s about 40 minutes into the suburbs. And Ithaca College was kind of like – not a random choice, but I wasn’t very excited about it at first because I just didn’t, I don’t know, I didn’t like it. Some people get a feeling when they go to a certain college campus and they’re like ‘Ah, this is the place for me’ and they get that feeling, and I just didn’t get that feeling anywhere. So, I just chose Ithaca College because my parents thought it was a good school. I was just indifferent about it…Now that I am going here I love it, but at the time I was scared and also not that excited.
HCIC: In the end, did your interest in the film program become your deciding factor in choosing IC?
RK: Yeah, my parents were like you know, ‘this is a good film school if you’re doing that.’ I mean my dad’s a photographer, so he kind of knows. I played the saxophone in high school, and at some of the other schools that I was applying to you know, they don’t have a band or anything that I could’ve been a part of without being a music major. That’s why my parents were pushing it for me, because they know I love playing and they were like ‘you can’t stop playing’, you know? And here, I get to be part of a jazz band that is open to all majors. I mean there’s like, TV majors, environmental science majors that play sax and trombone, and it’s really cool. And so now I get my parents. Finally I understand why they thought this was the best school for me. It really was. I wanted to be in a city. I wanted to be in New York City or Boston, but then Ithaca has a campus too. I didn’t know that I would like having a campus. I thought ‘Who needs that?’, but I think I do. I can live in the city when I graduate. It’s not a big deal.
HCIC: For our readers outside the Park school, film might sound like a pretty exotic major. What is it like to be a student studying film?
RK: It’s hard in a different way than anything else is because you are really putting yourself on the line. The films you make say something about you and that’s scary to have to present to everyone. A lot of the time we don’t have finals. And a lot of people are like ‘Oh, that’s lucky’, but it’s hard in a different way. It has its pros and cons. That’s what I would I say. That’s what being a film major is like. I mean in one class that film kids have to take, which I’m in now, Cinema Production II, the whole class is basically one assignment for the whole semester. It’s making this film. And it’s broken down into steps along the way. I mean being a film major is like these long-term assignments, these long-term meaningful, hard assignments. Not day-to-day stuff. Not like ‘Oh, you have to read and do a worksheet for next class.’ None of that. But just really big picture stuff. It has it’s pros and cons. I mean theoretically, there should be more relief and satisfaction if you’ve worked so hard and did one whole project the whole semester, but no one’s ever happy. None of us are ever happy with what we make. It’s hard but I guess I care about it enough that even if I’ve been disappointed with my work, I still try another project. I don’t know why. Because I keep thinking I can do better.
HCIC: Now let’s come to the fun part. Tell us about your new film. What is it called and what is it about?
RK: The film that I and other crew members basically made this year is kind of like – it’s a joke. It’s a joke film. It’s supposed to be a comedy. It’s kind of like a mockumentary, so like a documentary but you know when you’re watching it, it’s actually fake. And it’s just making fun of college students and how we live our lives, and the little things that we complain about and how stupid they are – and we’re trying to gain attention to that, I guess. It’s basically a parody of college life. A lot of people helped me out on it and helped to try to make it great, but also when a bunch of people are working on something, there’s a bunch of different opinions. But you can’t do it on your own either because it’s too much work. So, that’s also an issue. It’s not fighting it’s just kind of like coming head to head with the people that you have to work with. And that’s gonna be working in film, so that’s kind of scary. Does anything really come out the way you want it? Probably not.
HCIC: What will your film be titled?
RK: We’re thinking it’s going to be called, From the Outside. Kind of like to say to college students, ‘Okay, look at yourself from the outside.’ And the character Chris, in one of his last lines in the film says, ‘I don’t know. I don’t feel lucky. But maybe, I’d have to see it from the outside to really know.’ That’s what it ends with. So we thought that might be a cool title.
HCIC: For your pals in the Park school, let’s get technical now. Give us an idea of what your mise-en-scene strategy is for making a film on a college campus.
RK: The mise-en-scene I think is different from any project that you do. I don’t really have like a set thing that I do for everything. But I tend to gravitate towards symmetrical compositions. They’re really appealing to me. So I try to throw those in whenever I can. If you looked down this hallway, with all the lights and the shadows on the wall, I would want to shoot it just like straight in the middle, like symmetrical. I think that looks cool. Or even other things like, I don’t know. If you have two chairs, I would want to center them. I just like being able to cut the shot in half and have it match up. I just think it looks really good. That’s like a style thing. In terms of style, everyone has a different thing and I think that’s mine.
HCIC: Is there any one scene that really stands out to you that represents that kind of style in the film?
RK: Some of the B-roll shots do. It’s hard because the film I’m making this semester is like less of an artistic thing because it’s comedy. But I still tried to throw in a couple symmetrical shots where I could, because I like that.
HCIC: Have you incorporated music into your film, since you’re interested in both music and film equally?
RK: It’s hard because everything is copyrighted. But sometimes I wish there was a major here that combined music and film like completely. I would love to – I don’t know – I’m not classically trained. I play saxophone. I play piano, mostly by ear so I really couldn’t see myself being a music major. But at the same time, I wish there was a concentration in the film department of scoring or working with music and film in general. I think that would be awesome. That’s like me, I’d be so into that. Because for me, my life is kind of just about music and film. Like two different things and they’re really separate right now.
HCIC: What inspired you to become a filmmaker and to study film?
RK: Well, my dad is a photographer and he always has been. And he owns his own business. It’s really cool, and he always talks about it and always talked about it when I was a kid. I never thought I was really into it until I was thinking about what to be or what to major in and I realized that like, after all those years, I kind of am into it. He subconsciously made me interested in photography and video, because he also does video. So, it just seemed like a cool thing to explore. He taught me how to use a camera and taught me how to use Final Cut Pro, which no one uses anymore, but it got me into video. And I was like ‘This is kind of cool.’ My dad does aerial photography. His whole job is taking photos of construction sites, which at first when I was like ten or twelve sounded awful but you can actually get a pretty cool photo of a construction site. And so he sometimes has to do aerial photos, so every month or so he flies over lower Manhattan in a helicopter and leans out an open window and takes photos. And then I came with him and I started realizing how cool that was. And I was like ‘You know what? His life isn’t so bad.’ He’s doing what makes him happy, and that’s more than I think a lot of other adults can say they are. So, it was him, yeah. That’s why. Like subconsciously it was him. I liked it always, but maybe I only liked it because of him.
HCIC: What director has inspired you throughout your life?
RK: I watch a lot of television shows and shorter content, which I really enjoy. But I don’t have a specific director that I’ve always watched that inspired me. I pick and choose films not by their director but by other things, like the subject matter.
HCIC: Is there any other specific film or television show that you like in particular that has come out recently?
RK: I’m a huge fan of The Office. I think it’s so smart. Movies? I like “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” – that’s a classic film. But that’s not recent. What’s recent? I’m not sure. Oh my God, Whiplash! I’m obsessed with Whiplash. I loved Whiplash. It’s one of my favorite films recently. Like ever probably. It’s awesome. It came out in 2014, so it’s pretty new.
HCIC: What is the earliest memory you have of seeing a film?
RK: That’s super hard. I should have one, right? I’m trying to think if my dad showed me anything – he used to show me stuff. He showed me The Shining when I was 10. That was cool though. No, that was bad. My mom yelled at him for doing that afterwards, but he thought it was funny.
HCIC: Do you have any idea of what path you might want to go down in the film industry?
RK: I would love to work with music as it relates to film. But I think with this career, things are uncertain enough that I’m just going to do my best and see what comes to me – not comes to me, but to see what I can get. At first I thought, ‘Oh I only want to be an editor’, but then I don’t want to rule out job opportunities for other things. So, I kind of just want to see where this journey takes me. Because I’m probably gonna like it I guess. Or hate it. I don’t know.