RG Productions' partner Viva Farms featured in The NY Times!

Here at Reel Grrls we recently created a promotional video for Viva Farms, an organization who is doing important progressive work to support new farmers. We were thrilled to see that Viva’s work caught they eye of The New York Times, and was recently featured in a piece last Monday about how small scale farming is creating a new profit model for agriculture. The article did a great job highlighting the work Viva does helping Hispanics who previously worked as low-wage laborers start their own businesses. 

Reel Grrls created the video under our production company, RG Productions. At RG Productions we serve socially minded organizations doing important community work, and Viva’s story - as showcased in both the NYT and our video - is a proud example of exactly that.  

Check out RG Productions’ video below, and make sure to read the article here.

'Girl With the Birds' plays at Los Angeles Film Festival

Congratulations to Reel Grrls participant Dova Castaneda Zilly for having her animated film "The Girl With the Birds" screen at the Los Angeles Film Festival this past weekend! Dova made this beautiful light-box video as a 10 year old with a small team of her peers during our 2010 Summer Animation Camp - and we're so proud to see it showcased at such a great festival! If you live in LA, you can catch her film and the rest of the Future Filmmaker Series at the next screening on June 23rd.

OMG: Reel Grrls' media justice videos now available on DVD and On Demand!

Remember how Reel Grrls made headlines last May when we tweeted about Comcast's hiring of then-FCC Commissioner Baker? Well, in case you missed the conclusion to the story, the youth in our summer apprenticeship program produced advocacy videos about media justice and reform issues in response to the dispute. The videos are AMAZING and now they're available on our compilation DVD, Generation of Consolidation!

This week our story has taken another interesting turn. We're excited to announce that starting this week, Generation of Consolidation is available on Comcast On Demand locally in Seattle and Spokane! After Comcast responded to the press coverage last spring by trying to reinstate the pledged funds of $18,000 for our program, our fearless leader, Malory Graham, declined their offer and instead suggested they support our freedom of speech by hosting our media justice videos on the cable network - and they listened. On October 27th, 2011, we signed a contract for our youth media to be hosted on Comcast from now until February, 2012. You can find the videos On Demand with this path: Get Local > Around the Sound > Reel Grrls.

We're so excited to expand the reach of our videos to living rooms across Washington State. Our next goal is to get Generation of Consolidation in as many schools and libraries across the nation as possible - if you want to see this happen too, consider a donation to help our distribution efforts!

This is a huge win for youth voices around the nation - we're so grateful for our individual supporters, Free Press, and MAG-Net who made these videos possible! #MediajusticeNOW!

Happy Halloween from Reel Grrls!

Before there was Twilight, before there was True Blood, before there was The Vampire Diaries, there was Thicker Than Water!

Happy Halloween from the Reel Grrls team!

Reel Grrls Countdown to Halloween: Day 3

Only a few days left until one our favorite holidays, Halloween! Today's video is Max on Max, a short horror film takes place in a movie theater and leaves you questioning who is sane and who is not...

Halloween Countdown: Day 4

Today's spooky movie is from our 2011 summer animation camp and created by 2 sets of twins ages 11 and 12! Watch the what happens to a cat burglar that hoards stolen goods in Bad Cats Die Young.

Reel Grrls Countdown to Halloween: Day 5

Today's spooky movie was created in the Centrum Young Artists Project Film Class in June 2009! This thriller follows three film students looking for a place to shoot their horror movie.

Reel Grrls Countdown to Halloween: Day 6

6 more days until Halloween!

Today's Reel Grrls featured video is the truly scary Horror Movie (2007) which uses the genre to highlight the fact that most of the victims in horror films are women, perpetuating the abuse of women and girls in real life.

Reel Grrls Countdown to Halloween: Day 7

Halloween is only a week away and this year Reel Grrls is celebrating with a daily countdown by opening our vault of youth horror videos for your terror/enjoyment!

Without further ado, we present you with The Lost Sister, created in 2009:

The Lost Sister from ReelGrrls Workshops on Vimeo.

RG rocks the Film Festival scene!

Reel Grrls films have been invited to screen at some very exciting places recently! Here's a small sampling:

Last week RG filmmaker Shannon MacIntyre represented at The 15th Annual Tower of Youth Film Festival/North American Youth Film & Education Day in Sacramento, California. The animated film she created with her sister Kia MacIntyre and Jooniper Morales, Mamma Knows Best, was featured there and Shannon spoke about it afterwards at a panel that was televised live (check her out on the big screen in the photo below)!

This coming weekend, Reel Grrls is all up in the Seattle Lesbian and Gay Film Festival (SLGFF)! On Saturday Oct 22nd at 12:30pm at Pacific Place Cinema catch Relativity, a short documentary exploring gender and gender norms. The video was created in last spring's Lights Camera Reel Grrls intro program, in which we partnered with NOVA highschool's social justice class. Filmmaker Angeline Blattenbauer will be in attendance, and if we're lucky we may also see co-directors Finbar and Ellen Vickrey in the Q&A session after the screening.

In that same program, you'll also see The Cherdonna and Lou Show: the Movie, a film created by Reel Grrls staff and mentors for last year's International Documentary Challenge (a timed filmmaking competition). This lively experimental doc was featured as a finalist in the competition, and tells the story of two Seattle dancers that defy classification. Buy tickets to "Local Produce," the Saturday screening featuring both films, right here.

But that's not all!! On Sunday at SLGFF the films created this summer in Reel Queer Youth, a partnership program between Reel Grrls and Three Dollar Bill Cinema that teaches filmmaking to queer and allied youth of all genders, will screen at 12pm at Pacific Place (tickets here). The filmmakers will be in attendance, and Reel Queer Youth Tshirts will be on sale. These films are truly incredible, you do not want to miss them!

Next month, Reel Grrls also has the honor of being featured in the Teen Division of the Young People's Film Festival in Portland, Oregon. Five of our films will be screening there, including the animated Girl With Birds and the short documentary Who We Are:


Who We Are from ReelGrrls Workshops on Vimeo.

Who We Are was created in our very first Documentary Arts Camp last spring by five young women from Mt. Vernon. In the film, the girls tell their stories of what it's like to be a migrant worker. They're currently in the process of expanding these stories into a longer documentary. We can't wait to see it when it's finished! With the support of their community, all five Mt. Vernon filmmakers will be traveling to Portland to attend the festival. Dova Isabel Castañeda Zilly, writer and co-creator of Girl With Birds, will also be in attendance there. It should be awesome!

We hope to see you at one of these upcoming festivals. Thanks for supporting grrl-made media!!