New York Int’l Children’s Film Festival: March 4-19th
New York Int’l Children’s Film Festival opening is tomorrow, March 4th, and we love the excellent STEM films and documentaries that are being shown during the festival. The amazing team behind the festival is offering the GIANT community 10% off their first 4 tickets with the code STEM25. For many of us, this may be the first movie experience since the pandemic has begun, and we couldn’t be more excited to go back to theaters to watch such special series.
And what’s even more exciting? We have invited Thomas Verrette, producer | director | editor of Zero Gravity Documentary to join our live online Creative Workshop on Wednesday, March 9th at 5pm EST, so we can learn more about “behind the scenes” of making Zero Gravity and perhaps even planning to make our very own documentary!
Here we have highlighted a few of our favorite STEM films that are being screened at the festival.
Zero Gravity Documentary
ZERO GRAVITY follows a group of California kids coding for NASA. Screening March 6th at 11am at SVA Theatre. Thomas Verrette, producer | director | editor of Zero Gravity Documentary will also join GIANT’s live online Creative Workshop on Wednesday, March 9th at 5pm EST, to tell us more about “behind the scenes” of making this documentary.
Zero Gravity follows three middle school innovators and their first-time coach as they learn to navigate the complexities of NASA technology and life as a pre-teen. Gorgeous footage of outer space adds to the grandeur of their task, but the most compelling stories happen here on Earth, where the students support each other with teamwork and compassion, and their own hidden figure: the Mexican-American grandfather of their instructor whose experience at NASA sheds new light on the history of science and flight.
Photo from New York Int’l Children’s Film Festival
Girls’ POV: Science on Screen® short films featuring stories of young innovators changing the world. Screening March 5th & 11th at SVA Theatre.
This year Girls’ POV looks forward, and back, to celebrate stories of young scientists who are trailblazing creative ways to solve some of the world’s biggest challenges. Shorts in this line up includes:
NOT THE SCIENCE TYPE: GITANJALI, featuring Gitanjali Rao who was named TIME Magazine’s Kid of the Year in 2020 and, at just 16 years old, she’s already an accomplished scientist on a mission to create a global community of young innovators to solve problems all over the world.
KNIGHTS IN NEWARK, featuring a young girl, armed with her vivid imagination, who engineers a secret project on the roof of her apartment building to protect her immigrant family from the dreaded curse of the Knights in Newark.
SEA DRAGON, featuring a young fossil hunter who makes a groundbreaking discovery, challenging the worldview of 19th century England.
GENERATION IMPACT: THE CODER, featuring Jay Jay Patton who at the age of 13 designed and built an app to help kids connect with their incarcerated parents, inspired by her own experience.
HORIZON, featuring a determined astronaut on a mission to realize her dream of launching into uncharted space.
Gargarine at New York Int’l Children’s Film Festival
The stunning GAGARINE about a teen who uses his astronomical ambitions to try to save his home. Screening March 5th at 5:45pm at SVA Theatre
Yuri, 16, has lived all his life in Gagarine Towers, a vast, red-brick housing project on the outskirts of Paris. It’s not always the most relaxing place to live, but it is a vibrant, warm and richly diverse community filled with people from all corners of the world. From the heights of his apartment, Yuri dreams of becoming an astronaut. On the ground, he utilizes his engineering know-how to keep his home base humming. So when plans to demolish Gagarine are leaked, Yuri joins the resistance. With his friends Diana (Lyna Khoudri of The French Dispatch) and Houssam, he embarks on a mission to save his home, transforming the building into his very own “starship.” This Cannes award-winner dazzles with both cinematographic and deep-space bravura while holding up decent housing as a core human right. The film opens in theaters in the U.S. on April 1, 2022 Note: film contains mild language and drug references
Hope you enjoy watching these wonderful films and many more during New York Int’l Children’s Film Festival and don’t forget to use code STEM25 to receive 10% off your first 4 tickets.