Student film hits the big screen
North Surrey Secondary Grade 12 students Muizz Wahid (left) and Naheel Jawaid, both 16, won second place in a WorkSafeBC film contest and have now had their short film chosen to be screened at the Vancouver International Film Festival. EVAN SEAL PHOTO
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Updated: October 06, 2009 9:28 AM
A short film by a pair of students from North Surrey Secondary will be screened at the Vancouver International Film Festival next week.
The film, by Naheel Jawaid and Muizz Wahid, is called Evolve and was originally made for last year’s WorkSafeBC High School Video Contest.
The piece won second place in that competition and was subsequently submitted to the youth portion of the Vancouver International Film Festival.
Just 16 films were chosen from 300 submissions from as far away as Nepal and South Korea. And Evolve was one of them.
“At first we were pretty surprised because we made the video so long ago, we didn’t think anyone was interested in it anymore,” said Jawaid.
“It was very surprising news,” added Wahid, who like Jawaid, is now in Grade 12. “Being chosen is a huge honour.”
Evolve is a one-minute comical Public Service Announcement (PSA) that addresses injury prevention in construction, but is created in the style of an extreme nature video similar to that of the late Steve Irwin “Crocodile Hunter.”
Evolve has the host watching “a common species” in the construction world, a man atop a ladder using a drill to fix a light fixture.
“Although this species doesn’t have many natural predators, it has been known to get injured many times by the way of not practising safe work habits,” says the host, who says he doesn’t want to get too close as he “senses danger” as the worker has left most of his safety equipment, including a hardhat, on the ground.
Within moments, the worker plunges to the pavement. That’s how nature works, the host explains.
“If only this species could evolve and solve this simple problem with proper safety procedures,” he says.
The youth films will be screened Oct. 14 at 1:15 p.m. at the Vancity Theatre and Oct. 15, 6 p.m. at the Empire Granville 7 Theatre. A group of animation students from North Surrey Secondary will also be attending the Oct. 14 show.
“We’re all so excited for them,” said career facilitator Sharon Marshall, noting there could be more prizes in store for Wahid and Jawaid. “But we already think they’ve won.”
sreynolds@surreyleader.com
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