FILM-Y, the Danish Film Institute's mobile film studio for children and youth, has spent the last month in the Latvian capital of Riga. FILM-Y is a scaled-down, travel-friendly version of FILM-X, the Danish Film Institute's studio in Copenhagen, where children and teens get to direct, shoot, edit and screen their own short films.
FILM-Y visited Riga on the occasion of the city's appointment as the European Capital of Culture for 2014. Latvian children have had a chance to try out FILM-Y at the local children's culture house, Rīgas Skolēnu Pils. Over the course of the summer, films made by the children will be screened publicly as part of the Capital of Culture activities.
Two films
Discover two of the films that were made during FILM-Y's stay in Riga, one of them using the Morris Minor which is the centre piece of the set:
"Stop in the Forest":
Stopmotion film:
About the Visit
FILM-Y visited Riga from 1 April to mid-May. The official opening took place on 4 April, with attendees including Juris Bogdanov, head of Rīgas Skolēnu Pils; Ina Druviete, the Latvian minister of education; Per Carlsen, the Danish ambassador to Latvia; Simon Drewsen Holmberg of the Danish Cultural Institute in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania; and Charlotte Giese, head of the Danish Film Institute's department for children and youth.
Report on Latvian TV about FILM-Y in Riga:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RoPBZ7d96o
FILM-Y's Latvian visit is organised in partnership between the Danish Film Institute, the National Film Center of Latvia and the Danish Cultural Institute in Riga.
About FILM-Y
FILM-Y is inspired by FILM-X which opened in 2002 at the DFI Filmhouse in Copenhagen. Since its inception, the FILM-X studio has been a resounding success and has attracted international attention, offering insigths into technology, illusion and storytelling and providing new means of teaching film and film production for children and young people.
The FILM-Y set consists of a car, a Morris Minor, which is placed in front of a back projection screen. The crew can choose between four different films for the back projection screen. The car is equipped with microphones, and the set also consists of two editing stations.
Since 2008, FILM-Y has visited London, Damascus, Brussels, Transylvania and other international locations in addition to numerous Danish towns.