POPPY JASPER ROCK MORGAN HILL MOVIE

I want to hear as many as I can. Reduces guilt, brings consolation, and removes fear of the future. “That’s why we’re here as a film festival, to lift up independent voices. Last year saw the fest return to physical theaters-and even had its highest-ever attendance rate of filmmakers, some 300 directors, writers, actors and cinematographers traveling to South County for the event. After some scrambling, Scariot managed to screen a fortnight of films online for the 2021 edition. When the pandemic hit in 2020, it came just three weeks before screenings were supposed to begin. Of course, recent years have provided no shortage of challenges for the humble fest. On Monday, the festival presents an Icon Award to producer/writer/designer Lupe Valdez, co-founder of Teatro Campesino, honoring her lifetime of contributions to film and stage. Included among this year’s list are works by filmmakers from San Jose, Salinas, Gilroy and Menlo Park. Filmmaker Lane Michael Stanley, director of Addict Named Hal, which won last year’s Best Narrative Film award, returns this year with the short film Boifriend, about the complex ways parents sometimes only partially accept their gay and trans youth. This year’s marquee films include Pinball: The Man Who Saved the Game, a biopic about the fateful single pinball shot that allows us to legally play pinball today, and Bolan’s Shoes, which explores the joys of glam rock and is directed by acclaimed Welsh actor Ian Puleston-Davies. “I needed to show people what this festival could look like, something that had a little more Hollywood to it.” “I knew I needed the Granada,” Scariot says. Once funded with a purse of only $1,200, the festival now spans five cities, with Morgan Hill’s Granada Theatre as its homebase. In 2019, a year after she took over, it had grown to 3,000. In 2016, attendance had dropped to only 300 people. Since taking over, Scariot’s directorship has seen Poppy Jasper blossom.

Suddenly, there was no one to tell her her ideas were too big. That is, it wasn’t-up until a board meeting where the last remaining board member and treasurer both quit. “When I would talk about my ideas, I was told, that’s just not how we do things.” “I think my ideas were too big,” she says. In the early days, she found her ideas were often at odds with management. It seems her wild imagination hadn’t gone away. When she became aware of the local festival in South County, she naturally volunteered.

POPPY JASPER ROCK MORGAN HILL MOVIE

“I remember, 10 years old, seeing a movie poster, and I knew I didn’t want to be an actress, but I would look at all the names below and all the jobs there. Movies and music was a place you could just disappear,” she says. “I grew up in Gilroy pretty bored and had a wild imagination. A lifelong film fan, as a kid, she had felt instantly transported to the far-off places displayed on the movie posters in her local rental store. Scariot first became involved with the fest as a volunteer in 2011. Though the station didn’t survive, the festival quickly outlived its original goals, becoming a source of pride locally and a valuable opportunity for young filmmakers internationally. Poppy Jasper (named after a gemstone native to the Morgan Hill region) began in 2004 as a fundraiser for local public access station MHAT. “It was because nobody else wanted it,” she says with a laugh. She is humble when describing her ascension to festival director. Since 2018, Poppy Jasper has been run by Mattie Scariot. The fest rolls out Wednesday with a student filmmaker day, then flickers through days themed around local filmmakers, women filmmakers, films from Mexico and LGBTQI+ films, culminating next Wednesday with a showcase of films from Iran.

This Wednesday, Poppy Jasper returns with 260 films from 30 different countries around the world, all screening across Morgan Hill, San Martin, Gilroy, Hollister and San Juan Bautista. Last year, MovieMaker magazine included the fest in their list of 20 Great Film Festivals for First-Time Moviemakers. Increasingly, it is becoming recognized for its role providing up-and-coming filmmakers an early shot. She is, however, the director of the Poppy Jasper International Film Festival.įor one week each spring, PJIFF turns humble little Morgan Hill and the greater South County area into something of a cineaste’s retreat. Sometimes people ask Mattie Scariot if she is Poppy Jasper.

Poppy jasper rock morgan hill