Monache senior Ramses Gomez took home 1st place in his category in the Slick Rock Student Film Festival.
The Slick Rock Student Film Festival Award Ceremony was held in Visalia at the Fox Theater. It's Central California’s premier film competition for middle and high school students in Fresno, Kern, Kings, Madera, Mariposa, Merced, and Tulare Counties. As a program part of the Tulare County of Education, it holds major support from the Tulare County Suicide Prevention Task Force.
The Slick Rock Student Film Festival challenges students to meet industry standards in the technical aspects of film production. The competition is divided into two levels, middle school and high school. Both levels offer a variety of film genres for participation.
Some of these different categories included Blockbuster, Four Minute Short Story, General PSA’s, and Suicide Prevention PSA. Gomez chose to put together a Suicide Prevention PSA. When asked why Gomez shared twhen he started researching suicidal thoughts and depression, he learned of how big of a problem it is and how many people it affects on a daily basis.
“It’s not only the people who are affected by it but their families, friends, and everyone surrounding them,” stated Gomez. Gomez shared how he has had family members that have struggled with this topic, so it felt close to home. “It is a very important topic that doesn't get enough coverage,” shared Gomez.
The Slick Rock Student Film Festival is a yearly event Monache Multimedia and Technology Academy teacher Bobby Styles introduces to the students. Gomez recalled when he first heard about it as a freshman and how he had previously made short films.
Gomez was the only student from Porterville to take him 1st place at the recent festival. Sharing how this was his first time ever winning, Gomez explained how he always is making films for assignments during his MTA class but never for a festival. “It’s the first time where I actually thought, you know what I am actually going to follow through and compete in this,” stated Gomez
Gomez explained the process behind making his Suicide Prevention PSA. Gomez started his video back in September when Styles told him about a different film festival titled the Directing Chang Film Contest. Directing Change is a festival dedicated to PSA’s dealing with mental health. It's for ages 12-25 and sponsored by the state organization, Youth Creating Change.
Completing this film all by himself, Gomez placed second at the Direct and Change Festival. Shortly after he decided to compete in the Slick Rock Student Film Festival.
When asked how he felt winning, Gomez shared how it was a really proud moment for him. “It’s really fun to just participate in, you know they show your film on a big screen, you get to be with all of your friends, they even take you on a limo ride,” shared Gomez, also stating how after he won the award, he felt incredibly accomplished and glad he was able to spread awareness on such an important topic.
“Ramses is one of the best students I’ve had in my nine years of teaching Video Production at Monache High School. As a member of the Multimedia and Technology Academy, Ramses has exhibited an immense amount of creativity and passion during his high school career. We are all proud of him here at Monache, and we can’t wait to see what he does with his limitless potential,” stated Styles.
To watch Ramses’ PSA video, you can find it on the Monache TV YouTube channel. His video is titled “Help A Friend.”
Students from 47 Central Valley schools submitted more than 400 films in this year's Slick Rock Film Festival. Winning films in all categories can be viewed at tcoe.org/SlickRock