‘Like a condensed film school’

Teens get a movie education with TIFF Next Wave

After a long day of school at Toronto’s Don Mills Collegiate Institute, 17-year-old Winnie Wang’s day is not over yet. She arrives at the Bell Lightbox downtown, skips the box office and heads straight up two sets of escalators to reach the TIFF learning studios on the third floor. Inside, 11 other peers around her age greet Wang. But this isn’t a class. These 12 teens make up the TIFF Next Wave committee — programmers of the city’s biggest film festivals for teens, by teens.

Each year, TIFF selects 12 young film enthusiasts to make up this committee. This year, the theme is “outcasts and misfits.” From Feb. 13 to 15, the Lightbox will host the festival and its events, including a 24-hour film challenge and Q&A panels. Next Wave not only provides a platform for young filmmakers, but also creates a community where coming-of-age films make growing up seem less, well, awkward.

This year, Wang indirectly chose one of the films in the festival, Lily & Kat. TIFF youth programs manager Emily Scheer, who follows Wang on social media, saw her posting about its trailer and decided she would screen it to the committee. It was a hit. Lily & Kat follows two fashion grads and best friends, Lily (Jessica Rothe) and Kat (Hannah Murray), living in New York. The film is the directorial debut of 25-year-old Micael Preysler. “The idea for Lily & Kat came from the feeling of being in post-college purgatory,” says Preysler. “I wanted to capture that anxiety.”

For Preysler, the making of Lily & Kat was a learning experience very much like the one experienced by Wang and her committee members. “Going through that whole shooting process was basically like a condensed film school,” says Preysler, who will also be on the Next Wave talent lab panel.

For Wang, Next Wave has opened new avenues, resulting in her applying to University of Toronto for a double major in human biology — and cinema studies. “I can’t see myself studying something that isn’ t artrelated,” she says.