Free Kids Film + Sponsorship | Chattanooga Film Festival

We have watched the Chattanooga Film Festival (CFF) evolve over the years with great delight. From the early days when we made a grant to support Mise En Scenesters and their sorely needed new projector, to current times being referred to as “The Sundance Of The South”.  

This year we’re stepping up to sponsor a script reading and also sponsoring a FREE KIDS FILM for all who care to join in our community.  Scripts Gone Wild: Flash Gordon will sell out again this year, and it's hilarious. Here's what's going to happen, an unsuspecting (or entirely suspecting) group of filmmakers will hold a script and a spirit while reading the science-fiction classic, Flash Gordon. Drunken debauchery you will want to witness.

This is the first year the festival will have a few kids films. We're making one of them free! From Directors Patrick Imbert and Benjamin Renner, THE BIG BAD FOX AND OTHER TALES.  Teaser, a Fox that thinks it’s a chicken, and a Duck who wants to replace Father Christmas.  Playing Saturday, April 7th at 10 am. Reserve tickets now.

Let's Marvel at Black Panther | Tyner Middle School

Let’s face it, enhancing a 7th-grade class curriculum with a major motion picture can be a LOT of fun.  Especially when all 145 kids get to go at once.  Tyner Middle School's racial diversity is made up of approximately 74% African American; 21% Hispanic; and 5% White/other. The film of Black Panther and its release is one of the most important blockbusters for all people, but most importantly for the students at Tyner!

Michelle Dunn, a teacher at Tyner Middle, developed a #BlackPantherChallenge curriculum that included pieces of research, texts, information, and analyzed them together through Socratic Seminars and small group discussions. Then, by going to see the Black Panther movie together as a community, every child was able to discuss the issues presented in the curriculum, make deeper connections within themselves, and each other. And don't forget, when children feel empowered by their own culture, race, beliefs, and history; we see a better well-rounded human, thus a better community. Our community.

Update: Due to discounted movie tickets and overall thriftiness, our $1,870 grant will have a larger impact. A Wrinkle in Time will be studied school-wide and a movie trip again!

Shelter When Shelter Ends | Chattanooga Community Kitchen

Do you have a place to lay your head tonight? Over 600 Chattanoogans don't.  No person living in Chattanooga should go without a roof over their head, even if it is the thin roof of a tent with a tarp draped over it. Our $3,500 grant will provide 113 3 person tents with tarps and 500 ponchos to the Chattanooga Community Kitchen.

The Cold Weather Warming Shelter housed at the Chattanooga Community Kitchen will end in mid-March as the weather warms. The shelter currently averages about 100 people per night. On extremely cold nights, as many as 150 people are looking for a way out of the elements. The goal is to provide a tent and a tarp to everyone who leaves the shelter in the spring so they aren't without any shelter. Done.