SANTA FE Ð ItÕs day one of the two-week GirlsFilmSchool, and Noelle, Louise and Emily are on a mission: to find and film ugly stuff. Scars, scabs and scaffolding are good, they decide. So are garbage cans and cigarette butts and the bottom of a barbecue grill. Dog poop and a portable toilet are big finds. ÒJust really focus in on the texture of it,Ó suggests 17-year-old Louise Fox of Chico, Calif., as Noelle Sosaya, also 17, of Albuquerque aims a hand-held video camera. The student filmmakers were given a couple hours to choose a theme and prowl the campus of the College of Santa Fe, creating footage to be shown and discussed that night. Louise suggested they film things that are considered ugly, because Òpeople always focus on the pretty stuff.Ó ÒIt just might help our culture if we could find beauty in anything,Ó she said.

The exercise familiarizing them with the camera was the first in a series of classes Ð acting, directing, writing, editing, cinematography Ð designed to give young women a glimpse of career possibilities in the male-dominated film profession. Organizers of the summer program say itÕs unusual among film camps because itÕs restricted to girls. ÒSo often, dealing with technology in mixed-gender classes, the guys just feel more comfortable, and so they tend to take over,Ó said Deborah Fort, who teaches filmmaking at the college and is the programÕs founder and director. ÒIÕd see women who were very competent kind of defer to men Ð neither one of them being conscious of it.Ó

Open to girls who have completed at least 10th grade, the film school has students this summer from California, Arizona, Louisiana, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, Minnesota, Michigan and New Mexico. They live and study through June 28 on the campus of the College of Santa Fe, a private liberal arts school that emphasizes the visual, performing and creative arts. ÒIt helped to build my self-confidence a lot Ð just talking and interacting with people,Ó said Jennifer Kwok, 19, of Taos, who attended the film school last year and returned this year as an assistant mentor. ÒI actually took my skills and made a film of my own (at college), which IÕd never considered doing before,Ó said Kwok, a sophomore at Sarah Lawrence College in New York.

Emily Lindsay, 20, of Rio Rancho, a self-described Òart addict,Ó said she has already made one film with friends Ð a horror-movie spoof Ð and wants to make more. ÒI want to produce them. I want to direct them. I want to act in them,Ó said Lindsay, one of the 19 students attending the school.

Filmmaking is a tough career for women, said Finnish filmmaker and author Helena Lumme, who interviewed 30 women in the industry for her book ÒGreat Women of Film,Ó published this year. ÒThereÕs so many obstacles and roadblocks that unless youÕre completely dedicated, itÕs very hard,Ó Lumme said. ÒThere is discrimination. Although people donÕt admit it openly, the numbers tell a different story.Ó She cited the latest figures compiled by Martha Lauzen, a professor at San Diego State UniversityÕs School of Communication, whose annual report, ÒThe Celluloid Ceiling,Ó tracks womenÕs participation in the 250 top-grossing domestic films. For films in 2001, 6 percent of directors were women, as were 10 percent of screenwriters, 17 percent of executive producers, 25 percent of producers, 19 percent of editors and 2 percent of cinematographers, the report said.

Lumme is making a documentary interspersing interviews with some of the women in her book with interviews with GirlsFilmSchool students. ÒIÕm going to juxtapose the hopes and the dreams of these young women with the reality of the professionals who have already worked for 30 years in the business,Ó she said. Noelle expects to get her GED in September and go to Albuquerque Technical Vocational Institute. I want to do something with photography and film,Ó she said. ÒYou can make anything seem like totally different from what it really is.Ó Louise, who just finished her junior year at Chico High School, said her attraction to filmmaking grows out of a general interest in poetry, music and art. ÒA combination of these things is film,Ó she said.
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