THE BACK-TO-SCHOOL ISSUE
Four Columbia College Chicago alumni founded Sweet Void Cinema in 2021 with a goal of creating opportunities for independent filmmakers in Chicago.
Based in Humboldt Park, Sweet Void both produces films and screens work made by local filmmakers. The company also hosts screenwriting workshops every Wednesday, quarterly short film festivals and industry talkbacks for filmmakers at all levels, including current students.
“I would say that if there is a clear mission, it’s to platform and feed this ecosystem of young filmmakers in Chicago,” said Lino Gil, a 2021 Columbia alum and Sweet Void associate.
Sweet Void was founded by Columbia alumni Jack McCoy, Jon Anderson, Jose Perez and Aliya Haq. Other Columbia alumni are involved with the company, including Gil and Jason Nimako, who works as an assistant director.
“We’re making indie projects, usually using people from Chicago,” said Nimako, a 2018 graduate. “A lot of the time it’s just local artists we’re working with.”
Harvey Pullings II, a local filmmaker, has worked with Sweet Void on three projects over five years. His 2022 film, “That Boy Across the Street,” will be screened by Sweet Void in October. The film follows a teenager who discovers an object that allows him to teleport.
Pullings said organizations such as Sweet Void provide an important alternative to an increasingly digital filmmaking culture.
“We’re in an overly-dependent and oversaturated digital culture that conflates filmmaking with content creation,” Pullings said. “I feel Sweet Void and companies of this kind are mandatory for filmmakers, specifically those who are serious about developing this into a career.”
Sweet Void’s Shorts Festival gives local filmmakers another opportunity to have their work seen. The festival accepts films from filmmakers at all levels, with accepted films screened alongside Sweet Void’s own promotional materials.
“At the shorts festival, we have two blocks of films. In between, we have a Q&A,” said McCoy, a 2017 graduate.
McCoy said he typically talks with filmmakers before the festival and uses those conversations to guide the Q&A. “I use what I learned from our conversation for the Q&A as well,” he said.
Sweet Void also hosts an Industry Hobnob, an informal conversation with a guest from the film industry. Gil facilitates the event.
“We have a special guest who’s in the film industry, and basically we just talk,” McCoy said.
Gil initially joined Sweet Void as a contractor doing production design for one of the company’s in-house filmmakers. After working with the team, Gil designed the company’s logo and eventually joined as an in-house designer.
“I was doing production design for one of the in-house people, and I really loved working with the team. After that, they brought me on for the design of the logo, and we just loved working with each other so much that Jack brought me on full time as an in-house designer.”
Sweet Void has also screened work by Columbia alumni, including Michael Glover Smith’s feature film “Hekla.” The film follows a Chicago actress through a day of auditions as she deals with personal challenges. It won Best Director at the Fort Myers Film Festival and the Big Damn Deal Award for Best Performance for actress Elizabeth Stam at the Covellite International Film Festival.
Sweet Void’s next event, The Video Village Shorts Fest, is scheduled for August.
For Pullings, the organization’s value goes beyond screenings and festivals. He said bringing filmmakers together provides something that cannot be replicated through digital platforms.
“Nuance is really important when studying cinema and becoming a filmmaker, and can really only be mastered and understood through communal gathering and interaction,” Pullings said. “Sweet Void Cinema provides that with its screenings, workshops and company culture that puts the importance of being human at the forefront before anything else.”
Copy edited by Antonio Chaves
This story also appears in the Chronicle’s back-to-school issue.
