2:00 PM - 6:00 PM
Come watch climate short films selected by the 2024 Climate Film Festival, the largest festival of its kind in New York City. Films will be screened throughout the day, each followed by a special panel.
6:00 PM - 7:00 PM
“Reel Impact: Bringing Climate Films to Life”
Learn from impact producers, programmers, and filmmakers about the ecosystem of filmmaking today - from fundraising, to distribution, to production, to programming.
Jesse Tendler (Panelist): Jesse R. Tendler is an artist, filmmaker, curator, and educator. Jesse directs and produces a diverse range of projects, including short & feature length narrative fiction films, episodic projects, music videos, commercials, documentaries, theatre, and educational content. Past films (Frankie, Deadbeat, Leaving Circadia, Family On Board, 16mins) have won Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, and Audience Choice awards at various film festivals, including being selected for consideration by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for the 2016 Oscars. Jesse is an award-winning, critically acclaimed professional actor and former child star with 4 decades of experience in film & TV. In addition, Jesse is the Episodics Programming Director for the Lighthouse Int’l Film Festival, a screener for SXSW (since 2018), Festival Coordinator for the Ceres Food Film Festival, a panelist/judge for the Roosevelt Island Film Festival, and Programming Director for the Climate Film Festival. He is also a freelance script doctor and a professional photographer and videographer. A graduate of UPenn’s Management & Technology Program, Jesse earned dual B.S.E. degrees in Entrepreneurial Management & Marketing (Wharton) and Materials Science & Engineering (research focus: renewable clean energy technology). He is passionate about filmmaking, clean energy tech, artistic expression, education, the environment, social justice, and human rights.
Links: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0854911/ and https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessetendler/
Neal Ludevig (Panelist): You know me, but in relation to this event, my expertise is in producing festivals, producing films (directing, script supervising, and producing), and programming events on the festival circuit, as well as raising money. Also, in addition to helping put on MOTF (and now a bit of OG), Snarky is set to co-produce a mental health film festival in the spring.
Neal Ludevig is a producer, director, and entrepreneur credited across fiction and nonfiction. He is most known for producing the 50th Year Anniversary of Black Woodstock (connected to the “Summer of Soul” documentary), the Winter Jazz Fest concert w/Maurice Brown and Anderson .Paak (on Quincy Jones’ Network), the acclaimed mini-series “Insomnia”. He was awarded the Rainin Grant by SFFilm, was a finalist for the 2022 Sundance Producers Fellowship, a top 10 finalist for the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival's "Untold Stories" competition, and won the 2023 LES Film Festival's "Stay Indie" Project. He is a founder of Snarky Elephant Productions, hosts the acclaimed podcast "Leave Looking Up", and is the Executive Producer for the Revive Big Band’s 1st album, a 20+ piece big band led by the current MD for Ms. Lauryn Hill. In the world of climate, he is an advisory board member of the Marketplace of the Future, and a NYC Hub Steering Committee member at Oceanic Global, currently co-producing its 2025 Short Film Festival, and was selected as a 2024 Protect.Blue Wavemaker.
Neal is a Grammy member, was named an Emerging Leader by the Association of Performing Arts Presenters (APAP, awarded a Congressional Proclamation for his work via Harlem Arts Festival, and helped launched the national CPG company Enlightened. He is most passionate about projects connected with climate, music, and mental health.
Links: https://www.instagram.com/misternealio/ | https://www.instagram.com/wearesnarky | https://www.nealludevig.com/ | https://www.snarkyelephant.com/
Nyasha Laing (Panelist): You know her, but when it comes to impact producing, distribution, marketing, etc, this is her. A filmmaker herself too.
Nyasha Laing is a seasoned impact strategist who brings experience as a documentarian, international lawyer, and cultural practitioner into her innovative work to drive inclusion and transformation through storytelling. She has worked with award-winning artists and intergovernmental, academic, and cultural institutions in over 10 countries. Nyasha’s independent storytelling has been featured in dozens of film festivals and on public television and radio. She is a graduate of Yale University and NYU School of Law.
Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nyashalaing/ | https://www.instagram.com/nyashalaing/ | https://redowlpartners.com/
Jendayi Omowale (Moderator): A snarky 2023 cohort member, climate journalist, and documentary filmmaker.
Jendayi Omowale is a Caribbean-American journalist and filmmaker interested in examining the intersections of popular culture and power structures. Just like a dog with a bone, she is relentlessly chipping away at the “why?” behind social phenomena — it leads her to some interesting places. Following thinkers like Saidiya Hartman, her work centers around the need for critical fabulation when combating cultural erasure and entrenched inequality within the existing historical archive. She graduated from the University of Cambridge with her MPhil in World History and was named a CDH Associate for her work in digitization and online archival methods as decolonial praxis in cultural heritage. She received her Bachelor’s in Journalism and Dramatic Literature with a minor in History, and was chosen to be Class Representative for NYU’s Class of 2021 graduation. She has been nominated twice for Hearst Awards by the NYU Journalism department, once for her photo essay of the university’s profile, another for her multimedia documentary focusing on gentrification’s effects on the hair industry. Along with being a photographer and filmmaker, Jendayi has worked for over four years as a journalist, including writing for the likes of Teen Vogue and them. Currently, she runs an award-winning documentary series about Black artists and art history in New York called BlackArrogance! which was chosen for the 2024 Snarky Incubator Cohort, awarded an NYU Diversity Reporting Grant, IMDb-qualifying Onyko Films Award, Best Documentary at 2021 NYC Webfest and officially selected for the Berlin Lift-off Film Festival and Miami Webfest.
Links: https://www.jendayiomowale.com/ | https://www.linkedin.com/in/jendayi-omowale-337647161