Newbery Film Festival: Chicago Style

As part of the third American Writers Festival, which took place all day on Saturday, June 7, CLHOF teamed up with James Kennedy to highlight young filmmakers's short adaptations of Newbery award-winning books The 90-Second Newbery Film Festival is an annual video contest in which young readers create short movies that tell the entire stories of their chosen book. At the AWF, Kennedy curated a selection of the best past entries. The young filmmakers's takes on Madeline L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time, Arnold Loebel's Frog and Toad Together, Lois Lowry's The Giver, and Richard C. O'Brien's Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH were among those screened. Some of the films were family collaborations, such as the take on George Speare's Sign of the Beaver, in which an off-camera father takes exception to the dearth of beavers in the story and the son helps brainstorm ways to correct the misnomer.  

James Kennedy is the author of Bride of the Tornado, which the Chicago Tribune named one of the "Top 10 Books of 2023." James' other novels include Dare To Know, which was named by the Times Saturday Review as their "Best Sci-Fi Book of 2021," and the young adult fantasy The Order of Odd-Fish. He also hosts the Secrets of Story podcast with Matt Bird. Find him online at http://www.jameskennedy.com.