LightHouse Films Celebrates Awards With Two Exciting Directors

As the 2016 film festival season continues to unfold, the 8-year-old full service creative production and post boutique LightHouse Films, led by Partner/EP Thibaut Estellon, is emerging as a company to watch with two buzzed-about films by directors on their roster, including director Charlie Mysak’s “Best Emerging Director” win at the One Screen Film Festival (part of The One Club the world's foremost non-profit organization for the recognition and promotion of excellence in advertising) for his documentary short “New Heights,” which spotlights the work of the New York-based community organization of the same name and the positive role it played in the lives of three young New Yorkers.

“You not only see and feel the emotion in Charlie’s work, you sense a unique personality and strong artistic sense,” Estellon says. “He’s directing with his guts and feelings. In a crowded sector popularized by the explosion of branded content projects, it’s refreshing to see a young director showing human feelings and beauty in a true genuine and effective manner.”

In addition, LightHouse Films Director Camille de Galbert’s experimental short film “SIMON” has to date been screened at over 30 film festivals around the world, winning Best Film and Best Experimental at the Miami International Short Film Festival, Miami, FL; as well as Best Experimental Film at Malibu International Short Film Festival, Malibu, CA, Big Mini Media Film Festival, Brooklyn, NY and Women’s Independent Film Festival, Los Angeles, CA. It also earned Best Narrative Short Film at the Blow Up Experimental Film Festival, Chicago, IL.

Mysak Achieves “New Heights”:
For Mysak, his interest in making the short documentary “New Heights” coincided with learning about the New York-based youth-development organization that uses basketball to engage young men and women, and provide them with access to educational opportunities. 

“I came across this organization, and I was into their activism and message,” Mysak says. “The story was inherently there, and I wanted to showcase that.”

The narrative of “New Heights” is told through a montage of moving images showing the day to day lives of three struggling young people, coupled with a voiceover of each talking about the challenges they faced and how the New Heights program helped them reach their full potential. Two of the film’s subjects currently have careers in professional sports while the third is a graduate student.

“I felt it would be more impactful to see them as kids rather than just hear it in voiceover,” Mysak adds. “One of the biggest challenges was finding the right balance between subtle moments and impactful ones, suggesting certain moments visually without being melodramatic. It was about being real, and I think that approach paid off.”  

“SIMON” Sees Festival Wins:
Equally compelling yet markedly different is LightHouse Films’ Director Camille de Galbert experimental short film “Simon.” Known for her truly unique sensibility and approach to filmmaking, which combines elements of contemporary art, dance, performance work and experimental video art, de Galbert previous work was closer to the contemporary art circuit rather than the movie industry. That’s changed with “SIMON.”

Part one of her three-part “Aria Series,” “SIMON” is a powerful and provocative short that abstractly tells the story of a performer’s final entry onto the grand stage, only to be plagued by his own inner demons. In addition to showcasing de Galbert own impressive filmmaking skills, “SIMON” brings well-deserved attention to the film’s star Simon Courchel, a well-known performer on the experimental dance scene; the cinematographer Michael Belcher; and the music of Alexander Balanescu.

“I wasn’t looking for a specific message when writing and directing this film,” de Galbert says. “Through ‘SIMON,’ I tried to express a feeling, a state of mind, an inside-outside passage between dream and reality. I wanted to explore a part of our collective subconscious. It is what I want people to remember. Each viewer will react differently, there are several levels of interpretation for this film.”

Future “SIMON” screenings will be at the New Jersey Film Festival, New Brunswick, NJ on February 13 and at the Manchester Film Festival, Manchester, England on March 5, with others to follow throughout 2016.