Cinema grad wins big at TIFF

Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema graduate Kara Blake (BFA 05) won best emerging filmmaker award at the 2011 RBC Emerging Talent Competition, which takes place during the Toronto International Film Festival. Blake, who took home a prize $15,000, won for her film Next of Kin, a film that documents the parallel lives of two sisters surviving a long, cold winter in Montreal.

The RBC Emerging Filmmakers Competition is part of Talent Lab, a four-day intensive program at the Toronto International Film Festival that offers artistic development opportunities to a select group of emerging Canadian and international filmmakers. Each filmmaker is provided with a portable camera, $500 cash and challenged to develop a one to five minute short film for the competition. Each year the films will focus on one topic - the 2011 theme was Family.