Cockroaches, Hidden Worlds, Dancing to Agatha Christie, and Forgotten Children are among Highlights of New Jersey Film Festival in September (Excerpt)

Now in its fourth decade, the New Jersey Film Festival returns to Rutgers University in New Brunswick for its 41st bi-annual festival. It is a hybrid festival again as they are presenting it online as well as doing select in-person screenings in Voorhees Hall on the Rutgers University campus in New Brunswick. All of the films in this article will be available both in-person and online.

"All the films we are screening at the Fall 2022 New Jersey Film Festival are special as they went through a rigorous judging process, but I personally really enjoyed Charly Santagado's experimental dance feature Soldier Island which is based on Agatha Christie's mystery novel And Then There Were None,” said Rutgers University Professor Albert G. Nigrin, the Executive Director/Curator for the New Jersey Film Festival. “It is shot in the Drake House in Plainfield and at the Jersey Shore too. I like Charly's quirky sensibility.”

Soldier Island will be screened on Friday, September 23 along with the short films Cabeco - a short film about a passionate Argentine Tango dance fantasy; and Howl - an experimental film by Martin Del Carpio and Martin Gerigk.

Charly Santagado is a co-founder and Artistic Director of mignolo dance in Metuchen. She is a dancer and choreographer whose work has been produced at more than twenty venues around the tri-state area. Her short experimental film Mise En Abyme was named Best Experimental Film in the Spring 2022 New Jersey Film Festival.

Soldier Island is shot in a myriad of styles. It starts with a dancer moving in the darkness and then we see someone turn the pages of Agatha Christie’s novel. From there it moves into live action with one woman awakening from her slumber. Before long there are two, then three - all shown in different screens like on a Zoom call. The film increasingly adds more and more screens with people in their own little world. Watching the screens increase is a very interesting experience. It’s probably unlike any film you’ve ever seen as they interpret Agatha Christie’s story in a truly unique way.

The film features 10 dancers to represent the 10 main characters of the novel and was recorded inside The Drake House. Because they were unable to rehearse together in the same room (due to much of the creation period taking place during the height of COVID), each dancer has their own film within the film and lives (with some exceptions) within their own video box. Some of the dancers never even met in person, and this reflects both the new possibilities unlocked by these exceptional times and just how stratified our world has become.