The NINTH season of the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival is underway! We had our premiere screening on February 1 in Rochester, NY at the Rochester Museum and Science Center. There we are onstage with some of the young filmmakers after the screening!

Thanks so much to our longtime Rochester sponsors Delta Airlines, the Friends & Foundation of the Rochester Public Library, RIT Magic Spell Studio, Cheshire Audio Visual, and Rochester Community TV for making this possible. Thanks to Johanna Perrin Middle School, Our Lady of Mercy School For Young Women, and Hillel Community Day School for hosting me in the days leading up to the screening.

And thanks especially to Carol White Llewelyn of RCTV and Deb Ross (of our media sponsor, KidsOutAndAbout.com). They’re the ones who really make the wheels turn for the Rochester 90-Second Newbery! And they’re great friends. (Carol’s the one who took all the pictures in this post.)

An extra special thanks to my co-host, legendary author Bruce Coville! It was a privilege to be onstage with him. Our opening skit was all about me losing the Newbery spirit, and then I’m visited by three ghosts, all played by Bruce . . . I think you see where this is going. (I’ll have a video up once I get it, but I wanted to get this post up right away.) And big thanks to Kyle for playing the younger version of me, and Jacyn for playing his friend! The opening skit and the show went better than I could’ve expected, especially since I was still frantically putting the show together late the night before.

The costumes were provided by Stages Theater in Rochester, thanks again to the ever-resourceful Deb Ross. I’m very thankful!

And of course the biggest thanks go to our young filmmakers who actually provided the show! The show featured eight movies created right in the Rochester area (along with six more of this year’s best from around the country). Let’s check out the Rochester movies now!

Eian-Gabriel Sinclair has been making 90-Second Newbery movies for years. Every season I look forward to his elaborate animations and stop-motion masterpieces. Here’s his fifth (!) movie for the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival, an adaptation of the “Garden” vignette from Arnold Lobel’s 1973 Honor Book Frog and Toad Together, in a stop-motion medieval style:

The judges said in part (complete review here): “From the very beginning this movie inspires confidence, with the beautifully drawn titles that even feature animated singing mouths . . . You can really feel the frustration of Toad as he jumps up and down, desperately sings, and flies into a tantrum when the plant won’t grow quickly enough for him. The voice acting is also amazing . . . especially the behind-the-scenes bit at the end, where Frog complains about not getting enough lines — hilarious!”

The RCTV/Writers & Books Camp has also been submitting movies for years. They create theirs in a weeklong summer camp, and not only are the movies always wonderful and idiosyncratic and creative, but everyone always looks like they’re having such a fun time. Check out their version of Kwame Alexander’s 2015 Newbery Medal winner The Crossover:

The review on the 90-Second Newbery website reads (in part), “What a brilliant idea to have this basketball story narrated by two sportscasters! I especially loved how the sportscasters love to drop groan-worthy puns and dad jokes (and how the sportscaster on the right starts to get furious about it) . . . inventive, funny, and yet accurate to the book!”

The second movie made by RCTV/Writers & Books Camp was of Elizabeth George Speare’s 1984 Honor Book The Sign of the Beaver:

As the judges said in part (full review here), “Hilarious and innovative! I love how the Matt character in the book (originally, a Colonial-era boy surviving on his own in a cabin in the wilderness), is here updated to an flashily dressed cool dude, complete with updated slang (“That is so Gucci!”) . . . Great costumes, cinematography, and editing — this movie looks great and the pacing and jokes are tight. Fantastic performances throughout.”

The third movie by the RCTV/Writers & Books Camp is based on Robin McKinley’s 1985 Medal winner The Hero and the Crown:

As the judges wrote in part (full review here), “It was an inspired choice to retell this medieval-style fantasy adventure as a western! The music, costumes, and green-screen sets all worked together splendidly to make it feel authentic . . . I loved the comical details, like the tin-can telephone connected by string, or how certain details from the book (Aerin becoming ill from eating the surka leaves) are transposed into the western idiom (our cowgirl hero becoming ill from some strong moonshine). All the performances were funny and enjoyable, and the script manages to boil down this extremely complex, weirdly structured, very long book into something digestible and understandable.”

Jefferson Avenue Elementary School in Fairport did a great twist on Louis Sachar’s 1999 Newbery Medal winner Holes. They did it in the style of soccer, and it’s called “Goals”:

As the judges said (full review here), “Weird and wonderful . . . instead of prisoners at Camp Green Lake digging holes, it’s a ragtag soccer team kicking goals. The surreal beginning, with the bizarre parents who have decided to make their child into a soccer ball (???), was satisfyingly bonkers . . . All in all, an ingenious re-imagining of the story while still keeping the basic plot. A fun and funny ride!”

The next movie is based on Phyllis Reynolds Naylor’s 1992 Medal winner Shiloh, and it’s by Lily, Geoffery, Nicholas, Madison, and Kaci of Kendall Central Schools. Shiloh is one of those iconic boy-and-his-dog books. So how do these kids make their version special? It’s a brilliant move: by shooting the movie from the dog’s perspective! We overhear the Shiloh’s inner thoughts, and see everything from Shiloh’s point of view (you can even see Shiloh’s snout throughout the whole thing):

As the judges said in part (read full review here), “You really made the most of this idea, especially in the scene where Jud ‘kicks’ the dog, and everything shakes and gets woozy in a convincingly jarring way! I also thought it was inventive how you made Shiloh tremble with fear during the fight scene at night . . . Great performances from the other actors too. An ingenious idea, brilliantly implemented!”

As if to answer this boy-and-his-dog story, Rogers Middle School in Rochester did a stop-motion movie of a girl-and-her-dog story, Kate DiCamillo’s 2001 Honor Book Because of Winn-Dixie:

As the judges said in part (full review here), “The cut-paper puppets were wonderfully drawn, with lots of personality and style—and I loved the way they were animated, especially the moving lips when they are speaking! . . . I like how you used pictures from local places for your backgrounds . . . and the inventive touches like the ‘rain’ effect during the storm, or the careful details like the guitar strumming sound effect.”

I have one more movie I’d like to showcase! It’s from Leo Bernabi School, it’s another animal story—but this time it’s not about a dog, but a silverback gorilla. Yes, you guessed it, we’re talking about Katherine Applegate’s 2013 Medal winner The One and Only Ivan:

As the judges said in part (full review here), “An energetic, resourceful, and fun retelling of the story! I liked the detailed masks that you made for Ivan the gorilla, the elephants Ruby and Stella, and the dog Bob . . . There were a lot of nice touches and details, like the ‘I have an idea!’ light bulb, or how Ivan works with real paints with his finger, or the way the zookeeper smacks Ruby’s cage with his mace . . . Tells the story with style and humor!”

Thanks again for a wonderful time, Rochester! Thanks also to Heather, Steve, David, and everyone at the Rochester Museum and Science Center, as well as Hipocampo Children’s Books for doing the bookselling afterward.

Remember, it’s never too early to start working on next year’s 90-Second Newbery movie. You can turn it in any time, but the deadline will be January 15, 2021. You have nearly a year to create a real masterpiece for our 2021 screening!

By the way, if you enjoyed the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival this year, please consider kicking a few bucks our way. The 90-Second Newbery is always free to submit and to attend, but it does take money to run. And anyway, it’s tax-deductible! Our fiscal sponsor is Fractured Atlas, a non-profit arts service organization.

I’ll leave you with this. I’d be remiss if I didn’t also thank Arthur and Amy, old friends whom I stay with whenever I’m in Rochester. Their hospitality is second to none. One night we went out for sushi and ramen, and we tried to do blind contour drawing of each other’s faces. It came out kind of horrifying . . . and then we tried to contort our faces to look like the drawings . . . and I think some kind of odd synthesis was achieved:

I’m already looking forward to next year, Rochester! You are the bee’s knees.

We rely on community support to keep the 90-Second Newbery going. Please consider making a tax-deductible donation to us here, through our fiscal sponsor Fractured Atlas, a non-profit arts service organization.

The 90-Second Newbery Film Festival is an annual video contest I founded in which kid filmmakers create short movies that tell the entire stories of Newbery-winning books—preferably with a fun twist. For instance, check out the movie above, based on Lloyd Alexander’s 1966 Newbery Honor Winner The Black Cauldron . . . but retold in the style of a Dungeons and Dragons game!

I love the acting, which perfectly portrays the impetuous assistant pig-keeper Taran, the weird-metaphor-spewing Princess Eilonwy, the boastful bard (with lie-detecting harp) Fflewddur Fflam, the cute glutton Gurgi, the bullying Prince Ellidyr, the noble Adaon . . . as well as some fantastic witches, zombies, and a very capable Dungeon Master! You may recognize the actors from their movie last year of The Tale of Despereaux, or of their movie two years ago My Father’s Dragon. This is one of the many movies that’ll be featured in the 90-Second Newbery’s 2020 season.

Okay, okay! I know the above movie is nine minutes long. That’s way too long! But think of the above movie as the extended director’s cut. There is a shorter edit at the end of this post.

Join the fun and make your own movie for the 90-Second Newbery! It’s open to young filmmakers up to 18 years old, and adult help is allowed. The deadline is January 10, 2020, so get busy now! Moviemakers in Minnesota and Colorado have an extended deadline of February 21, 2020. (Need technical help and moviemaking advice? Check out our video resources and how-to guides.)

In 2020 we’ll be screening our film festival in thirteen cities (with possibly more to be added). All of the screenings are FREE (except Seattle)! I’ll put up links to make your reservations in January. For now, save these dates:

Saturday, February 1, 2020
The ROCHESTER, NY screening, at the Eisenhart Auditorium of the Rochester Museum & Science Center (657 East Ave). Hosted by me and author Bruce Coville (My Teacher Is An Alien, Space Station Ice 3, and more). Made possible by our sponsors at Friends & Foundation of the Rochester Public Library, Rochester Community TV, Cheshire Audio Visual, and RIT MAGIC Spells Studios. Onsite book sales by Hipocampo Children’s Books. 2 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Sunday, February 9, 2020
The SAN FRANCISCO screening, at the San Francisco Public Library (100 Larkin Street) in the Koret Auditorium. Hosted by me and author Marcus Ewert (Mummy Cat, Mr. Pack Rat Really Wants That). 2 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Saturday, February 15, 2020
The SAN ANTONIO, TX screening, at the Mays Family Center at the Witte Museum (3801 Broadway St., San Antonio, TX). Hosted by me and author Carolyn Flores (The Amazing Watercolor Fish, A Surprise for Teresita). Made possible by partners at Bexar County Digital Library Bibliotech and the Hidalgo Foundation through the generosity of H-E-B Texas Grocery. Onsite book sales by The Twig Book Shop. 2 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Saturday, February 22, 2020
The BROOKLYN PUBLIC LIBRARY screening, at the Central Library (10 Grand Army Plaza, Brooklyn, NY) in the Dweck Auditorium. Hosted by me and Newbery Honor winner Rita Williams-Garcia (One Crazy Summer). Onsite book sales by Stories Bookshop + Storytelling Lab. 1 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Saturday, February 29, 2020
The TACOMA, WA screening, at the Rialto Theatre (310 S 9th St., Tacoma, WA). Hosted by me and Tacoma’s own Doug Mackey. Onsite book sales by King’s Books. 1-3 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Sunday, March 1, 2020
The SEATTLE screening, at the Children’s Film Festival Seattle 2020 at the Northwest Film Forum (1515 12th Ave., between Pike and Pine). Hosted by me and author Sundee Frazier (the Cleo Edison Oliver series, The Other Half of My Heart, and more). Onsite book sales by Secret Garden Books. 5 pm. Buy your tickets here.

Sunday, March 8, 2020
The CHICAGO PUBLIC LIBRARY screening, at the Harold Washington Library Center (400 S. State Street) in the Pritzker Auditorium. Hosted by me and author Keir Graff (The Phantom Tower). Onsite book sales by Madison Street Books. 1:45 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Saturday, March 14, 2020
The BOSTON screening, at the Boston Public Library in Copley Square (700 Boylston St, Boston, MA). Hosted by me and author Susan Tan (Cilla Lee-Jenkins: Future Author Extraordinaire and more). Onsite book sales by Trident Booksellers and Cafe. 2:30 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Friday, March 27, 2020
The OREM, UT screening, at the Orem Public Library (58 N State St). Hosted by me and author Keir Graff (The Phantom Tower). Made possible by partners at Utah Humanities and the Orem Public Library. 6:30 pm. Make your free reservation here..

Saturday, March 28, 2020 (afternoon)
The SALT LAKE CITY screening, at the Salt Lake City Public Library (210 East 400 South). Hosted by me and author Keir Graff (The Phantom Tower). Made possible by partners at Utah Humanities and the Salt Lake City Public Library. Onsite book sales by Weller Book Works. 1 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Saturday, March 28, 2020 (evening)
The OGDEN, UT screening, at the Treehouse Museum (347 22nd Street, Ogden, UT). Hosted by me and author Keir Graff (The Phantom Tower). Made possible by partners at Utah Humanities and the Treehouse Museum. 6:30 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Saturday, April 4, 2020
The BOULDER, CO screening, at the Boulder Public Library (1001 Arapahoe Avenue). Hosted by me and author Lija Fisher (The Cryptid Catcher). On-site book sales by the Boulder Book Store. 3:00-4:30 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

Saturday, April 25, 2020
The MINNEAPOLIS screening, at the Minneapolis Central Library (300 Nicollet Mall) in Pohlad Hall. Hosted by me and Newbery Medal winner Kelly Barnhill (The Girl Who Drank the Moon). On-site book sales by the Red Balloon Bookshop. 3 pm. Make your FREE reservation here.

These screenings are huge fun. That’s why we consistently draw sold-out audiences of hundreds of folks! Thanks so much to my hilarious, enthusiastic co-hosts for being part of this.

Do you want to bring the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival to your town? Every year we expand into more cities, and I’d love to come to yours! Drop me a line at james@90secondnewbery.com.

Now go out and make your own 90-Second Newbery movies! Remember, the deadline is January 10, 2020. I can’t wait to see what you create!

(Want to ensure I can pull off this weird operation for another year? Please seriously consider donating to us here, through our fiscal sponsor Fractured Atlas, a non-profit arts service organization. All donations are tax-deductible.)

I co-host a podcast about storytelling with my friend Matt Bird. It’s called The Secrets of Story and it’s a companion to Matt’s book and blog of the same name.

Matt’s a great guy! But there’s no getting around it: he is the Moriarty to my Holmes, the Goldfinger to my Bond, the Khan to my Kirk, the Newman to my Seinfeld. Neither of us can survive while the other one lives! And so, as you might expect, I object to some of the storytelling advice of my nemesis.

On our podcast, Matt usually offers some screenwriting/novel-writing wisdom and I’ll disagree with it, or challenge one of the platitudes of writing advice you hear from others (you know—books like Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat, Robert McKee’s Story, etc.). Such guidance often sounds so reasonable, illuminating, even inspiring . . . and yet I’ve found that, by taking them seriously, I’ve become snared in mental traps that drain my creativity and send me into blind alleys. Don’t get me wrong: I’ve found some useful ideas in such books, and Matt’s book is hands-down the best such book I’ve read. You should buy it! It’s good!

Even still . . . while I find the analysis in these books interesting, they derail me when I’m actually trying to create something fresh. For me, a truly new, exciting idea is always going to feel wrong at first. It’s going to break some rule. Otherwise it wouldn’t be new, right? (And only bad people love rules and checklists.)

Anyway, whenever Matt and I record an episode, I usually post about it here on the blog . . . but I just realized I haven’t posted about the last four episodes we’ve recorded! So this’ll be a long post featuring those four podcast episodes. They’re all good episodes! You should listen to them!

Let’s start with Episode 9, “Positive Passivity”:

You always hear the advice, “Don’t have a passive main character! The hero of your story should always be active, pushing every scene forward, constantly making big decisions that affect the world around them!” And I guess that’s true . . . or is it?

Admit it: some of the most famous characters from some of the most beloved stories are pretty passive! Consider Harry Potter, James from James and the Giant Peach, Chihiro from Spirited Away, Bella in Twilight, Charlie in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Meg in A Wrinkle in Time, Arthur Dent in The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Alice in Alice in Wonderland, or many others. These great characters are absolutely not taking the bull by the horns in every scene. In fact, I argue in this episode, these characters are passive by design. Their stories wouldn’t work as well if they were the active, ass-kicking, empowered heroes that misguided storytelling orthodoxy demands. A hero with too much agency is, in fact, alienating! I argue that the hero can be plenty passive at the beginning of the story, as long as their agency increases throughout the story. Indeed there is something appealing about certain kinds of passivity! Matt disagrees at the beginning of the episode, but in the end I bring him around. That’s why this episode, Episode 9, is called “Positive Passivity”, and you can listen to it here:

In the comments section, commenter “Harvey Jerkwater” made this good point:

All of the stories you mentioned—Harry Potter, Spirited Away, Twilight, Alien—they’re about characters being thrown into radically strange worlds or having their regular world radically tipped by strangeness. I think that’s critical to the idea of positive passivity.

Partially this allows the worldbuilding space to happen. We see this Bold New Circumstance through the eyes of someone taking it in. You can’t start mucking with the world until we know what the world is.

Also, the protagonist suddenly taking action and making big choices when he or she has just been hurled into bizarre circumstances would make the hero look overconfident at best, and more likely a buffoon.

If the story is set in a world that’s quickly understood by the reader— e.g., “it’s a diner in rural New York State” or “it’s a temp agency in Liverpool”—then passivity is a storytelling flaw, because we don’t need to be shown that world in excruciating detail to understand its rules. We expect the protagonist also knows its rules and has no reason to be passive while he or she gets the lay of the land.

Passivity in a protagonist is fine if the story has other motors to keep the reader going. Protagonist action is a great engine, but it’s not the only one. However, other motors burn out a lot faster and tend to be more fragile.

Great point, Harvey!

Okay, on to the next episode! Back on Episode 5, Matt and I had author Jonathan Auxier as a guest. Here in Episode 10, Jonathan Auxier returns to the podcast to comment on our last three episodes . . . not only about “positive passivity,” but also my theory about the decline of the hero and the suppressed/hidden side/back half of the Hero’s Journey (Episode Eight, “The Jedi In Decline”), and also my thoughts about the application of OODA loops to storytelling (Episode Seven, “Expectations and OODA Loops”). Jonathan’s comments deepen and enrich those previous three episodes, so it’s probably best to actually listen to those episodes before you listen to Episode 10: More Fun With Jonathan Auxier:

After you’ve listened to this one, I think it’s worth it to look at Matt’s post about it, in which he has some interesting follow-up thoughts.

And now on to Episode 11: Heroic Self-Interest with Geoff Betts. Hoo boy. This is the one in which Matt and I go for each other’s throats.

Special guest Geoff Betts—Matt’s best friend from the old days—joins us to talk about the role of self-interest in characters. Matt has a piece of advice that I think that is totally wrongheaded, reductive, and depressing, which he summed up in his blog post Rule #42: People Only Want What They Want. Basically, Matt claims that characters are only really believable when they’re acting in their own self-interest. I think this is ludicrous, and that it doesn’t cover the full range of human motivation. Geoff happens to be a union organizer, and he brings his own real-world perspective in how to motivate people through self-interest. He also provides a calming influence as Matt and I get more and more furious with each other . . . as the episode goes on, I feel Matt continually redefines “self-interest” is broader and more tortured ways so that it seems to pretty much covers every case.

Anyway, come for the debate, and stay for my idea about a gender-flipped, age-flipped version of Annie, in which Annie is “Andy” (a 35-year-old Will-Ferrell-in-Elf-ish orphan), Daddy Warbucks is a Jojo-Siwa-esque instagrammer and influencer, and Grace is a take-no-crap J.K. Simmons type:

After you listen to the episode, head down to the comments section for some spirited debate. As commentor “Vlad” says, “Usually I think that Matt’s principles have some core insight going for them, and that James’ counter-examples are chipping away at the edges to refine the principle; but in this case, James is 100% right.” In your face, Bird!

That brings us to the final episode I want to feature today, Episode 12: Hollywoodization.

In this episode, we talk about the book-to-movie adaptations of Jeff Van Der Meer’s Annihilation, Philip K. Dick’s Minority Report, and Philip K. Dick’s We Can Remember It For You Wholesale (which was made into the movie Total Recall). Matt and I agree that Annihilation doesn’t fully succeed, we completely disagree about Minority Report (I loved it, he hated it), and we agree again about the bulletproof gloriousness of the 1990 Schwarezenegger version of Total Recall. Listen here:

In this episode, Matt cut much from our discussion of Annihilation. One of the things I meant to mention was that I feel that one of the elements horror movies often need to succeed is to have a “Game Over, Man!” person who is the audience surrogate for fear.

One of the reasons that Annihilation (the movie) didn’t work so well for me was that every character was so infuriatingly calm! The Gina Rodriguez character Anya came closest to being visceral and real, but all the other characters were just so professional or chilly or abstracted that there was no place for the audience’s reptile impulses to go.

In many horror movies (especially ensemble pieces), there needs to be a character who just up and says “This is nuts! What are we even doing here?” early on, and/or who acts as the audience’s lowest impulses (cowardice, lust, fear, appetite, whatever) that can ground the story.

In Aliens it’s Bill Paxton’s Hudson character who loudly proclaims his exasperation and cowardice: “Well that’s just great! That’s just great man! . . . That’s it man, game over man, game over!”

In Alien, Yaphet Kotto’s character Parker serves that role. In this year’s Midsommar, Will Poulter’s character Mark plays that role (he’s the horny jerky grad student friend who pees on the sacred tree) – he’s the most cowardly, the most directed by his base impulses. But we need that person as a release for the audience, somebody whom the audience could look at and say: “Well, if I were in that situation, maybe I wouldn’t be the bravest or cleverest person in the world, but I wouldn’t be as bad as that guy.”

That crucial “Game Over, Man!” person doesn’t exist in Annihilation– all the ladies on the team are such competent professionals, and so therefore we can’t help but feel a little distant from their adventures. Annihilation is, at least on some level, a horror movie–but horror is a primal emotion, so we need other primal emotions stoked too, or at least acknowledged, because they’re all stickily and messily and inextricably kludged together. Annihilation tries to be a POLITE, ARTY horror movie . . . and even though on balance I did enjoy it, it was not as successful as it could have been because base desires/emotions/thoughts were not given proper outlet.

And that’s that! Four podcast episodes. Four spirited arguments. If you liked these episodes, I recommend you listen to them all! After all, there are only twelve of them! And seriously, Matt’s book is good (even taking into account my disagreements). Do yourself a favor and buy it.