Cyborg love story garners 3rd MovieFest win for IU student

Gesumino Aho-Rulli never even considered pursuing film until he took Introduction to Design and Production in the IU telecommunications department.

Now, the fifth-year senior, is the three-time reigning champion of IU’s Campus MovieFest competition.

“Film has always been something my family’s shared as a common bond,” he said.
When he was growing up, Aho-Rulli said his father had a large movie collection and loved television, but no one he knew worked in the film industry. At IU, Aho-Rulli realized that was how he could do what he really hoped to do.

“What I really wanted was to tell stories,” Aho-Rulli said.

So he created a major. Aho-Rulli is studying 2-D and 3-D film and television direction through the Individualized Major Program because, he said, IU’s film courses are spread out between departments, making it difficult to truly study the craft.

But what interests Aho-Rulli most about film is the collaboration that takes place to create a story.

“‘Sparks’ couldn’t have been possible without the other people involved,” he said about this year’s winning Campus MovieFest film. “Being able to collaborate with other students here is what drove that desire over the years.”

“Sparks” is about two cyborgs that fall in love after they each receive a heart. In five minutes it tells a story of freedom and unrequited love. It was filmed by Ed Wu and produced by Sophie Parkison and Chelsey McKrill.

Aho-Rulli said he got the idea from a recent interest in robots.

“I get kind of enamored in things,” he said. “This summer I was on this cyborg robot kick, so I guess I just got the idea.”

“Sparks” is the third Aho-Rulli film to win IU’s Campus MovieFest. It will also air in May at the Cannes Festival in France.

Now, Aho-Rulli is working with N’Ovation Productions, a student group he formed, to create what he calls a “modern fairy tale mafia” film.

“The fairy tale characters will kind of exist within this modernized world,” he said. “Since no one’s paying us to make this we can be as creative and outlandish as
possible.”

In all of his films, Aho-Rulli said he tries to focus on social themes he thinks are important and express them creatively.

“We try to make what we call socially responsible films,” he said. “We try to find creative ways to promote social responsibility.”

N’Ovation Productions’ 2010 Campus MovieFest film, “Giggles,” was about child abuse, but the film portrayed the topic creatively using an imaginary friend.

After he graduates and finishes the fairy tale film, Aho-Rulli said he wants to go to Hollywood and work within the studio system.

“My dream is to be a creative director in a sort of Vegas-style stage show like Cirque du Soleil,” he said.

But he said his more realistic hope is to find a job in the studio system creating films.
“As long as I can tell stories, I’ll be happy,” he said.