Photos by Audrey Clark
“I love being able to connect with a place that has s
o much love for movies,” said Film & Media Arts student Audrey Clark, who has spent the last semester in Cannes, France, studying at the Université Côte d’Azur as part of a U study abroad program. “The richness in history in Europe is unbelievable!”
The Université Côte d’Azur (UCA) program was born out of a partnership between professionals on the Côte d’Azur campus and the Department of Film & Media Arts. “This exchange opportunity is the product of several years’ worth of discussions between UCA and the U about collaborating.” said Andrew Patrick Nelson, Ph.D., Chair of the Department of Film & Media Arts. “We already send many students to Korea each year, so this was a natural extension of our existing study abroad efforts.”
UCA is located on the French Riviera, or Côte d’Azur, the coastline on the southeast corner of France bordering the Mediterranean Sea. Participating students take a full load of classes and are immersed as full-time students on UCA’s George Méliès campus in Cannes — home to the Cannes Film Festival, largely considered to be the most prestigious film festival in the world. Dr. Nelson notes that, with this new inclusion of Cannes, U Film students can experience three of the world’s major film festivals: Sundance in Utah, Busan Film Festival in Korea with the U Asia campus, and now Cannes.
Opened in 2021, the campus was specifically created to support what the French call “the Seventh Art” — filmmaking. “Our campus has a movie theater that can play student films for testing/display, a sound mixing studio with high-tech equipment to be able to mix your movies in Dolby Atmos format, as well as a huge theater next door that plays mainstream movies to the public,” said Clark.
Susie Park, another film student, says they have two class sessions per day, each 2-3 hours long. “The classes we take are screenwriting, European cinema, and sound design,” said Park. The sound design course also includes some music composition, which was new to Clark. “It’s something I’ve never done before, but am loving more and more as time goes by!” she said.
During the week, Park says she and her classmates have established a pleasant routine. “An average day so far looks like us going to class, grocery shopping after school, cooking dinner, and watching a film together,” said Park.
Clark, meanwhile, explores the local cuisine and scenery a bit more: “A typical day for me starts by visiting a French bakery for a coffee, and then I’m off to school!” she said. “After school, you can find me studying with my friends at a cafe, reading on the beach (which is only a block away from our housing), or finding a new museum to discover.”
Indeed, getting to experience the legendary beauty of the French Riviera and the wealth of culture available in France has been a highlight of the program. Clark has especially appreciated all the art and history nearby. “My teachers have linked certain emotions created by a film to emotions evoked by European paintings that are hundreds if not thousands of years old,” she said. As a bonus, Clark can then go see that art herself. “Museums are also usually free for students, and there is a lot of art worth checking out in France,” she said.
There’s also time to travel to other places in Europe. “So far, we’ve visited Nice, Paris, Milan, Verona,” Park said. Though, for Park, her experience of Western culture in Cannes has already been very foreign, as she comes from the University of Utah Asia campus in Incheon, South Korea. “There’s been lots of culture differences to adjust to,” she said. “For example, in Korea there are lots of places and people working 24/7. However, in Europe they close early, and sometimes don’t work on the weekends. Also, on a sidenote, there are lots of dogs in Cannes!”
Park points out that her experience coming from the U Asia campus has made the study abroad opportunity even more interesting. “I don’t think it’s very common for a group of students from one school, but two campuses, come together in a different country to study filmmaking,” she said. “I now enjoy my company with my old and new friends.”
“This experience has helped me as a filmmaker by exposing me to a new environment filled with a love and pride for film,” said Clark. And she agrees with Park that her new friendships make it that much better. “I love being able to connect with the other students here who have different interests than me and with a place that has so much love for movies.” ▪