Lubeck’s class assignment film wins top BAFTA prize

Zoe Lubeck’s “static drawings in motion”

A joyously narrated and illustrated tribute to honor the life of her dog, Lucy, garnered DePaul University graduate student Zoe Lubeck the top U.S. Student Film award at the recent British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) held in LA.

Voting members gave Lubeck’s short the Special Jury Prize, making her one of eight winners out of nearly 800 entries from 89 invited film schools. The awards give students the opportunity to connect with top filmmakers and get directions on their careers.

Chicago native Lubeck, 24, recently finished her first year in DePaul’s three-year Digital Cinema program.  The poignant but charming five minute film, produced in April, 2014, was a class assignment to tell a visual story.

“My dog had just passed away and I knew I wanted to make something to honor her that was fast and to the point,” Lubeck says.

Rather than use photos of Lucy, a West Highland White Terrier, Lubeck asked her roommate, Miden Wood, an illustrator of comics and graphic novels, to freehand her script. Without time to animate, Lubeck opted for “static drawings in motion,” she says. Operating on a thin student budget, she worked with what was close at hand.

Top BAFTA winner Zoe Lubeck“Looking around our apartment, I saw a whiteboard and marker. I had the camera and we added a light,” Lubeck says. She shot a continual two hour take of Wood’s swift and endearing freehanding of the script later that Lubeck later edited to five minutes, speeding and slowing in time with the pace of her words.

Her brother, 26-year-old Charlie Lubeck, scored the short, using a cover of Bob Dylan’s “One Too Many Mornings” for the closing frames. It took Lubeck under two weeks to total completion.

BAFTA judges cited it for its simplicity and use of voice.

Lubeck fell in love with filmmaking after helping friends make a short home movie. “The process of indie filmmaking sparked my interest enough to keep going,” she says.

While loving to write scripts, Lubeck says that she will focus on her role as a director of photography. She’s currently working on two of her own longform film projects. “King Rat”is a coming-of-age story shot at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana and next year she will shoot “On the Beach” a love story of two expats in Greece.

“Lucy” will screen in September at Colorado’s Crested Butte Film Festival. It won the “Audience Choice” at Chicago’s Reel Short Film Festival and showcased at the Vail Film Festival.

After it was posted on Vimeo“Lucy” has won viewers around the world, giving Lubeck’s dog a bit of an eternal and loved life.