Projo 7 to 7 News Blog

WARREN, R.I. -- A former Warren man now living in Los Angeles has won a national film contest with the five-minute film he and his college roommate made for their thesis project.

Colin Ferri, 23, and Nabil Abou-Harb, 24, won the $20,000 top prize in Link TV's online film contest with their film Arab in America.

The film takes a comic approach to the difficulties that Arab-Americans face in flying on commercial airlines, getting a job and interacting with Americans suspicious of someone with an Arab name. Abou-Harb has a brother named Osama. His father and uncle have had a hard time getting hired since Sept. 11, 2001.

Ferri is the son of Rosemary Ferri and Stephen Ferri Jr., both of Warren. He and Abou-Harb were roommates at Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah, Ga., from which they graduated in 2007. They shot the film in late 2006, early 2007 as their senior thesis.

"When you make a short film, you send it out to everything under the sun," Ferri said. One contest they entered was the One Nation Many Voices contest for Link TV. They found out last month that they were finalists and on Thursday that they had won.

"It was really surprising," Ferri said. "We really didn't expect to win."

Ferri said they would use the $20,000 to repay their investor, Nick Applegate, a Savannah businessman in construction and real estate. They shot the movie for about $25,000, Ferri said.

Now they're adapting the short into a feature-length screenplay. "We're in the developmental stages of getting it made," Ferri said.

To view the Web site about the short and how they made it, click here.

 Tags  Warren RI

Comments

Christopher Ferreira said:

hey Colin-- Its been a long time sir.. Congratulations on your success!! Thats amazing! You were in a dream i had the other night and you were talking about this film lol; i forget where we were but the scale was EPIC. well i dont know what your plans are but someday we should link up- im still acting and im visiting California this July. ill keep in touch. Major congrats again sir.

Link | April 19, 2009 1:05 PM
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