Biola University Cinema & Media Arts junior Taylor Rae’s film, The Old Man and the Ceiling, is an official selection in the 2009 Damah Film Festival. Rae’s film won the award for Best Actor at the 2009 Biola Film Festival.

The Old Man and the Ceiling, one of 12 films in contention for winning the festival, is a drama about a man waking up the day after his wife of 50 years had passed away.

The winner of the Damah Film Festival is calculated by tabulating the totals of online votes and jury votes. Supporters can view and vote for any of the films online. The jurors consist of a group of professionals in the film industry, including Ralph Winter producer of Planet of the Apes, Biola’s own alum Scott Derickson, director of The Day the Earth Stood Still, and Janet Scott Batchler who co-wrote Batman Forever.

The top three films will be awarded on Oct. 3, 2009 in Seattle, WA at the film festival where the first place winner will receive $5,000, second place will be awarded $2,500 and third place will receive $1,000. Voting is open until Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2009.

Damah is a non-profit organization that provides filmmakers the opportunity to share their artistic work that explores the idea of spirituality. Their mission is to encourage filmmakers to voice their views on spirituality through short films. The Damah Film Festival started in October of 2001 and continues to grow as more films are generating topics that deal with human experiences such as spirituality.

For further information on Damah and to vote for Rae’s film, visit www.damah.com .

Written by Jennifer Thach, Media Relations Intern. For more information, contact Jenna Bartlo, Media Relations coordinator, at jenna.l.bartlo@biola.edu or 562.777.4061.