East Palestine is still grappling with the effects of last year’s train derailment, which spilled 39 million gallons of toxic chemicals and touched off an ongoing recovery. The organizer of the first East Palestine Environmental Film Festival said he wants “to bring hope” out of that tragedy.
Robert Corna grew up in Northeast Ohio before spending the past three decades in the film industry in New York, California and Italy. He returned to Cleveland to be closer to family just before the train derailment on Feb. 3, 2023. Exactly one year later, he’ll be at the Main Street Theater in Columbiana from 2-6 p.m., spotlighting features and shorts from around the world. As a documentarian, the idea came to him while he was filming the aftermath of the derailment.
“Then I realized, there’s so many other people that were also doing documentaries on it,” he said. “I kind of was like, ‘Do I really want to be competing?’ It's not a competition.”
Instead, he was inspired by the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City, launched after the September 11 attacks to help revitalize the neighborhood in Lower Manhattan. Corna has attended Tribeca, Cannes, Sundance and other festivals for two decades. He also founded the Hilltop Film Festival of Diversity and Inclusion while teaching at Birmingham-Southern College in Alabama in 2020.
“I thought, ‘This film festival maybe could bring people, or at the very least attention, back to the area but in a more positive way,’” he said. “Instead of political rallies and panels and town halls, something artistic that people can enjoy instead of just feeling the negative.”
Corna said most of the submissions are about the environment and its preservation. He hopes audiences are inspired to appreciate film but also the natural world.
“Some people will go just to enjoy the movies,” he said. “Some might get inspired and want to do something on their own or do something in their hometown.”
As of Jan. 24, only two submissions were specifically tied to the East Palestine derailment. He expects many more will be completed in time for next year’s festival. The deadline for submissions is Jan. 31.
