People who make documentaries may travel around the world to tell extraordinary stories, but Chris Farina found compelling tales in his own backyard. There’s the documentary called World Peace and Other Fourth Grade Achievements about a gifted teacher who developed a game in which children figure out how to settle disputes and prevent conflicts.
“Welcome to the World Peace Game," says educator John Hunter announces to a class of fourth graders. "I’m very, very sorry, but you’re going to have to have fun today!"
The children groan in mock complaint.
"This is the World Peace Game. It’s a political science simulation," Hunter continues. "The game basically pits four or five countries against each other politically, socially, militarily and economically, and they have to use their imagination to think their way out of these problems that they’re pitched into headfirst.”
The game has gone global, with kids in many countries learning how world peace might be achieved, and the State Department taking a keen interest.
Another film, Seats at the Table, tells how a professor and students from UVA went to a juvenile detention center each week – joining students there to study Russian literature.
“This is a class in which two groups of young people – 18 to 21 – one group from a university, the other from a correctional center, sit down, side by side, and have conversations about life through literature,” says the professor.
“When I walk into that building every Tuesday afternoon, it was like I wasn’t locked up. For the next three hours I could live, be myself,” one student from the correctional center explains.
And soon to come, a film about the Bridge Ministry.
“For years they have been changing and saving the lives of men dealing with serious drug addiction issues,” says filmmaker Chris Farina.
He was in the midst of shooting at the Bridge when he started having trouble breathing. He was hospitalized and diagnosed with ALS – a progressive disease that attacks nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. One year later, he relies on a machine to help him breathe and a wheelchair to get around, but he continues his work – shining a light on inspiring people doing important things.
“It such a positive uplift for me, so in that sense I want to continue doing it,” Farina explains.
And there’s another film in the works – this one on a lighter subject, the old UVA Pep Band – an irreverent group of students who played at football games and mocked the opposition.
“It was like the old Saturday Night Live," Farina recalls. "People weren’t afraid to say things and make fun of things, and I feel like reminding people that it’s okay to do that and have a sense of humor. It’s not a bad thing.”
Farina has funded his films and supported his family through what could be America’s quirkiest parking lot on the Corner, across from UVA.
He hires students from fields like philosophy and anthropology.
“And it was almost like he assembled this ragtag group of fractured poets who were somehow like himself," says one parking lot attendant. "We were certainly capable of great things, but none of us would probably ever achieve it.”
“I think I saw it as a group of unemployable misfits whom he had a gift or a curse of being able to identify and give them a job,” says another staffer.
And now, some of those employees, friends and neighbors feel it’s time to give back. Farina and his wife, Jaqueline Dugery, had health insurance, but Chris requires 24-hour care, and with two kids in college the bills have really added up. So Farina fans have organized a benefit called Farina Fest. They plan to show clips from his films and feature people who appeared in them on November 5th at the Paramount.
