The Festival may be known for its world-class film selections, killer parties, legendary wine and food, and indulgent hospitality; but what truly motivates our team throughout the year is giving back through our community-based Education & Outreach Programs. Our passion is to expose students to films, filmmakers and subjects that open the conversation about critical, relevant and timely issues by screening and discussing socially-conscious films.
Each year our goal is to increase the number of students’ lives we touch, and the intensity of that positive impact. We have done so from our inception with our ever-expanding Filmmakers-in-the-Schools program, and an all-day student field trip, called INSPIRE. With bothprograms, students (and their teachers) have the opportunity to watch horizon-expanding and motivational films, and then to engage in open discussions with the filmmakers in their classrooms during the week of the festival.
This year, with our second annual INSPIRE student field trip, we will bring 1,200 middle and high school students to the Napa Valley 
Performing Arts Center at Lincoln Theater on November 10 to screen two inspirational films and F R E E (a documentary following five at-risk teens through a year in an Oakland dance program at Destiny Youth Arts).
Landfillharmonic is the inspirational story of the Recycled Orchestra of Cateura, a Paraguayan musical youth group of kids that live next to one of South America’s largest landfills. This unlikely orchestra plays music from instruments made entirely out of garbage. The film is a testament to the transformative power of music and the resilience of the human spirit.
NVFF, a registered 501c3 non-profit organization, is currently seeking financial support to bring 24 members of the youth orchestra, their chaperones and the director of the film from Paraguay to provide opportunities for them to perform in Napa Valley. A portion of the orchestra will play at the INSPIRE 2015 screening of Landfillharmonic, and the entire orchestra will play at a featured screening on NVFF Opening Day, Wednesday, November 11. Air and ground travel, accommodations, per diems and Artists Fees (money that goes back to the communities and families in Paraguay) must be covered as part of the contract with the Recycled Orchestra.
We encourage everyone to join us for this year’s fifth annual Napa Valley Film Festival and get involved. Read about all of our hard-hitting documentaries, beautiful narratives, quirky and thought-provoking shorts, big awards season screenings, celebrities attending (e.g., Kelly Preston and John Travolta), and so much more on our website at nvff.org .
Watch the Landfillharmonic Trailer here and the segment 60-Minutes did on The Recycled Orchestra chronicled here.
Learn more about NVFF here.
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Marc Lhormer is the Founder and Executive & Artistic Director of the Napa Valley Film Festival. Marc is a native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and a graduate of Yale University. After working for Bain & Company right our of college, Marc moved west to get his MBA from Stanford Business School. Marc has worked for a variety of for-profit and non-profit startups, most notably starting the youth leadership development program City Year in Seattle. Marc’s other half Brenda Lhormer is a Bay Area native who went to Stanford and then worked at Oracle and Microsoft before joining Marc in their mid-life identity crisis as film people. Together they produced the hit indie film BOTTLE SHOCK which led to the crazy idea to create the Napa Valley Film Festival, now celebrating its fifth season, November 11 – 15, 2015.
