Remington Smith
Areas of Interest
- Film Studies and Production
- Horror Films
Educational History
- BA History, University of Louisville, 2008
- MA Film Studies, University of Edinburgh, 2010
- MFA Film & Video Production, University of Iowa, 2014
Academic Background
Remington Smith earned his BA in History from the University of Louisville in 2008. In 2010 he earned an MA in Film Studies from the University of Edinburgh with a thesis on "Unsafe Horrors: A Critical Analysis of Horror Cinema, Torture Porn and the Unsafe Horror Film" and completed a documentary short film, Last Good Thing. Remington earned an MFA in Film and Video Production from the University of Iowa in 2014.
His MFA thesis film, Rubbertown, is now the feature-length documentary of the same name about a woman moving her entire house to another county to escape the environmental hazards of nearby chemical plants. Rubbertown will be released on Amazon and Vimeo for rent/purchase in spring 2018.
His narrative work includes the horror short The Woods which screened nationally and abroad and has earned over 20,000 views on Vimeo. Most recently he directed the narrative short Our Half Acre for the 48 Hour Film Project. It won Best Film, Best Script, and Best Directing, and will go on to represent Louisville at Filmapalooza at Paris, France in March 2018.
When he's not teaching, producing new work or assisting other filmmakers with their films, you can find him reading Stephen King novels, exploring abandoned buildings, and going on long bike rides.
Academic Objectives
Professor Smith makes documentaries and narratives while also acting as producer or cinematographer in collaboration with other filmmakers. His documentaries explore how the past haunts the present as well as investigate social or personal issues creatively. His narrative works use horror or thriller genres to explore psychological and social themes, in particular, race, class, and gender. He creates narratives about characters or communities that receive short shrift from studio films. Recently, he is focused on female driven narratives, and future projects will continue to deal with issues of class and race through an autobiographical lens.