By ALI NADERZAD – April 19, 2007

The Tribeca Film Festival was founded in an attempt to revive lower Manhattan after the terrorist attacks of September 11. It’s fair to say that the festival accomplished much more than breathe much-needed life into Tribeca and surroundings: it has helped young filmmakers achieve better exposure. Columbia University’s School of the Arts has been fostering a growing number of such filmmakers, and this year’s Tribeca festival will include three features and seven shorts by Columbians: Blue State (Marshall Lewy) and Normal Adolescent Behavior (Beth Schacter) are two of the features entered. In addition to the traditional film program, a new theory-based film studies curriculum will be inaugurated at Columbia in Fall. Columbia counts people like Richard Pena (Film Society of Lincoln Center), Annette Insdorf (author, producer and previous host of the Cannes Festival’s televised broadcast), and James Schamus (Focus Features) among its faculty. Every year, new films are rolled out at Columbia’s film festival, which takes place at the IFC Film Center and Symphony Space (shown here: Amber Tamblyn in Normal Adolescent Behavior).