Well, I think it’s safe to call our first film festival a smashing success. There was a great turn out and we had standing room only for both the 7:30 and 9:30 shows. That means we had somewhere between 160-180 people view the films and both crowds were good and rowdy, just the way I likes ’em. We screened 18 films, not counting any of the introductions or exit animations and the festival was approximately an hour and 45 minutes long.
We’re debating some sort of encore presentation or perhaps a dinner and a movie night at the Silverbow so that more people can see the films we’ve put together. Also, some of you have requested copies of the film festival. This is something we can’t currently produce with any sort of ease. Maybe if we get enough interested people who all want to kick in $5-$10 for a copy we can send it away and get some duplicates but we don’t have any high speed dubbing equipment here in our office and I don’t have any desire to spend an hour and forty-five minutes creating each VHS copy.
We made just about $100 from donations at the festival which will be used to help pay for advertising costs next time around.
Thanks to all of the film makers who were able to scrape together shorts for the festival. There were definitely some flashes of brilliance through out the festival and I think that the quality of films will only improve for the next time. …and speaking of the next time, we plan on holding our next film festival in approximately six months. I think that lands us in December or January sometime. If anyone has suggested venues or wants help generating ideas for a short film, just drop me a line. I’m open to any suggestions that will make the next festival even better. I’m trying to put together a discussion board to facilitate a little more of a community atmosphere but it’s yet another side project so I don’t have any estimate on when it will be ready.
Laters
I just wanted to say thanks once more to the Silverbow, Alaska On-screen Advertising, The Juneau Arts & Humanities Council, and all of the great film makers and actors who participated in the festival.