Submarine Channel

Film Festies Get Creative

Film festivals, once the glamorous, red-carpet domain of exclusive, silverscreen show-casery, are starting to innovate in the ways they communicate with their increasingly diverse audiences. As the digital era takes hold, festivals serve not only to celebrate the movie medium, but also to produce their own audio-visual content through promos, contests and wacky side projects – sometimes to such high standards that they rival the movies themselves. Inspired by our glorious *Cannes moment* this week, we were thinking how the roles are reversing, with festivals creating rather than merely exhibiting artworks. And because we’re nice like that, we’ll share three of them with you:

1. Promos & Trailers
Simple but delicious logos like the Berlin Film Festival’s, or David Verbeek’s promo for IFFR, provide an immediate opportunity for festivals to show how much more badass they are than all the others. Some festivals go all the way, making short films which serve as commercials – like Titanic in Hungary, or IDFA in the Netherlands. And isn’t it just like the Finns to take it that one step further, like they did with their “The Field’ trailer for Docpoint? Nudity and non-subtitled Finnish, what’s not to like?!

2. Video Presentations
Festies like IDFA and Next in Romania, love movie-making so much – they just can’t leave it alone! Streaming interviews with participants, workshop and program presentations, or simply the events’ making-of , they just keep ’em coming – even long after the last disheveled reveler has left the closing party…

3. Movie Series
And what about making an entire SERIES of short movies, for the mere promotion of a festival? The seven shorts created for the promotion of TIFF (Romania) by young, well-known Romanian directors feature Balkan versions of James Bond in a series of hilariously un-Bond-like situations, to highlight the festival’s 007 anniversary celebration. For Imagine 26th Amsterdam Fantastic Film Festival, a contest among regular passionate-about-movies people produced a series of super-smashing clips, now available for your perusing pleasure. The rebellious American Cinevegas festival produced its own series too, around the theme Ten Things About Vegas, with mind-bending results from experimental renegades like Cam Archer, James Fotopoulos, Kevin Everson, Tom Brandt, the Zellner Brothers, Randy Walker & Jennifer Shainin.

Rock’n’roll baby!