REGIONAL FILM FESTIVALS AND WOODS HOLE
On a day which to most people was a holiday, for me it was filled with film festival business. I spent almost 8 hours with BUFF people. With Anna and Kevin virtually taking over the festival, they have organized the szcreening process and are even taking some responsibility for the finances. Late in the afternoon, we met with half a dozen new volunteers who will address issues of obtaining sponsorship and advertising, , PR, and program design. After a roller coster of six years, BUFF 7, and the people who are beginning to run it, does seem to have a future.
On the less optimistic side, I talked with two New England festival administrators yesterday whose festivals are in an awkward state of transition. One festival, run for years onan all volunteer basis, hired a non-film related administrative director at a higher salary that any small sized festival could afford. For the first time the festival ran a deficit; the administrator resigned. And there is noone th fill the shoes, and there is no commitment from someone who knows how to program. At the other long-running festival, the much less-saleried director is also stepping down, but the newly energized Board still hasn't addressed the issues of fund raising or programming. People are in place to do administrative work, but there has been no offer to them so far on the part of the Board. It's getting late, but fundamental issues need to be addressed.
Then there is Woods Hole, . Now in its l4th year, due to the sheer tenacity of founder and director Judy Laster, the Festival has grown from a one-day, one-show event to not only a multi-venued 8-day annual event well attended by fimmakers, which takes over Water St, but has also established an important year round presence in the community, what with the off-season Dinner and a Movie series at the Captain Kidd. And now she is doing an Oscar night fund-raising event for the Festivals new Filmmakers in the Schools program. With a full time job on Beacon Hill, Judy also finds time to run the Reel Blues Fest and to make movies. In fact she was the sixth film festival director I talked with yesterday, and she called about submitting her short film, AUTOMATIC DRIP, a surrealist cmedy about coffee obsession shot in Woods Hole. We'll look at it at the BUFF screenings Thursday night. I've seen an earlier cut, and and what I liked best is the way the film has a quiet charm in presenting the almost WAKING NED DEVINE/Ealing Studios eccentricities of the inhabitants of this small coastal community. Just as Judy has captured the spirit of the community in her short film, so too has she established the film festival in the community she so clearly loves.
On the less optimistic side, I talked with two New England festival administrators yesterday whose festivals are in an awkward state of transition. One festival, run for years onan all volunteer basis, hired a non-film related administrative director at a higher salary that any small sized festival could afford. For the first time the festival ran a deficit; the administrator resigned. And there is noone th fill the shoes, and there is no commitment from someone who knows how to program. At the other long-running festival, the much less-saleried director is also stepping down, but the newly energized Board still hasn't addressed the issues of fund raising or programming. People are in place to do administrative work, but there has been no offer to them so far on the part of the Board. It's getting late, but fundamental issues need to be addressed.
Then there is Woods Hole, . Now in its l4th year, due to the sheer tenacity of founder and director Judy Laster, the Festival has grown from a one-day, one-show event to not only a multi-venued 8-day annual event well attended by fimmakers, which takes over Water St, but has also established an important year round presence in the community, what with the off-season Dinner and a Movie series at the Captain Kidd. And now she is doing an Oscar night fund-raising event for the Festivals new Filmmakers in the Schools program. With a full time job on Beacon Hill, Judy also finds time to run the Reel Blues Fest and to make movies. In fact she was the sixth film festival director I talked with yesterday, and she called about submitting her short film, AUTOMATIC DRIP, a surrealist cmedy about coffee obsession shot in Woods Hole. We'll look at it at the BUFF screenings Thursday night. I've seen an earlier cut, and and what I liked best is the way the film has a quiet charm in presenting the almost WAKING NED DEVINE/Ealing Studios eccentricities of the inhabitants of this small coastal community. Just as Judy has captured the spirit of the community in her short film, so too has she established the film festival in the community she so clearly loves.
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