ssauvagefilmfestival2024

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Past Iterations of Cinecity

During this lecture we looked at past events that took place around the Cinecity film festival

Dive in movies:

Happens during the night where hours go back in autumn

Was European funded

Screened in the Prince Regent swimming pool a mixtape of 25min featuring films that had a swimming pool in them.

200 people came in at once every 30min

A lot of health and safety issues to consider with people drinking all night long and a lot of electricity near the water

The Hitchcock Papers:

All 53 of Hitchcock’s feature films include a newspaper frontpage. This can make the narrative progress or just cite what’s going on.

Cinecity made an exhibition on the use of newspaper in film

Created fake newspaper, recreation of ones that show in films

Artist Moving Image:

Movies that aren’t huge production but that are made by artists that use film as a medium to express things

Stan Douglas makes works that’s very cinematic, inspired by Hitchcock and Samuel Beckett.

“if you want art you go to the galleries and if you want entertainment you go to the movies”, this statement disallows art screenings to take place in cinemas.

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As part of the elective course we needed to create a proposal for a film festival of our own creation. I chose to curate mine around movies that had scenes inside move theatres in them, naming it Cinemaception

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First Lecture

These are notes taken from the first lecture we had on the course:

Over 500 major film festivals, every day in the world two / three major festivals going on

1929 Switzerland, kind of the first film festival called a congress where lots of filmmakers came together to show their films.

Venice is acknowledged to be the first film festival in 1930’s

Made under Mussolini’s regime to show this sense of nationality

Other european countries ended up doing the same thing to rivalise during the ww2 period

80% of current film festivals were set up in the past 20 years, massive explosion in numbers due to digitalization of media

Industry term for film festival: Exhibition (the showing of a film in a cinema)

Stages of film:

production

exhibition

distribution

legacy (archive, conservation)

education / training

A List Festivals

Cannes

Berlin

Sundance

Toronto

Venice

Film festivals go by film genre, or by theme, there is a film festival for everything

Film festivals are valuable for movies to be promoted to a level which they won’t get to if not for the expostion that some festivals grant.

The increase of film festivals is due to the increase of films releases, they need a place to be shown. Last year 17 films a day released in UK Cinemas.

Blockbuster Culture: we live in an era where we all go see the same things. if everyone is talking about a movie it’ll make the individual want to also see that movie to be part of the group. this applies to art, music, exhibitions. The cost of living crisis made this worst as now a cinema experience is 10£ so you want to make sure you “bet on something safe”.

Mainstream is more conservative, takes fewer risks, and aims to make money. This leaves a lot of space for film festivals that offer a wider range of films.

Film festivals have become an alternative distribution method due to this overflow of films and the presence of blockbuster culture

Why has the internet not killed cinema? Cinema has survived to televison, dvd’s, video. Similarly to live music, cinema seems to be intemporal.

Film festivals demonstrate the importance of immersive events and live events.

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Favorite Films

We had to select five of our favorite films and we why they are so important to us. Here is my top 5:

Annie Hall by Woody Allen

The Graduate by Mike Nichols

Le Petit Soldat by Jean-Luc Godard

La Haine by Mathieu Kassovitz

Seven Samurai by Akira Kurosawa

These are all well established classics but I like each of these movies because I relate to them all in different ways. I've only seen Seven Samurais in cinemas but I'm looking forward to see more of them on the big screen

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This presentation created as part of the Film Festival elective class showcases a film festival that already exists. I investigated the Film On The Rocks Festival that took place in Yao Noi in Thailand.