28^th Telluride Film Festival Student Symposium (1-5 September 2016)

The impressions are still settling from what was one of the most surreal experiences of my life as film addict and student. The Telluride Film Festival, where I participated in the 28^th Student Symposium, a side program bringing together a select group of students from around the world, has recently wrapped its 43^rd edition. Having once again curated an elegant and culturally significant selection of films, the festival provided a true cinematic vacation and most indulgent experience of film escapism.

Telluride Film Festival was founded in 1973 and is today one of the most prestigious film festivals in the world, existing, however, in a category of its own. Set in the beautiful town of Telluride, high in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, the festival takes place each year over the Labor Day weekend. The festival famously doesn’t announce its program until the opening day, underlining the trust and reputation it has built with its audience, a loyal group of cinephiles making the annual pilgrimage to get lost in movies.

Compared to other festivals of the same prominence, it is much smaller in scope. And much more contained; in location, duration, film selection, and simplicity of the overall production. It is a very intimate cinematic event, organized in a manner that utilizes the remote, scenic location to its atmospheric advantage, creating a three-day cocoon where the barriers between the art, the screen, the author, the performer and the audience disintegrate. The absence of red carpets, juries and awards, press and distribution market in its usual festival form, removes that degree of exclusivity and industry alienation, in service of pure joy and excitement that is film discovery.

The experience was all-encompassing; the town was living and pulsing with movies. Our Symposium schedule was jam-packed with film screenings, discussions and guest speakers, from early morning to late night. There were such moments when a lunch break turned into a quick meal stop at one of the open air Q&A sessions with, for example, Werner Herzog and Errol Morris, or Tom Hanks and Bryan Cranston, while late at night, the sounds of open air film screening filled the streets and kept the bears away. The Labor Day picnic saw Herzog receive his volcano-shaped birthday cake while we lounged in the meadow eating, followed by a Q&A with Emma Stone and Damien Chazelle, there to promote La La Land. Then there was that time I hitched a last minute solo ride on the gondola and travelled over the mountain in pitch dark to catch a screening of Frantz in the nearby mountain village.

Our student group had a specially tailored program, the selection offering a variety of international film entries, old and new, spanning over all screening locations. The combination of film screenings followed by group discussions, as well as discussions with filmmakers themselves, opened up space for new layers of reading and interpretation, adding depth and dimension of film experience, new understanding of the art-form and the act of creation itself. The sessions illuminated where the stories begin and how they take form, all expressed differently by these talented artists, each with their own sensibility and energy.

The films all resonated one way or another, the programming consistent in quality. Personal standouts included Moonlight by Barry Jenkins, and Graduation by Cristian Mungiu, both of whom were guest speakers in our group. For Barry Jenkins, the premiere of his film Moonlight at Telluride was especially significant, seeing as this is where it all started for him, in a way, with himself participating in one of the Student Symposiums, and later returning to work at the festival. He was very gracious with the group, generously sharing his insights, sources of inspiration, as well as personal details woven into the film, making it all the more memorable and inspiring.

The nature of work and projects we have undertaken throughout the year in the Film, Exhibition and Curation course have created a natural base for the type of engagement and observation needed to navigate this particular environment, extending into one of the most rewarding in a series of learning experiences.

I sincerely thank my mentors Jane and Susan for their guidance, care and support throughout the year, and for helping get this particular journey off the ground. Without them, Telluride would have remained a mere bookmarked dream of a cinematic mountain retreat.

Studying film exhibition and curation at the University of Edinburgh has been a valuable experience which I was eager to apply to my local native area, that is to say Alsace, France.

I used time allocated for research within the programme to go back home to explore Alsatian film archives. I was based in local folk museum Ecomusée d’Alsace but managed to meet a range of moving image professionals during my 2-month visit. Discussing resources and current initiatives with them made me realise that, despite ‘film archive’ emerging as a buzz word in academia, most of the practical work is still to be done. The field of film archives is full of opportunities, especially when working on an international level and trying to create Pan-European projects (and further).

I met many lovely and truly passionate professionals and non-professionals, both in France and in Scotland who are designing innovative and creative strategies to generate interest around existing moving images. They are trying to raise awareness of those images as a support for memory, artistic creation and overall powerful social and political significance.

Whether a personal film reel or official TV or film images, moving images have the capacity to generate a deeply personal connection with audiences. To me, moving images are currently the most powerful and most used medium to shape history and memory. They are extremely familiar to us, which strengthen their impact when rehashed, reworked and reflected upon.

There is still a lot to be done for funding organisations and the general public to be made aware of the power of the archive. I will put to you a few exciting questions which stemmed out of my field research;

Which images are valuable?

What is to be exhibited and what can be exhibited?

How can we achieve fairness and a true representation when taking into account audience interest, legal and practical matters?

How do we exhibit film archives?

I leave those questions with future FECers who will, I am sure, develop further as the field of film archives grows.

I will conclude with a small advice to those interested in film archives; look up film archive festivals and who is behind them. You’d be surprised to find single individuals, who could probably use a hand, putting all their efforts into amazing events and safeguarding odysseys. Opportunities are numerous and much closer than you might think. Most large businesses, art and governmental organisations have film collections waiting for cataloguing, research and exhibition.

I, myself, have caught the ‘archive fever’ and will shortly start volunteering at the Centre for Collections at the University of Edinburgh thanks to Rachel Hosker who guided me through my master’s research.

Film at Edinburgh Blog Updates

Take one beautiful Greek island.

Take two fantastic film festivals.

Take three MSc Film, Exhibition and Curation students past and present.

Aliki Makrigianni (2017) has followed in the footsteps of her compatriots and former MSc FEC students Hara Vlachou and Theodoros Karamanolis to the island of Syros. Aliki spent the summer working on the Syros International Film Festival. Aliki had a brilliant time working on the festival and has come back full of exciting ideas around film and live music collaboration.

As we’ve spent years longing to go out to Syros to enjoy AnimaSyros – the international film animation festival – which Hara and Theo have been working on, this just feels like rubbing it in a bit.

Venice Ahoy

And to prove there is no end to the sickeningly glamorous travels of our FEC students, this update on what Steven Armour (2016) has been up to since submitting his final project is enough to have me chewing my desk as I look out at the Edinburgh drizzle. Thanks for the kind words Steven and can’t wait to hear how it all went.

“I just wanted to send a quick email to thank Jane and Susan for being such encouraging and truly inspiring course directors, and for making the Film, Exhibition and Curation course so enjoyable.

I thought I should also update you to let you know I’ve had the good fortune of being selected for this year’s 28 Times Cinema initiative, organised by Europa Cinemas, meaning that I will be attending the Venice Film Festival next week as a jury member and reviewer for the Venice Days sidebar selection of films. The jury comprises myself and 27 other young individuals from each country of the EU (I’m representing the UK), and we’re presided over by avant garde queer filmmaker Bruce LaBruce (Film and Gender will come in even more handy!).

I believe my involvement and experiences in Film, Exhibition and Curation were invaluable for my application and helping me secure this position. I also get to partake in workshops covering the likes of cinema networks across Europe, film festival social media marketing, translating cinema for European audiences, and film criticism. Should be a great and exciting experience!”

Nollywood Week 2016

Leslie de Oliveira (2016) took up a fantastic opportunity in Paris earlier this summer, volunteering on this year’s  Nollywood Week film festival. Nollywood Week is a relatively new addition to the festival circuit and is dedicated to promoting  a lesser known cinema. Leslie says she was particularly drawn to  working on an event that “ focuses on promoting an alternative cinema (successful in Africa and within the African diaspora around the world but not distributed through Western traditional circuits, hence totally invisible)”.

As it turns out she had a ringside seat at a festival which is growing rapidly from its initial small scale to a major happening in the city. Leslie says she learned a great deal from the challenges and the successes of the festival and that “ It was very interesting to witness the mutation of a small festival with humble expectations to a larger scale event “

Nollywood Week video

https://youtu.be/HrmtoVwv7SQ

Leslie has now returned to Paris and is working on some collaborative cultural projects as well as having set up her own company to develop her own film curatorial practice, beginning by working on the lovely ideas she was researched for her final project. Bonne chance et bon courage Leslie.

It was during an undergraduate film course on global cinema when I first became fascinated in how films circulate and reach viewers. Picture it: a group of fifteen 20- year olds watching films like Mehrjui’s The Cow and Omirbajev’s Student in rural Vermont, USA. Two years later, as a Film, Exhibition & Curation MSc student, I was even more determined to dig deeper into the mechanics of film distribution and sales. I successfully applied for an internship with Film Movement, an indie film distributor, and left Edinburgh for New York City in early May to complete an intensive four-month placement. Film Movement is a North American distributor of award-winning independent and foreign films. Since its launch in 2002, Film Movement has released more than 250 feature films and shorts from 50 countries across 6 continents, and regularly acquires top contenders at Sundance, Cannes, Venice, Toronto, Berlin, Tribeca and, more recently, Hot Docs and AFI Docs. I wanted to work for Film Movement specifically for two reasons: its business model is truly “full service”: Film Movement releases its films through art-house cinemas, universities, libraries, television channels, Cable VOD platforms, broadband outlets, in-flight entertainment systems and on home video. Secondly, the small size of staff—15 people or so—meant greater responsibilities for even the most junior employees. With only four months, I wanted to maximize what I could learn on the job. As an exhibition intern, I assisted with general office administration but worked as a kind of assistant to Film Movement’s Director of Public Relations and Promotions Genevieve Villaflor, an incredibly sharp woman with vast knowledge of the industry. Under her guidance, I wrote press releases and press kits for new acquisitions and regional theatrical screenings, and tracked press coverage of Film Movement titles across print, broadcast and online outlets. This also entailed keeping track of the best quotes from positive reviews to use for marketing materials. In addition to handling email inquiries from press outlets, exhibitors, filmmakers, and publicists, I also collated sales reports, updated metadata for digital partners, wrote film synopses, physically prepared and shipped theatrical and publicity assets, quality checked new home entertainment releases, curated short films for the Film of the Month club and helped manage the database spanning hundreds of films.

For fear of writing another dissertation-length piece, I won’t go into detail here addressing the competitive landscape of film distribution and what companies like Film Movement are doing to stay competitive. Instead, I’ve listed below a few tips that I think might be more immediately helpful for the next FECer who wants to pursue a career in indie film distribution:

1) Know your Excel!

2) Familiarize yourself with the schedules of leading film festivals as employees plan their calendars around them.

3) Understand that “VOD” is an umbrella term: there’s Cable VOD; subscription VOD; transactional VOD; ad-supported VOD and other types, all of which operate differently.

4) If you are specifically interested in film publicity and marketing, I urge you to study published press kits, press releases and wrap reports that can be easily accessed online.

5) When possible, ask to sit in on acquisitions meetings. It is endlessly interesting to observe how executives decide what films to acquire and the terms of sale.

6) Read the trades: Variety, The Hollywood Reporter and Screen International are the big three.

Just attended the fascinating Digital Single Market panel as part of the Digital REWIRED event at EIFF. Aside from the consensus that fact that the world of film exhibition keeps utterly changing every nat’s breathe is both exciting and extraordinarily difficult it was great to see the woman on the floor organising it all was FEC graduate Ana Moraes – now Dr Ana Moraes after successfully completing her PhD a month or so ago. Even more brilliant is the fact that she will take up a position as research assistant with David Martin-Jones in the autumn. Huge huge congratulations. We are so proud! 

Fan Yije was recently invited to join FEC graduate Mengchen at the Cannes Film Festival. Here she blogs about the experience.

Cannes Film Festival Report

This is my first time to Cannes Film Festival, which I dreamed of going to. Obviously, it’s an unforgettable experience. The lovely weather, large number of films, booming film market, countless parties and red carpet steps, all these things left me a deep impression.

During these 12 days, filmmakers, reporters, buyers, sellers from all over the world were gathered in this small town to enjoy the film carnival. I worked at China Film Foundation Pavilion in International Village which is an exhibition space and a meeting point for all countries producing films. China Film Foundation Pavilion is organised by China Film Foundation-Wu Tianming Film Fund for Young Talents in partnership with Movie View. It hosted panel discussions, conferences and meetings about film festival and Chinese film industry, including Chinese Film Market, Co-production Strategies and Mutual Investments, Navigating the Festival Circuit, International Film Funds: Talents Oriented Strategy, New Talents and Marketing: Young Producers Projects and Investments in Movies and Entertainment Companies in China: How It Works. In particular, I would like to talk about the Navigating the Festival Circuit which provided an overview of the cultural, economic and social role of the film festivals. This panel discussion invited the programmers and directors from various international film festivals like Sundance Film Festival, HKIFF, TIFF, and BIFF. They talked about different types of the festivals and their film selection, whether premiere is really such important or not, how to balance personal taste, audience tastes, and other element.

Cannes Film Festival is a typical “business festival”. The film market is the core of the festival. Meanwhile, Marché du Film is the world’s leading market. For me, the film is still the most attractive part of the festival. There is no doubt that Cannes Film Festival gathers a very large number of the best films of the whole year. And luckily, you can see these films in advance. But Cannes Film Festival is an event for film professionals only. So all films are not available for the public but opened just for the registered members. Another interesting point of Cannes is that it’s hierarchical. In Cannes, your badge is your rank. It’s a caste system and what the colour of your badge says about you. Press, market and festival badge have different priorities. Every screening, hours before the screening, the line of the festival and market badge was long. People with blue press badge just needed to wait a short time, then, the pink and white badges were much shorter and enjoyed the prime seats.

At last, giving a little tips. As film students, we can apply the festival badge by ourselves so that we can go to the market, international village and some events. While this kind of badge can’t request the invitation ticket for the competition and hons completion screenings in Lumiere theatre (the main cinema with red carpet), but audiences can queue the Last Minute for theses film and also for most of other screenings.

FECers Becky Padley (2015) and Charline Foch (2016) setting up for Hidden Door. Looking fanbloodygreat.

FEC students Sonja Baksa and Jennie Shearman (2016) have been working with artist Isabella Rocamora as she prepares her upcoming exhibition. It’s been a fantastic opportunity for them to get to grips with the level of detail, focus and energy needed for such complex and intriguing work. It opens next week and we look forward to it very much. IMAGING FAITH

IMAGING FAITH

ISABEL ROCAMORA
SCIENNES GALLERIES, SUMMERHALL
26 May – 13 July 2016
Tue – Sun 11.00 – 18.00
Private View: 25 May (19.00 – 21.00)
1, Summerhall, Edinburgh EH9 1PL

“A uniquely profound and moving comment on timely aspects of the human condition… Mesmerizing” Now Magazine, Toronto

In the adjoining gallery a series of still images depict Rocamora’s experience of Jerusalem, culturally and politically contextualising the film triptych. A dedicated reading room provides a contemplative space in which contemporary thinkers (historians, theologians and philosophers, including Gil Anidjar, Mark Cauchi, Victoria Rocamora and Simon Critchley) have been invited to curate passages from seminal texts in response to the themes of the exhibition.

Isabel Rocamora is a British-Spanish artist whose films have been widely awarded and exhibited internationally. Recent shows include the Koffler Gallery, Toronto (solo); CCC Palazzo Strozzi, Florence; the National Museum of Photography, Copenhagen and the Bologna Museum of Modern Art. Imaging Faith presents the UK premiere of this new body of work by the Edinburgh-based artist as well as the first exhibition of her work in Scotland.

Curated by Holly Knox Yeoman.
www.summerhall.co.uk 

Becky Padley (2015) is organising and programming films for the Hidden Door Festival this year and doing stellar work. Not only does the festival look utterly brilliant but she’s created the opportunity for a number of current FEC students to curate and deliver events. Good on ya Becky. I’m so looking forward to it.

Billie Phipps Tyndall (2015) having moved Bangkok is now involved in the Bankok Edge Festival and plans to help organise a short film competition for the next edition, whilst teaching primary school. Congratulations Billie! We can’t wait to hear more about it.

Also, Mengchen Wen is in Cannes working at the  China Film Foundation Pavilion – International Village, Pantiero side n° 216.Visit them from May 11th to 22th. She has asked current FEC student Fan Yije to help her out. How exciting and we look forward to the reports on Fan’s return.

Learning about LGBT representation in China. 

A fantastic programme of shorts intercut with interviews at the Filmhouse on Friday and Saturday. FECers 2016 are totally making the most of their opportunities.Thanks so much to Filmhouse and Nigel Chipps for giving them this chance. Great audiences and we hope it will do more. More pics PRESENT LOVE

Thanks so much to the Glasgow Film Festival 2016 who provided an opportunity for this year’s students to really get to know what it’s all about. They created and delivered a fantastic event surveillancetoselfie.com
and all the students and audiences alike thoroughly enjoyed themselves. Just brilliant.

Katherine Irving, a graduate of Film Studies at UoE, is currently working for the FIlm Exhibitions Department for the  Boston Museum of Fine Arts (go Katherine!) She invited some colleagues from FS and FEC (Film, Exhibition & Curation) to contribute essays to the online Film Notes Archive on Kubrick – they are a great read and well done all. Rebecca Raab writes, ‘It was really fun to join up with the others again for this project and to see that we’re all on board!’

You can read their work here. http://www.mfa.org/node/493346

We’re very excited that Rebecca Padley (2015) was invited to join the wonderful Hidden Door festival as programme coordinator before she’d even graduated. She will have a big curatorial responsibility for the film strand and we wish her all the best for the festival. We know her FEC chums will be standing with her all through.

Charlotte Micklewright (2015) continues her fantastic work with artistic director, Peter Taylor, at the Berwick Film Festival and we know her incredible hard work, diplomacy and brilliant mind are fully appreciated.

Lauren Clarke (2015) continues to dig into the archives with enthusiasm as researcher on a documentary for BBC Four about Antonia Bird, where her ability to grasp the rich, complex, little known but very important story of Bird’s career is much appreciated.

And exciting news from previous years’ students.

Hara Vlahou has recently joined the staff of the Thessaloniki International Film Festival and we look forward to hearing more about her work there.

Paulina Kowalczyk is coordinating film/exhibition projects at the CCA Ujazdowski Castle. Currently she’s working on a show with Kuba Bakowski.

In addition to contributing to the submissions panel FEC students created a programme of short films for this year’s festival called Supressed/ Expressed. It will show on Oct 22 at 6pm and it will be a fascinating watch.

Supressed/ Expressed

Charlotte Micklewright (FEC 2014/15) has been working with the Berwick Festival for some months and has recently been joined by fellow FECers. She describes the experience below. It looks like it’s going to be a great festival.

It has been a great opportunity to be so involved with the Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival. I started off as an intern managing submissions as I was really interested in the festival’s curatorial process for my own research. I then took on the role of Programme Coordinator and am now liaising with artists, filmmakers, distributors, projectionists and technicians to bring the festival together!

Who’s Watching Who 

The Film, Exhibition & Curation (formerly FiPS) programme proved to be the perfect launchpad for an exciting career in film, technology, and education, writes Corey Boling. Upon graduating in 2011, I’ve since spent my days interning at the Guggenheim Museum, working at the Tribeca Film Institute, and I even founding my very own international nonprofit film organization called FILMMAKERS WITHOUT BORDERS. These days, I spend my time traveling around the world teaching filmmaking and media literacy to underserved students in places like Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Peru, Tanzania, and Thailand. Whether helping youth create their own short film and multimedia projects or producing community screenings of student work across Africa, Asia, and Latin America, it’s clear to me that my time in Edinburgh was a dynamic and formative chapter that continues to inform every aspect of my daily life!

Really fantastic screening of Antonia Bird’s ‘Safe’ last night. Emotional honest storytelling with powerful performances from all especially Kate Hardie and Aiden Gillen. Kate presented the film as part of a series she’s programmed with the gorgeous Arthouse Cinema in Crouchend about women and film. Kate’s intro was superb — raised the house with thunderous applause. Here’s a couple of pics and if you want to see the Bird clipreel we made to show last night you’ll find it at

Thanks to Fec’ers who came to help out last night – you were fab and thanks to all who helped with clip choices for reel. Much appreciated!

Acknowledged Legislators: ‘Lived experience’ in Scottish Poetry Films

Richie McCaffery, University of Glasgow, and Stefanie Van de Peer, University of Stirling

This excellent and much needed consideration of film and poetry in Scotland is deeply interesting on many levels. It’s also fantastic for Nort Atlantik Drift: A Portrait of Robert Alan Jamieson to be included in such company. Blown away….

Tina Chan, graduate of MSc Film, Exhibition and Curation 2011/13 writes to tell of her very exciting career since completing the course. We’re so proud of her:

I always remember you and Jane and what I learned in your classes. Those days in Edinburgh always come to my mind. It’s been fantastic to turn knowledge gained in school into real event practice. Normally my work is helping promote films made in Taiwan especially those shot in Taipei, and so I have had the chance to come into contact with Taiwanese film makers,critics,reporters and to know more about this field. I feel lucky and honored to have met and to hold events for three honorable directors so far since I got back to Taiwan and started my current job,They were Ang Lee, Luc Besson and Martin Scorsese.

 Lanqing (2013/14) writes to tell us the great news that she has been employed by Beijing United Entertainment Partner Culture & Media Co as Operation Assistant in the International Operation Department of UEP, a film distribution company base in Beijing, China. UEP is the first company that cooperates with Hollywood studios (Sony/Columbia pictures) to do the job of marketing in China.  UEP has become a strategic partner with many famous film and media companies. It also has close cooperation with many well-known film production teams from Mainland China, Hong Kong and Macao. UEP has been distributing films like The amazing Spider Man 2, The Smurfs 2 and Grace of Monaco, etc. in China.
Last year UEP set their branch company in LA and Australia, and they plan to set one in London and another on in Paris this year. The job I’m doing now is writing a UK film market report, which is one of the preparatory tasks for supporting the setting of the new company in London. Lanqing’s department, she explains, is like the bridge between the head office in China and the branch companies abroad. Besides doing various job for support the oversea companies, her department also sells Chinese films to the international market and brings overseas products to China.

MSc Film, Exhibition & Curation students of 2014/15 were invited to create a programme of shorts for the Glasgow Short Film Festival that somehow analysed and made visible the curatorial process. After a number of weeks thinking, experimenting and planning the students created a feature length film essay which contained a short film programme. It went down very well with audiences at the festival and the students thoroughly enjoyed hearing the guests on the panel discussion (as part of the short film symposium) refer and discuss the ideas in the essay film.

Here is a link to the film: Anatomy of a Short Film Programme

FEC graduate Rebecca Raab  (2013/14) writes with exciting news about the development of her career in film exhibition.

http://film.mfg.de/de http://film.mfg.de/de

Film, Exhibition & Curation students (FEC) created and hosted a sell-out, day-long event at the Glasgow Film Festival 2015. It takes a lot of planning, teamwork, imagination and enthusiasm to bring film and people together in such a way. The success of Power Suit Yourself showcased beautifully that the FEC students have what it takes with knobs on (or, to be more accurate in this case: shoulder-pads on).

Well done all for a fantastic day and night of film and fun.

The GFF photographer caught the party mood. More photos here