This is an open access book. This edited collection aims to document the effects of Covid-19 on film festivals and to theorize film festivals in the age of social distancing. To some extent, this crisis begs us to consider what happens when festivals can’t happen; while films have found new (temporary) channels of distribution (most often in the forms of digital releases), the festival format appears particularly vulnerable in pandemic times. Imperfect measures, such as the move to a digital format, cannot recapture the communal experience at the very core of festivals. Given the global nature of the pandemic and the diversity of the festival phenomenon, this book features a wide range of case studies and analytical frameworks. With contributors including established scholars and frontline festival workers, the book is conceived as both a theoretical endeavour and a practical exploration of festival organizing in pandemic times.
Author(s): Marijke de Valck, Antoine Damiens
Series: Framing Film Festivals
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2023
Language: English
Pages: 350
City: Cham
Acknowledgements
Contents
Notes on Contributors
List of Figures
List of Tables
Chapter 1: What Happens When Festivals Can’t Happen?
Pandemic Scholarship: Documenting and Thinking Through an Ongoing Crisis
Rethinking Film Festivals in the Pandemic Era and After
Bibliography
Part I: Contaminated Circuits: Covid-19 and the Festival Ecosystem
Chapter 2: Stopping the Flow: Film Circulation in the Festival Ecosystem at a Moment of Disruption
Continuous Uncertainty
Distribution: Circulation on the Circuit
Curators and Festival Organizers
Markets
Sales Agents
Distributors
Filmmakers
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 3: Scarcity, Ubiquity, and the Film Festival After Covid
Scarcity and Ubiquity
Changing Strategies of Risk Avoidance
Looking to the Past (of Newspapers) to See the Future (of Festivals)
The Post-Covid Outlook
Bibliography
Chapter 4: Locating Buzz and Liveness: The Role of Geoblocking and Co-presence in Virtual Film Festivals
Geoblocking and Locating Film Festival Space
Networked Co-presence: Geofencing and Value Creation
Rethinking Festival (Studies) Futures
Bibliography
Chapter 5: Film Festivals on the Small Screen: Audiences, Domestic Space, and Everyday Media
Media and Domestic Space in the Post-Broadcast Era
Addressing the Home: Reconfiguring the Public in Private Spaces
Reconfiguring the Time of the Audience
Remediating Audience Participation
Conclusion: Reframing the Film Festival Audience
Bibliography
Chapter 6: Finding Allies in Pandemic Times: Documentary Film Festivals and Streaming Platforms
Case Study I: DAFilms
Doc Alliance, DAFilms, and Film Festivals: Collaboration and Reciprocity
Searching for Partners During the Pandemic: The 2020 Calendar
Modes of Collaboration with DAFilms: Partnerships, Identity, and Belonging
Case Study 2: Tënk
Tënk and Film Festivals, a Constitutive Link
2020, the Covid Year: Revisiting the Alliance
Return to the Original Equilibrium of the Alliance
Conclusions
Bibliography
List of Interviews
Chapter 7: Chilean Film Festivals and Local Audiences: Going Online?
Chilean Festivals Under Covid-19
Live Events and Hybrid Strategies
Festivals Moving Online
Digital Literacy and Gatekeeping Practices
The Paradox of Online Access
Tactics for Engaging Audiences Online
Conclusions: The Future of Going Online
Bibliography
List of Websites of Film Festivals Cited
Part II: Experimenting on the Frontlines: Innovative Responses to the Crisis
Chapter 8: Vidéo de Femmes Dans le Parc: Feminist Rhythms and Festival Times Under Covid
Insistent Ephemerality: VFP as Feminist Festival Practice
VFP @ 29: Creative Solutions to Online Exhibition
Outdoor Cinema and Sociability in Montreal
Conclusions
Bibliography
Chapter 9: Curating Our Own Space: A Conversation on Online Queer Film Exhibition and Adult Queer Cinema
Chapter 10: Cinephilia, Publics, Cinegoraphilia: Surveying the Short-Term Effects of Covid-19 on Community-Based Festivals in Toronto
Covid in Ontario: A Timeline
Canada’s Arts Funding Ecosystem
Cinegoraphilia and Toronto Festivals
Toronto Outdoor Picture Show
Toronto Queer Film Festival
Conclusion: TOPS and TQFF in 2021 and Beyond
Bibliography
Chapter 11: Film Festivals in Taiwan: Lurking on the Periphery
Pandemic Preparedness in Taiwan
Taipei Film Festival: Where Government Is a Stakeholder
When Update Failed
Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival: The Chinese-Language “Oscars”
Taiwan Cinema Amid the Pandemic
Future Landscape of Taiwan Cinema
Bibliography
Chapter 12: Precarity, Innovation, and Survival in the Indian Film Festival Sector
Film Festivals and the Pandemic
Film Festivals After the Lockdown
KASHISH: “The World Must See Us in Our Splendid Colors”
KASHISH Virtual 2020
Embracing the Global
Kriti Film Club and the Lockdown Film Festivals
South Asian Feminist Film Festival
The Rising Gardens Film Festival
Rethinking Community at Rising Gardens
Refusals: The Kolkata People’s Film Festival
Is the Future Hybrid?
Bibliography
Chapter 13: Curating as Care: La Semaine de la Critique and the Marrakech International Film Festival in the Age of Covid-19
The Difference Between Film Programming and Film Curating
Semaine de la Critique in the Age of Covid-19: Taking Care of Movies
The 2020 Marrakech International Film Festival: Canceling the Festival, Developing the Atlas Workshops
Curating Films as Caring for Films and Communities
Bibliography
Part III: Never Waste a Good Crisis: (Re)imagining Festivals After the Pandemic
Chapter 14: Toward Decolonized Film Festival Worlds
African Screen Worlds: Decolonizing Film and Screen Studies
Film Festival Film (2019)
From Cosmetic Appropriation to Deep Decolonization
Reorienting Film Festivals
Blueprints for Decolonial Film Festival/Curatorial Practice
Turning over a New Leaf
Bibliography
List of Survey Participants
Chapter 15: Festivals, Covid-19, and the Crisis of Archiving
A Few Elements of Context: Archiving Pre-digital Festivals
“If It’s Not on Paper, It Doesn’t Exist At All”: Unintended Consequences of the Digital Revolution
Archiving Festivals Organized During the Covid-19 Pandemic
Bibliography
Chapter 16: Greening Film Festivals
Blue Skies
Heavy Clouds
Green Futures
Final Remarks
Bibliography
Index
