Week 2

This week I began looking into some potential partner schools along the east coast. So far in my little research, I found George Mason University, Drexel University, and Champlain College to be possible choices. They each have a strong film production program and would have an interest in submitting to Visions 6 or even attending.  

Regarding this week's readings, I found both the "Festival of Their Own" and "From Art House to Microcinema" articles very eye-opening. I did not know anything about the history of film festivals and Phil Hall's article provided a sufficient, yet detailed overview of how they evolved and developed. I found the Nomad VideoFilm Festival the most interesting example. The idea of a mobile film festival is extremely innovative and targeted an exclusive audience through its word of mouth marketing and screening experimental short films. After reading this article, I now know the variety of approaches when organizing a film festival including themes, marketing, venue, target audiences, and many other aspects. 

I have never heard of a microcinema before reading Alvin’s article. She did make a valid point that the ‘art house’ cinema is a disappearing venue due to online streaming videos and the loss of film theater financing. When I was studying abroad, there were multiple art house cinemas scattered around London that would only screen independent and foreign films. There were only two major theaters that would screen ‘blockbuster films’. I wish this was the case in America. Although there are art house cinemas in the U.S., I feel like they are only accessible in large cities and not in smaller areas. For instance, there has been a hand full of films, such as Zero Theorem (2013), that I’ve wished to see while in Wilmington, but the film is only screened in ‘selected’ theaters. I find that the accessibility to view independent and foreign films within Wilmington is extremely limited. It is in need of an art house cinema or microcinema.