scholarly journals Film festivals as cosmopolitan assemblages

2018 ◽  
pp. 111-125
Author(s):  
Monia Acciari
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Competency ◽  
Film Festival ◽  
Film Festivals ◽  
Deleuze And Guattari ◽  
Associate Director

In this article, I seek to explore the use and development of the notion of cosmopolitanism within the context of film festivals. I will examine the specific case study of the Leicester Asian Film Festival from the perspective of an insider—as a Film Programmer and Associate Director of the event. The questions that I intend to answer are: what happens to our understanding of film festivals when we frame it through discourses of cosmopolitanism and borders and, conversely, what happens to our understanding of cosmopolitanism when we frame it through film festival studies? Accordingly, I will place cosmopolitanism in conversation with the developing literature on film festival studies. The aim is to offer an idea of film festivals as “cosmopolitan assemblage”, within a frame of fluidity, exchangeability and multiple functionalities (Deleuze and Guattari). In developing this concept, I will draw on Ulf Hannerz’s use of the term cosmopolitanism that includes being open to and involved with otherness. The aim is to theorise the idea of festivals as borders, and inspire new forms of consciousness and cultural competency applied to film festival programming.

Absence, Ambiguity, and Deviating Pleasure Activism: The Tokyo Rainbow Film Festival

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-36
Author(s):  
Qin QIN
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Studies ◽  
Methodological Framework ◽  
Film Festival ◽  
Film Festivals ◽  
Two Factors ◽  
Diachronic Study ◽  
Historical Trajectory ◽  
A Site ◽  
Shed Light

Abstract Whereas several Japanese popular magazines have published reports and interviews on LGBT film festival curators, little scholarship has shed light on Japanese LGBT film festivals. This article serves as a case study of how the festival enables the festival community—cinephiles, LGBT audiences, organized groups of activists, and indie filmmakers—to share ideas and coordinate within and outside the metropolis. I conduct a synchronic and diachronic study to sketch the historical trajectory of the festivalgoers, material spaces, festival formation, curation, and programming. In utilizing a methodological framework which includes geopolitics, gender, film, and organizational studies, this article proposes an approach that juxtaposes the classic concept of ‘counterpublics’ with the theoretical reading of affective politics and pleasure activism. The findings suggest that the Tokyo Rainbow Reel Film Festival functions as a site of discursive political stances and affective disposition. The ambiguity of the film festival space correlates closely with two factors: Japanese homophobia, or ‘the absence of LGBT’, and an unorthodox pleasure activism that does not include suffering and oppression.

More than a “Chinese Century”: The Case of International Film Festival and Awards Macao

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennie Jordan ◽  
Hiu Man Chan
Keyword(s):  
Soft Power ◽  
Cultural Policy ◽  
Mainland China ◽  
Marketing Strategies ◽  
Film Festival ◽  
Film Festivals ◽  
Event Management ◽  
International Reputation ◽  
Unique Status

This paper contributes to debates around cultural event management in the Chinese century by investigating the case of the International Film Festival & Awards Macao (IFFAM). It first problematises the Chinese century concept by contrasting studies on film-related soft power in China as cultural diplomacy with the Macao Special Administrative Government’s use of festivals and events as place marketing strategies. It argues Macao does not fit comfortably into the soft power paradigm normally associated with China and uses the festival to illuminate areas of difference. Within this problematised context, the case study of IFFAM is built on existing studies of eventalisation as urban cultural policies. The analysis section demonstrates IFFAM differs from state-led film activities in mainland China. Findings presented and evaluated include official announcements about IFFAM by the Macao Government Tourism Office (MGTO), where the festival’s objective to ‘improve Macao’s international reputation’ are contrasted with the paradigms underpinning mainland China’s going-out international trade policy. Further findings relate to the festival’s programming strategies, and domestic and international reception of IFFAM in the past years, answering the question of whether Macao and IFFAM act as intermediaries, influencing cultural policy and film festival production practices in other regions of China and recentring film festivals’ focus from Europe to Asia. It emphasises the importance of IFFAM’s development in Macao because of its unique status and potential as an alternative, intermediary lens for observing the Chinese century.

scholarly journals From the event to the everyday: distributor-driven film festivals

2020 ◽  
pp. 1329878X2093847
Author(s):  
Stuart Richards ◽  
Lauren Carroll Harris
Keyword(s):  
Film Industry ◽  
Interesting Case ◽  
Film Festival ◽  
Film Festivals ◽  
Film Culture ◽  
European North ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Important Field ◽  
Primary Focus

Film festival research is an important field within screen and cultural studies, with festivals mainly theorised as a cinephile phenomenon occurring in European/North American contexts. Though cinephilia is indeed a major aspect of film festivals, adopting cinephilia as a primary focus for festival research obscures, and cannot explain, other motivations for running festivals, as well as how festivals fit into other trends in the film industry and film culture today. As researchers and film critics working in Australia, we have observed trends in festival culture that do not fit the dominant cinephilic framework. Principal among these trends is the emergence of Palace Cinemas, an arthouse cinema chain, and Palace Films, its distribution arm, as the curator and presenter of its own chain of film festivals. This essay presents an interesting case study that considers Palace Cinemas in relation to dominant understandings of the film festival. These film festivals do not exclusively fit either of Mark Peranson’s ideal models of festivals – audiences festivals or business festivals – but rather between these two positions. These distributor-driven film festivals, such as those run by Palace, greatly diminish any association with festival time, defined by Janet Harbord as a key feature of festivals.

scholarly journals Creative and emotional labour

2019 ◽  
pp. 128-145
Author(s):  
Alexandra Colta
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Creative Process ◽  
Collaborative Research ◽  
Film Festival ◽  
Film Festivals ◽  
Research Project ◽  
Emotional Labour ◽  
Academic Scholarship ◽  
Made In

Film festival curation and programming remain highly individualistic practices, that negotiate several discourses/tensions, including the responsibility of the curator to others (artists and audiences) and the creative independence of the curator. Much remains to be written about the creative process of curation, and how aesthetic judgements are articulated by those who practice it. While progress in this direction has been made in relation to some festivals (LGBT, African), human rights film festivals have only recently started to be part of academic scholarship, which tended to focus on the main functions and spectatorship roles that they encourage (Tascón; Tascón and Wils; Davies). This article focuses on the creative process of programming human rights film festivals using the case study of Document Human Rights Film Festival in Glasgow. Part of a practice-led collaborative research project between the Universities of Glasgow, St Andrews and the festival, this article is based on my reflections and experience as a co-opted member of the programming team for the 2016 and 2017 editions. Drawing on practice-led ethnography, I argue that this festival adopted a form of ethical programming, sharing authorship and responsibility towards the audience, the filmmakers and the profession, as well as a form of emotional labour.

scholarly journals Negotiating ‘Asianness’ at the Tokyo International Film Festival Local, Regional and International Dynamics Through Programming Practices and Film Markets

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eugenio De Angelis
Keyword(s):  
Film Industry ◽  
Film Festival ◽  
Film Festivals ◽  
History Of ◽  
Specific Interests ◽  
Asian Cinema ◽  
Programming Practices ◽  
International Status ◽  
Over Time

In this paper I will trace a brief history of major Asian film festivals to understand how the notion of ‘Asianness’ evolved over time and how it is expressed nowadays through programming practices and film markets. Then I will focus on the case study of the Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF) as a problematic site where cultural and economic dynamics converge. As an A-category festival, TIFF has to balance its international status with regional relevance, negotiating ‘Asianness’ in a complex relationship involving the local film industry, since questions on ‘Asian cinema’ are deeply linked to the national. Finally, I will draw some conclusions, discussing how TIFF relates to other major film festivals in Asia, where ‘Asianness’ has been used as a shared effort to distinguish themselves from the paradigm set by European film festivals. However, this is an ongoing process, TIFF struggles to use ‘Asianness’ as a unifying element and the specific interests of each festival obstruct the possibility to create a more systematic trans-Asian model.

scholarly journals The media festival volunteer: Connecting online and on-ground fan labor

2013 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Moses Peaslee ◽  
Jessica El-Khoury ◽  
Ashley Liles
Keyword(s):  
Participant Observation ◽  
Observation Data ◽  
Film Festival ◽  
Film Festivals ◽  
Initial Attempt ◽  
Free Labor ◽  
The Media ◽  
A Site

In this initial attempt to bring volunteering, or what we call on-ground fan labor, into the ongoing discussion of fan productivity, we examine volunteer motivations as elicited through interview and participant observation data collected at a 2012 genre film festival, Fantastic Fest, held in Austin, Texas. This case study is a first step toward integrating the volunteer and fan labor literatures and interrogating the role of social capital and civic engagement in volunteerism. We conclude that the media festival (a term intended to encompass such sites as film festivals and fan conventions) is a site of particular and emergent importance for those studying the audience's increasing delivery of free labor.

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