film festival
Latest
An AI-focused film festival is coming to New York in February
Filmmakers can user green screen, text-to-image and other AI techniques in their movies.
‘Fortnite’ will host an animated short film festival this weekend
The looping 30-minute program includes some Oscar nominees.
Our favorite films and VR experiences at Sundance 2021
Here’s what we’ve learned from covering the 2021 Sundance: Virtual film festivals can be awkward, but it’s still an absolute rush to get an early look at some of the year’s most interesting films.
Tribeca Film Festival is bringing its VR films to Oculus headsets
Just like pretty much every other event for the foreseeable future, the Tribeca Film Festival isn't taking place as it normally would after organizers postponed it from April. However, the festival is joining SXSW in making some of its programming available online. Tribeca is already streaming a new short film per day, and there's more on the way.
Why streaming isn’t the savior of canceled film festivals
The cancellation of the SXSW festival came as a major blow to the film industry, bringing with it the postponement of 99 world premieres. To cut down on the spread of coronavirus, other film festivals soon followed suit. All this has led to a flurry of Twitter users suggesting film festivals should pivot to streaming. That isn't the easy answer viral tweets would have you believe. Still, there's a way it might work. Focusing on SXSW, there have been suggestions that film critics could create a DIY streaming festival by sharing the logins and passwords we are given to screen select films from home. Beyond being a breach of professional etiquette, sharing screening links could easily be shut down by the filmmakers and PR reps who oversee them. A password change or a pulled upload is all it'd take to cut a title from this proposed lineup.
Last week of voting for Dailymotion/Original iPhone Film Festival finalists
Everyone loves a winner, and when it comes to the top 12 finalists in the Original iPhone Film Festival (OIFF), the decision about who should get the golden trophy comes down to all of you. This year's 12 finalists in the competition (co-hosted by video site Dailymotion) are facing off across four categories to see who's got the best clip. All of these entries are built from footage captured exclusively on iOS devices, and they're a lovely showcase for what's possible with the iPhone 4S's new camera. The voting for winners continues through next Wednesday, and the final tally will be announced live at Macworld | iWorld on Thursday the 26th of January. Best of luck to the finalists -- now get out there and vote!
Watch game trailers and short films on an NYC rooftop
Kill Screen magazine is hosting a short video game film festival in the skies of NYC on July 30. The festival will include entries like that one Dead Island trailer, Super There Will Be Blood, and an excerpt from Mojang: the Story of Minecraft. And since it's on a rooftop, maybe Batman will show up!
Apple's Insomnia Film Festival cancelled
Excited for Apple's Insomnia Film Festival? Don't hold your breath -- Apple has contacted participants via email to say that the event has been canceled. The "festival" was supposed to be Apple giving participants a list of elements and 24 hours to make a three-minute film about them, but after some unexpected server problems, the festival was postponed until after the holidays last year. The website is gone, and they are now saying that they are "unable to reschedule the festival as hoped," which means it's off indefinitely. The email also says that Apple teams "constantly seek new and better ways to showcase your artistic expression," and that there will be other "opportunities to participate in Apple creative festivals." Unfortunately, they're no more specific than that -- it's unknown whether the problems last year are still going on, or if Apple has something else going down that can't conflict with Insomnia. It's too bad -- it would have been great to see what kinds of films came out of the competition. But of course given what's going on with the economy and what's happening at AAPL, this was probably just the first corner cut.
Slamdance treats games as kid-centric
Take a look at the finalists for the 2007 Slamdance Guerilla Gamemakers Competition and notice how only one game even remotely tackles a controversial subject, Super Columbine Massacre RPG. That game has subsequently been dropped from the running. And like that, we are reminded how video games are perceived.In a biting editorial, Newsweek's resident gamer N'Gai Croal condemns Slamdance President Peter Baxter's decision, noting the disparate treatment between games and cinema. Film festivals (of which Slamdance is a part) are notorious for showing pieces that tackle controversial topics that could make SCMRPG look like Mario Party. Our understanding is that the game's creator was simply trying to explore an issue, much like Gus Van Sant's film Elephant.Though we agree with Croal's editorial, we do sympathize with Baxter's position, who was losing financial backers because of the game's inclusion. We are reminded that the game industry is still in an infant stage, and any controversial subject will have detractors. All we can do is stand up for what we believe in, and know someday the general consensus on gaming will expand into a larger age bracket.
Sundance Film Festival: coming soon to your cellphone
While it's no surprise that video on cellphone screens is quickly becoming the next hurrah, it's saying something when ole Robert Redford himself dedicates a new branch of the Sundance Film Festival specifically to the mobile audience. Teaming up with the GSM Association, Sundance Institute is creating the Sundance Film Festival: Global Short Film Project in order to showcase the popularity and credibility in delivering media to those wee screens. Organizers have commissioned "six independent filmmakers to create five short films, crafted exclusively for mobile distribution," and all will make their debut at the world's largest annual mobile event -- the 3GSM World Congress -- in Barcelona next year. Dubbed as "the fourth screen," there's certainly a lot of coin to be made by opening up a new medium to deliver content, but there's always TinyTube (or Orb) to keep your multimedia-playing mobile happy until Hollywood takes it over.[Via Mobile Gadget News]
Portable Film Festival coming this Wednesday
If you're like me, you consider yourself something of a film connoisseur, attending film festivals every chance you have. But not all of us are fortunate enough to live nearby the Tribeca Film Festival. No worries. The Portable Film Festival is launching this Wednesday, and it will let you download 67 pre-selected films from all over the world to your PSP. The films were created specifically for the small screen, and they include animations, documentaries, experimental works, and more. Not only will you be able to download the films to your PSP, you'll also be able to vote for your favorite film. The winner of the competition will earn $1500 and software from Autodesk (that doesn't come cheap, trust me). So, get your Memory Sticks ready! Check out a mini-interview after the cut.
