9.3 National and Regional Showcases

Traditionally film festivals have been influenced by, or only exist due to, geopolitics. Festivals do more than just showcase films an audience would otherwise not have a chance to see. The film festival circuit as an alternative distribution network has a strong influence on the status of a film, the attention it receives and potentially the commercial life it has. Thus, many regional festivals – financed by the regional municipalities – are expected to weigh in their influence to highlight national and regional works and further the region’s (film) economy (cf. Reichel-Heldt 2007, section 1.1).

Ahn, SooJeong. The Pusan International Film Festival 1996-2005: South Korean Cinema in Local, Regional, and Global Context. PhD Thesis, University of Nottingham, 2008, eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/10513/1/AHN_etheses_all.pdf. Accessed 2 July 2021.

Ciecko, Anne. “Bridges Between: Reflections on Dubai and Its International Film Festival.” Asian Cinema, vol. 17, no. 2, 2006, pp. 17–25. doi:10.1386/ac.17.2.17_5.

Hedling, Olof. “‘Detta dåliga samvete’: om kortfilmen, regionerna och filmfestivalerna.” [‘This bad conscience’: On short film, regions and film festivals]. Välfärdsbilder: Svensk film utanför biografen, edited by Erik Hedling, Statens ljud- och bildarkiv, 2008, pp. 261–81.

 

(Last updated: 17 September 2021)