This past year Zachary Tannar has been working his filmmaking connections across Vancouver Island to put together the Hub City Cinema Society’s second two-day Cinefest film festival.
Rather than put out a call for submissions, all films for the Island-centric event have been selected by the HCCS president with support from the group’s board of directors.
“I know most of the filmmakers already on the Island, so I don’t really need them to submit. I know who’s making stuff, I know who’s putting stuff out there,” Tannar said.
Despite this advantage, rounding up enough films for the festival proved challenging at first. Tannar said he occasionally doubted whether the event would live up to last year’s inaugural Cinefest.
“Last year we had a big festival, we showed three features, we had a ton of short films and going into this year I was a little worried that maybe our filmmakers haven’t been very busy and I wouldn’t have enough to put together a full show,” he said. “And it was almost at a point where we only had enough films for really one night.”
Tannar said in order to be considered a proper film festival the event would have to last two days. He did some extra searching and was eventually able to compile two distinct, full programs. The festival’s Mature Movies Showcase takes place on Sept. 26, followed by its Friendly Films Showcase the following day. In total there are 19 short films ranging from one to 30 minutes in length, the majority by Nanaimo filmmakers. The top 10 entries into HCCS’s One Minute Mobile Movie Challenge will also be screened.
“A majority of films, I think all of them except maybe five of them, have been shown at other festivals around the world, so that’s kind of my primary criteria,” Tannar said, adding that he also considers movies that lack distribution but deserve an audience.
“There are a lot of films that have a local flavour that just might not be seen any where else.”
While last year’s festival was held at VIU’s Malaspina Theatre, this year’s event is being hosted at Avalon Cinema. Tannar said it’s an ideal venue.
“It’s got everybody excited. I think as a filmmaker we all fall in love with movies at the movie theatre, watching them there,” Tannar said.
“And it’s a dream, I think, of every filmmaker to have their movie actually shown there. So it’s going to be a really special occasion.”
WHAT’S ON … The Hub City Cinema Society’s Cinefest film festival takes place at the Avalon Cinema on Sept. 26 and 27, doors at 6:30 p.m., show at 7 p.m. Tickets are $10, $5 for members and students, available at the box office or online. Click here for a list of films and to purchase tickets.
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