Hollywood-gossip addicts aren't likely to get any celebrity scoops at the RiverRun International Film Festival this week.
Artistic types probably won't see their favorite stars cloaked in dark scarves and blazers. The George Clooneys and Julia Robertses of the world frequent festivals in Salt Lake City and Cannes, France, not Winston-Salem. And there aren't enough cameras here for the Paris Hiltons and Lindsay Lohans.
But, despite the lack of A-list stars, RiverRun is making a bigger name for itself -- and a bigger financial splash -- each year.
"We're not trying to be Sundance, we're not trying to be Tribeca," said Andrew Rodgers, RiverRun's executive director. "What we are is a really strong regional film festival."
The festival sold about 11,000 tickets last year -- almost four times the 3,000 it sold in 2003, when the festival first came to Winston-Salem. More than 300 volunteers are expected to pitch in this year, and a RiverRun jury will present more than 10 awards to filmmakers.
Based on last year's attendance, the festival will have an estimated economic impact of about $3.3 million, said Richard Emmett, the chief operating officer for the Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County.
Rodgers said that a survey last year showed that most of the people who attend RiverRun live in North Carolina -- and, of those, most live in the Triad -- which means the bulk of the money comes from local residents. But it is money that those residents could have spent outside of Winston-Salem.
Keeping it here helps the local economy, Winston-Salem Mayor Allen Joines said.
Such cultural events as RiverRun also create intangible benefits for the city, Joines said.
Joines serves on the fundraising committee for the National Black Theatre Festival, which is put on by the N.C. Black Repertory Company. He said that such cultural offerings as festivals are especially important to the "knowledge-based industries" -- the scientists and doctors -- that Winston-Salem is trying to attract.
"It does create a certain amount of visitors to the community in both the film producers and people who actually come from out of town to the festival," Joines said. "But secondly and -- probably as importantly to me as an economic-development guy -- is the image it helps to create for the community as a vibrant place where a company might want to locate, because of things like the film festival and the National Black Theatre Festival."
Dealing with economic downturn
Festival organizers knew the downturn in the economy would affect their sponsorships this year and did their best to prepare for it, Rodgers said. Sponsorships -- not including in-kind donations -- dropped from about $142,000 to about $115,000.
Anticipating a large drop, organizers turned to grants, which have more than offset the decline in corporate contributions. Grants from such groups as the Arts Council and the Millennium Fund increased from $102,000 to $174,000.
Rodgers said that the festival's strength is built primarily on the selection of films shown. Festival organizers choose from more than 1,000 films, he said, submitted from all over the world.
Although a locally made film can sometimes guarantee an audience, Rodgers said he doesn't want to weaken the crop of films in the festival just to be able to say that local filmmakers are involved.
Still, there is a strong local flavor to this year's festival, with a number of filmmakers having ties to the area. The list includes Eyeborgs, from Crimson Wolf Productions, based in Lewisville; Goodbye Solo, directed by Winston-Salem native Ramin Bahrani; Rocaterrania by Brett Ingram, a UNC Greensboro professor and documentary filmmaker; and With These Hands: The Story of an American Furniture Factory, by Matt Barr, another professor and filmmaker at UNCG.
The presence of so many local films is just a fluke this year, Rodgers said. Many area filmmakers make submissions to the festival each year, but Rodgers estimates that about 90 percent of the films fail to make the cut.
Uneven support for independents
Independent films have gotten somewhat mixed support from Winston-Salem audiences in recent years. While RiverRun has flourished, other efforts have failed.
North Point 5, a theater which once featured art-house style films, closed in 2003 and is now a church.
Films on Fourth, a series that showed independent films at the Stevens Center, shut down in 2007 amid financial problems caused by poor attendance.
For many area film buffs, seeing even the most heralded foreign films means making a trip to Greensboro.
That has left a void for film lovers looking for something more than the latest Hollywood blockbuster, said Peter Brunette, a journalist and film critic who directs the film-studies program at Wake Forest University.
"I tell my students the two most tragic words in the English language are ‘Greensboro only,'" he said, referring to local listings for independent films that are not screened here.
The buzz created by a film festival such as RiverRun can be hard to sustain on a scale large enough to support art-house theaters and independent film series, he said.
David Morgan is the deputy editor of The Hollywood Reporter and has extensively traveled the global festival circuit, hitting all the big-name festivals including Cannes, Toronto and Hong Kong.
RiverRun organizers invited him to be part of the festival's jury last year. He didn't know much about the festival, so he started asking his film-business contacts about RiverRun.
He liked what he heard.
"RiverRun has a really good reputation," he said. "It's respected as one of the better small festivals in the country," said Morgan, who is returning this year to take part in a panel discussion.
"RiverRun will never be a first-run festival (like those in major cities)," Morgan said. "But it can become respected for bringing in quality films."
Having successful filmmakers in town increases the likelihood that the area will be chosen as a location when they make their next films, Morgan said.
"You've got a thousand things you can thump your chest about in that region," he said.
Rebecca Clark, the director of the Piedmont Triad Film Commission, agrees, pointing to director Rick Beiber as an example.
Beiber's film Aurora Borealis played at RiverRun in 2005. Last year, Beiber returned to the area to shoot scenes for his next film, The 5th Quarter, about former Wake Forest football player Jon Abbate and the team's 2006 run to the Orange Bowl.
Beiber could have used other colleges to stand in for Wake Forest, but he chose to come here in part because he learned of the area through RiverRun, Clark said.
"It's a great opportunity for me to network with filmmakers," said Clark, whose job is to lure productions here to take advantage of the area's diverse settings. "It's become a formidable festival. Not only is it growing, but people are taking notice."
■ Paul Garber can be reached at 727-7327 or at pgarber@wsjournal.com.
■ Laura Graff can be reached at 727-7279 or at lgraff@wsjournal.com.
RiverRun 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007**** 2008 2009
Tickets issued* 2,594 5,988 6,790 8,782 7,516 10,567 n/a
Attendees (est.)** 3,000 6,250 7,000 7,500 8,250 11,000 n/a
Ticket sales $15,517 $34,793 $37,815 $42,146 $53,019 $71,781 n/a
Expenses*** $186,631 $228,877 $386,768 $371,586 $361,396 $657,459 *****
Total Films 69 110 134 77 95 95 107
Countries represented 8 19 18 24 25 26 27
Screens Used 5 5 8 7 8 7 6
Volunteers 110 120 120 210 229 260 315+
Number of Days 4 4 4 4 6 6 8
* The number of 2006 tickets issued was inflated due to tickets being distributed and going unused by sponsors.
** Estimate includes the number of film/panel/party tickets issued, passholders, student screenings and nonticketed festival events.
*** Expenses are as recorded in RiverRun's annual audit report and include both cash and in-kind offsets.
**** In 2007 RiverRun switched to a fiscal year calendar, and so expenses recorded are from 01/01/07 - 06/30/07. Starting in 2008, expense calendar runs 07/01 through 06/30.
***** Cash-only budget for 2008 is $368,860.
Email
Facebook
Google
Twitter
Favorites
More
Advertisement