Post 1: Reflecting on ‘Enthusiastic Amateurs’

Around the world, film festival emerges during the post war, many which inherit European’s characteristics where it reflects on the pre- and post- Second World War European geopolitics. However, Kirsten Stevens argues throughout her piece while reminding the readers that the emergence of film festivals in Australia reevaluates that film festivals began as ‘European phenomenon’. To compare Australia and Europe, the purpose of their film festival is different because Europe aims to reach to a wider audience with commercial films, making their purpose about glamour and is internationally appealing. Meanwhile, Australia celebrates locals and all kind of art forms where the amateur cinema enthusiasts insist to show films that were produced outside of the Hollywood studio system, making it noncommercial and heavily emphasize on film culture.

With this reading, the origin of the Olinda Film Festival was surprisingly successful in terms with critical and financial acclaim in which became a sort of template for Melbourne and Sydney’s film festival in the future by adapting its “anti-Hollywood and anti-commercial focus” (Stevens, 2016). While organizing these events, clearly in Europe, how it is financed was one factor that distinguished between Australian and European film festivals. As demonstrated, Melbourne and Sydney’s film festival was organized by the film society where the money is sourced independently whereas in Europe, were funded by the national government which makes the structure of their film festivals as operational as it is dictated by the government agendas. This shows the governments’ high involvement with the event as well as building international relations where Australia lacks this.

As Melbourne Film Festival ensure their survival, the non-profit financial structure would be diminished when third partner Federation Internationale des Associations de Producteurs de Films (FIAPF) impacted their structure with its restrictions and regulations which limits Melbourne Film Festival with access to international films as FIAPF “removed accreditation” (Stevens, 2016)  from Melbourne Film Festival for two years. Even when the two years past, unfortunately, there were new restrictions being applied. During this, Sydney’s Film festival also were competing for international films, creating more of a strand relationship between Melbourne and Sydney.

The impact goes further when the third-party organization, has its effect on the attendees .When Australian film festivals intends to celebrate its locals by being shown to the public, during this partnership, “only those people who were members of MFF… could attend” (Stevens, 2016). This misses out the whole asset of film festival culture in Australia that it was supposed to be about appreciation to locally made films and not about international spectacles.

Reference:

Kirsten Stevens, “Enthusiastic Amateurs: Origins of Australia’s Film Festival Movement” in Kirsten Stevens, Australian Film Festivals: Audience, Place, and Exhibition Culture, Palgrave Macmillan US, New York, 2016, pp. 17-46.