Festivals of their Own Response

The article discussed the origins of film a festival since around the 1930’s. At this time, Benito Mussolini was in power and saw this as a good opportunity to use film as a way “bolster his standings in the eyes of the world” (pg.189). I found it interesting that the festival was held in Venice even though film actually originated in France with people like the Lumiere brothers in the late 1800s. France did eventually try and create one but it was on the day that Germany invaded Poland, thus starting World War II. The text went on to say how several other festivals came about. Starting with the Cannes film festival in France, then Germany created one in order to combat the French, and then Italy revisited the Venice Festival. I found it interesting that Sundance was not fully established as Sundance till about the 1960’s. I thought that it had literally been around since World War II. The text goes on to make several good points about the old films festivals and how they have kind of forgotten the point of film festivals which is to actually show movies that cannot be seen really anywhere else. They have just become high class for already well established filmmakers that already have a theatrical or a television release planned for their film. The whole point of the film festival is to give recognition to filmmakers who aren’t really that well known but still work hard at their art. It is meant to be a discussion for the films being seen and a chance for several different types of filmmakers to interact. It made me glad to see that in response to that several other smaller festivals came about in order to pursue that goal and create an environment for all types of filmmakers.