Film Festival Alliance fills January film fest meetup void with FilmEx, adds more staff

Film Festival Alliance (FFA) announced the creation of FilmEx, a virtual gathering of talks, panels, and presentations focusing on innovation, technological analysis, and methods to promote equity and inclusion in the film festival industry and independent film exhibition space. FFA also continued its growth as an organization, adding Gray Rodriguez as Director of Communications and promoting Barbara Twist to the role of Associate Director from her previously held post as Director of Membership.

FilmEx, named to include everyone involved in the independent film exhibition world, and coincidentally, as a nod to the legendary Los Angeles-based film festival in the 70s and 80s that eventually spawned not only AFI FEST directly, but the spirit and format that so many film festivals still employ to this day, will take place January 11-15, 2021. Film Festival Alliance has previously partnered with the Art House Convergence for their annual conference for several years, but as that conference is on hiatus for 2021, FFA has stepped up to host what has become an annual touchstone gathering event for the national film festival and independent film exhibition community and industry. They are currently accepting applications for prospective speakers. FilmEx speaker forms can be found at https://forms.gle/jo7jq8sC14jd47Rm7. Registration for the event will open on Tuesday, November 23.

Film Festival Alliance Executive Director Lela Meadow-Conner, said, “FilmEx will set the tone for the year to come, bringing everyone in the ever-growing film festival and art house cinema communities together in the virtual space we are all currently inhabiting, to share new ideas, methods, and business practices, as our members and others continue to innovate the ways in which we present films, and benefit filmmakers, distributors and audiences. We hope to join the voices of experience and bring new ones to the table, to look at the ways in which we move forward and the opportunities that exist for change.”

Film Festival Alliance has partnered with organizations including Alliance for Action, Art House Convergence, Avenue ISR, Festival Formula LTD, Firelight Media, Full Spectrum Features, IFP, Queering the Cinema, Theatrical At Home, and Together Films to provide a wide-ranging, dynamic, and comprehensive array of panels, talks, conversation tracks, and events to process, deconstruct, and look towards the future of our industry.

Among the FilmEx topics informed by, but not limited to, the experiences of film festivals dealing with the realities of operating during the pandemic, will be; Building Loyalty & Audience Engagement in the Virtual Spaces; Next Level Grant Writing; Balancing Sponsorship in the Virtual & IRL Worlds; Redefining Success from An Experiential POV; Confronting Reduced Bandwidth & Oversaturation; Staffing Sustainability: Retention in the Age of Covid; and Rethinking Programming Categories & Barriers.

Additionally, participants at FilmEx will connect with this year’s FFA Leadership Lab Fellows, engage in conversations focused squarely on continuing efforts to improve equity and inclusion within their organizations and programming, meet with distributors, key industry vendors, and even participate in virtual karaoke, film trivia events, select screenings, and other social events – all in an effort to give film festivals and independent film exhibitors the tools they will need to continue to connect, innovate, streamline, and build upon the success many film festivals and cinemas have experienced despite stark challenges presented to them this year..

Film Festival Alliance has been cited in numerous interviews with executive directors of regional film festivals across the country as having been instrumental in aiding their success throughout the year as they innovated and brought about measures to present their events in the midst of the pandemic. As FFA’s member film festivals, on the whole, went beyond surviving in a year beset with unforeseen hurdles and roadblocks, to instead, expand their audience and branding reach via virtual presentations as well as increasing their support of filmmakers, Film Festival Alliance also grew its activity, consultation, and events since March which has demanded more staff to support those efforts.

“It is an amazing testament to our film festival community that in one year’s time, we’ve been able to triple our consulting staff. The need to come together as an industry has never been more evident.” said Meadow-Conner. “Barbara Twist has been essential this year in helping our organization and membership navigate these unchartered waters. Gray Rodriguez brings marketing experience from many different points of view, that will greatly support the sustainability and growth of our programming. She has been a valuable member of the Alliance and the regional festival landscape and I’m thrilled that she is joining our team.”

Gray Rodriguez is a film festival organizer and enthusiast with a particular affinity for operations and marketing.  Currently the Director of Marketing for the Tallgrass Film Association, following a stint as that organization’s volunteer director, which evolved from her own time as a volunteer for the Tallgrass International Film Festival. Rodriguez has spent the past three years volunteering with the Sundance Film Festival in artist relations and has previously served as a marketing consultant for the Bentonville Film Festival.

Additionally, FFA has promoted Barbara Twist, formerly Director of Membership, to an Associate Director role. In her new position, Twist will continue to oversee membership and be more actively involved with FFA’s programming. Twist is a filmmaker and exhibition consultant based in Los Angeles. She has been a consultant for Europa Cinemas, Europa International and IndieCollect, among others. She previously worked with Art House Convergence as the Managing Director, where she first nurtured her passion for Art Houses & Film Festivals. She is on the board of the Ann Arbor Film Festival and Cinema Lamont. She holds an MFA in Creative Producing from Columbia University, and has produced several award-winning short films. Barbara also currently serves as Director of Partnerships for the Vidiots Foundation.

More information on Film Festival Alliance can be found at: https://filmfestivalalliance.org/.