How to run an inter­na­tion­al film festival

You can’t real­ly move for great film fes­ti­vals way down Aus­tralia way, but short­ly incom­ing is the lat­est edi­tion of the Mel­bourne Inter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val, which runs from the 28 July to the 14 August. On the evi­dence of the recent­ly announced line-up, this one looks set to be a crack­er. We caught up with the festival’s Artis­tic Direc­tor, Michelle Carey, to find out how she goes about mak­ing the event such a suc­cess, the impor­tance of adapt­ing to the land­scape of the city, and why the promise of dis­cov­ery is such a vital ingre­di­ent when it comes to attract­ing punters.

Carey: Every­thing pos­si­ble! The Artis­tic Direc­tor real­ly sets the tone for the fes­ti­val, and every­thing flows on from there. Most impor­tant­ly, pick films that peo­ple will appre­ci­ate, or even have their minds blown by, and care about their pre­sen­ta­tion. But I think it’s also impor­tant to put for­ward some sort of defence of cin­e­ma, whether it’s screen­ing films that peo­ple have not seen before, or show­ing the work of a direc­tor who may elic­it strong respons­es, neg­a­tive or positive.

Admis­sions, yes. But also people’s respons­es as they come out of the cin­e­ma, even as they go in, what they are say­ing on social media or in reviews. A nice sim­ple one: are peo­ple smil­ing? Are they talk­ing about films? Do they look excit­ed? Hear­ing peo­ple talk about the films on the train is always nice.

Well both, and I don’t think these need to be con­tra­dic­to­ry strate­gies. There are cer­tain films or direc­tors most peo­ple are going to want to see, and will expect to see at a fes­ti­val like MIFF. But then there are also die-hard niche audi­ences – those that love hor­ror, any­thing around fash­ion, LGB­TIQ, lan­guage-based, human rights sto­ries, etc. Niche doesn’t mean they are minor audi­ences, just that they are high­ly atten­u­at­ed to cer­tain lan­guages, or themes, gen­res, etc. I myself sit some­where with­in all this. I don’t think I’m a niche audi­ence myself, but I’m also inter­est­ed in the shin­ing gems that lie beneath the surface.

There are two main fac­tors – the peo­ple and the city. The peo­ple of Mel­bourne have always been keen cul­ture-devour­ers, it’s a great city for music and art espe­cial­ly. And peo­ple from all over the coun­try move to Mel­bourne to be able to take part in the many cul­tur­al events here. This can’t be under­stat­ed enough when one con­sid­ers new audi­ences. Peo­ple move here every year and that brings new audi­ences. And the city itself is com­pact, so it’s easy to trav­el between venues, whether by foot or on a tram, which are free in the CBD (cen­tral busi­ness dis­trict). Plus it’s easy to access any­thing you need for fes­ti­val going, whether it’s good cof­fee or good bars.

Yes, I think so. Because fes­ti­vals are about dis­cov­ery. My favourite fes­ti­vals have always had inter­est­ing ret­ro­spec­tives. I love see­ing all the new films, but to con­trast them with old­er films – clas­sics or films that didn’t make it to the film his­to­ry canon for what­ev­er rea­son – real­ly makes a fes­ti­val. Still, ret­ro­spec­tives are not for every­one, which is absolute­ly fine. But I think at least in the Aus­tralian con­text, they are one of the pro­gram­ming inter­ests that real­ly set MIFF apart.

MIFF runs from the 28 July to the 14 August. For more details, vis­it their web­site here.