So when the opportunity to report at their 4th Future Film Festival came up, I jumped at the chance. The weekend’s programme boasted a diverse range of sessions, screenings and workshops. I arrived eager on Saturday morning and looked over the schedule again, before queuing for tickets to my favoured sessions. On Saturday delegates had the option to attend 4 out of a possible 12 sessions. It felt like I was in a my favourite restaurant trying to decide which of the amazing dishes to choose. Sometimes I chose well, sometimes I chose the chicken...
It started well when I attended my first awards ceremony (which you can read about here) – the Future Film Animation awards. It was exciting to see that this, a classic, yet oft overlooked medium in film (except the recent flow of brilliant pixar films), was thriving and producing some incredibly slick, clever and endearing films. The winner of the 19-25 category, Train of Thought, can be seen here.
However, for my next workshop on ‘screenwriting’ we’d been shoved down in the basement of the BFI which wasn’t ideal. The room looked as if it held about 15 people, 20 max. 30 odd showed up. Suddenly this intimate little session turned into an overcrowded lecture. The leader explained that he would usually get to know his students better, but there were simply too many of us.
If the numbers had been right it may well have been a better session, but with too many delegates there was no room for any real discussion or in depth analysis of writing techniques. The only message I came away with was ‘show, don’t tell’, which is pretty much the first line of any scriptwriting book anyway.
So on I went to ‘In your face: getting your film seen’ - a panel discussion about breaking into the festival circuit and finding a distributor for your shorts. In amongst the slightly stilted discussion, there was a lot good advice given by the panel (which can be found here), but at the time I slightly resented having one of the experts say ‘I guess I just got lucky’; this isn’t the kind of advice aspiring filmmakers need to hear.
I left on the Saturday evening with a bag of notes but a lot of mixed messages. I felt lightly despondent, not inspired like I expected; something about the first day just hadn’t lived up to my expectations.
Thankfully the fest really got into its stride on Sunday.
The screening of Gareth Edwards’ Monsters, followed by a Q&A with him was a true delight and there was a noticeable buzz as people left the cinema. Hearing Edwards talk about his film with so much passion and enthusiasm was the perfect way to start the day - this is the kind of inspiration I was looking for from the off. (Read more about Monsters here)
I then attended an advice session about being a critic - this was the first ‘expert panel’ to truly offer some good advice. Members included a writer for Sight & Sound, Online Editor for Little White Lies and film writer for Who’s Jack. Questions from the floor where informative and succinctly answered, and the panel chair asked questions of the delegates making it feel much more like a two way discussion
The day ended on a high with the screening and results of the Future Film Fiction awards. For me this was the highlight of the weekend - while the 19-25 category were good, the 15-18s stole the show with 3 very different, but very intelligent short films. (You can read about them here.)
By the end of Sunday I felt inspired again.
This is still a young festival, with much potential, but still with a bit to learn. Its main draw for me - that it is aimed specifically at 15-25 year olds - was one of its drawbacks. The difference in knowledge that 10 years makes is amazing - and in trying to cater for such a wide group of people, some of the practical sessions lost their focus and ended up being too basic.
And, though I may sound like I have a chip on my Northern shoulder, programme organisers need to remember that it’s the British Film Institute, not the London Film Institute. Very little discussion was given to other filmmaking cities, such as Manchester or Edinburgh and too often people assumed that all delegates lived and worked in London.
That said, I thoroughly enjoyed my weekend. Both panel discussions I attended were informative - in particular the film critic session - and I was genuinely in awe of what Gareth Edwards had managed to achieve. But the Awards ceremonies were the highlight for me, in particular seeing the work created by youth groups to try and inspire young adults to find their voice through the medium of film.
As I said, this is still a young festival with much to learn, and with each year it will grow, and grow better. I would certainly recommend it for aspiring young filmmakers - to see the work that your peers are producing (and be embarrassed by and made jealous of the quality of projects submitted by people 5 years younger than you!) is a great way to get your mind working. It's also a fantastic place to network, meet like minded people and get access to industry professionals. I look forward to the day when I can go back and see the winners of this years categories presenting their debut feature films, noting how it was this festival that inspired them in the first place.
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