From May 27th to June 5th, 2005, the GLBT and Film communities will flock to the Uptown Stage and Screen on 8th Avenue for a week of fabulous gay film. Fairy Tales has once again descended upon our city, and this year it’s bigger and better then ever!
"It’s our seventh year, so we thought ‘why not go to seven days?’" Brenda Lieberman, Festival Producer and Programming Coordinator of Fairy Tales told GayCalgary.com.
"[In the past], having it over three days, the weekend flew by so quickly that people missed it. The majority of our advertising comes from word of mouth, and it was high over three days so it will be even higher over seven. As well, [watching so] many movies in three days can be a lot to ask, so by stretching it out, it gives more people a chance to watch the films without getting burned out. They can spread the word and really look at the program guide. It helps that our advertisers as well as our sponsors now get an extra four days of advertising, so it has more appeal. Distributors want to see that we have opening, centerpiece, and closing galas, and you can’t do that over three days. We didn’t want to shoot too high so we only added four screenings, but for our first year [with this change in effect], expanding that is more than enough."
The festival has changed and grown a great deal from its early days. Lieberman gave us a brief history from the beginning to the present.
"Fairytales started in 1999 through the Calgary Society of Independent Filmmakers (CSIF). One of the staff at the time felt there was a need for this type of event in Calgary. Trevor Alberts, Kevin Allen, and Kelly Langard started the festival up. In year two, Kelly had left the festival and I was hired on at CSIF as the programming coordinator for the year. I got involved with programming all of their special events, which included assisting with Fairy Tales. At that point Trevor was volunteer-running it, and the CSIF was just hosting it. All three founders had left and Trevor asked if I would take over running it. The festival never 100% fit CSIF’s mandate, so it was bound to separate [to form] Fairy Tales, and that is where we sit now. I organize it as a volunteer and pull together people to assist. We have formed our own board of directors and are working on charitable status. We are expanding to compare to other GLBT festivals around the world."
While those in attendance see the finished product, planning for next year’s event will start shortly after this year’s event is wrapped up. Lieberman keeps her ear to the ground for films, and attends the Toronto International Film Festival on her own dime to look for potentials. Fundraising and sponsorship is a huge part of preparing, as presently the festival is entirely privately funded. A call to submissions is sent out, and when all is said and done, the selection committee sifts through more than 200 shorts to select what will be shown on screen. They also solicit for the full-length features and review them. It can be hard trying to pick the right selection of films to fit their diverse audience.
"We have a mainstream audience – people tend to like slicker production values, strong acting and a good story. We have been looking for high[ly] polished films; in the same regard we get a lot of people who want something edgier and more artistic. As we grow we get more people. We had been catering to people who we felt wanted to see really strong international cinema. Now that we are targeting a broader audience, we can bring in ‘artier’ films. I don’t think our audience goes for the same style of film that San Francisco or Toronto do, as they run 300 films in their programs, and we get a huge number of the submissions from that. We haven’t picked a lot of those because we don’t have a lot of room in the festival, so we try and pick the best of the best. Not everyone who comes to Fairy Tales is a ‘film person’ so we can’t hit them with the really strange material that doesn’t necessarily have a point. I want to bring in the most people so we pick the strongest films we can find."
This year’s festival will have some unique new films including John and Michael – a short film about two boys with down syndrome, Thailand’s "Beautiful Boxer" - their first transgendered feature based on the true story of famed Transgendered kickboxer Parinya Charoenphol (Nong Toom), and "Raspberry Reich" from acclaimed director Bruce LaBruce.
"[Reich] is very sexual and political, and definitely comes from an independent filmmaker. It is quite evident that he is keeping creative control over his work. It is heavier and probably the most sex we’ve had in a film ever. It’s not to say that is a bad thing, a lot of festivals show his work and people in Calgary want to see Bruce’s work. We haven’t shown his work before for a number of reasons, including the fact that we have had so many other films we wanted to show. We are also nervous because a lot of festivals don’t have to rate their films but we do, so by rating the film you are limiting your audience. I don’t know what Alberta Classifications will rate this [as], I imagine it will be higher than an R. We never wanted to censor our programming but in the same regards we wanted to wait until we were a little bigger to incorporate films like Raspberry Reich into the programming. ... We have never had a Transgendered film before, and Beautiful Boxer is a film that hopefully everyone will see, [since] it is an important topic. We feel strongly that it will open people’s eyes."
The plan is to bring in a varied audience. The success of last year’s popular short, D.E.B.S., resulted in a full-length feature that will run at the festival. The event will kick off with the opening gala feature, "Mysterious Skin", starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt (seen last year in "Latter Days"), Elisabeth Shue and Michelle Trachtenberg of Buffy the Vampire Slayer!
"We get a large percentage of men who only see the gay films and women who go to the others. Some we can market as a crossover film. We want to bring everyone, straight, Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Trans-identified because this whole festival is about showcasing different kinds of work that not only appeals to the GLBTQ community but those interested in film. We watch every movie as a group, guys and girls, gay and straight, and we want to all love the movie so that everyone will enjoy what we put into the festival. We want to reach as much of Calgary as we can. Some distributors don’t want to market to just a GLBTQ audience, and that is why we advertise in different forms to the broader Calgary audience."
The future looks bright for Fairy Tales, as they are taking steps towards applying for grants. Having established themselves, things will only get bigger and better.
"I see it continuing to grow, it is here to stay and we can start applying for grants. If we can get more funding I can easily see us doubling in size and bringing in filmmakers – something we have only been able to afford to do once. There is a lot of opportunity for growth. We have [smaller] festivals across Canada modeling after us, and we are modeling after the larger ones. I called a distributor in a city in the US and the person I spoke to knew who we were. Fairy Tales is making itself known on an international level which is great for Calgary and the festival. If we can grow to accommodate more films it will lead to a lot more opportunity. It is tough to decide [on] 9 features out of 200, so it would be great to have more spots open."
This year will be a great opportunity to revisit the event, or experience it for the first time.
"People anticipate it more, and wish they could attend. I am amazed with how many more people, when I approach them about the festival, know who we are and have attended the event. People are more familiar [with it] and have attended in the past – I find that out just by phoning people. People are more hardcore and willing to see more movies in a short period of time because it is harder to see these films after they are gone. You can buy some on DVD but the experience of being in a theatre can’t be duplicated. People sometimes focus so much on one negative thing, like a short or film they didn’t like. It is so much work, people don’t realize how much it takes to put this on and trying to appeal to so many different people and not knowing how different our audience [is]. You throw in one quirky one and then hear about it for a year. I hope that people appreciate each film for what it is worth, and realize they are there for a reason."
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Contributor Jason Clevett |
Locale Calgary |
Topic Fairy Tales Film Festival | Film Festival |
Photo Gallery Fairy Tales Film Festival |
