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The Hamptons Film Festival Has It All
The 2010 Hampton’s Film Festival Kicks Off Oct 7-11th
127 Hours, directed by Danny Boyle and starring James Franco
As the Hampton’s Film Festival gets ready to kick off, Encore sits down with David Nugent, director of programming to give us an idea what will be in store with this year’s event.
You have a great lineup again this year. Can you elaborate on some of the special events, films and series going on with this year’s festival?
Well, what’s ultimately the goal is to have the best films we can possibly have, and I think we have a really strong lineup this year. Our opening night film, Barney’s Version, a Sony Classics release, stars Paul Giamatti, who we have coming to attend the opening along with the director and producer. The following night we’re kicking off our South Hampton venue with The King’s Speech. The film’s director, Tom Hooper, is coming and I’m sure audiences are going to love it. And then we have a very strong closing night film, Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan. We’ve had him before with The Wrestler, so it’s very nice to continue with a filmmaker like him. We also have a strong centerpiece called the The Debt, starring one of the Hamptons’ rising stars, Jessica Chastain. Ultimately, the heart of the festival is the films, and we’re really proud of the lineup.
You also have several great events and programs. Could you highlight some of those?
In addition to the films, we have our special programs. We have a lot of interesting programs coming up including “Conversations With…” which is always one of the hottest tickets at the festival. One’s with Isabella Rossellini, another with Stanley Tucci, and we’ve also got James Franco and Julian Schnabel, who will be interviewed by Alec Baldwin. It should be a lot of fun.
We’re continuing our relationship with Kodak and doing a cinematography master class along with Stuart Dryburgh, a great cinematographer. We’re also doing an animation master class with the director and producer of Toy Story 3. I think that’s a wonderful thing to offer our audience, to hear antidotes, clips and behind-the-scenes stories on how these films come together.
Could you tell us more about your new partnership with Babelgum?
We’re working with Babelgum, one of the premiere places for short films online, on an animation festival. Filmmakers have been uploading and submitting their short films to Babelgum’s website for quite some time now. There’s a very prestigious group of jurors who are narrowing them down, and we will be showing the finalists. People can then vote in person at the festival, online or on their mobile devices. And there will also be a panel of the future of animation with the filmmakers.
In regards to the “business” of the festival, does being so close to NYFF cause any challenges—or benefits—for HIFF?
I don’t think it presents a problem. We moved the festival up a week, so we’re now during the Columbus Day weekend [Oct. 7-11]. We’re a Thursday-Monday festival, instead of a Wednesday-Sunday one. Wednesday was always tough for opening night because for those of the audience that come from New York, it’s smack in the middle of work week.
I don’t think it’s a big concern about being close to the NYFF. We only really overlap with their closing weekend. They’re an amazing festival, but an unusual festival, too, in as much as, unlike ours and Sundance, Toronto, etc, they only have a few films screening a day. Their festival is spread out. We didn’t have a problem last year with our opening overlapping; we screened some of the films that were at that festival as well, so we’re happy with ours.
Has the economy made you rethink some marketing and promotional initiatives?
The economy has affected all non-profit groups, and we’re no different. Luckily we have a really good sponsorship department that works really hard and keeps the ship afloat. But its certainly true we’re no different than any arts nonprofit, and we’ve had challenges that we face that even European festivals don’t, because they get more government support than U.S. counterparts. So yes, we’ve faced our challenges and we have a supportive board of directors and strong executive director. We’re doing alright.