Cape Town film festival eyes a focused 2018 edition
Riding of the success of the previous editions, organisers of the Cape Town International Film Market and Festival (CTIFMF) are once again putting finishing touches to their preparation for a fantastic outing this year. The 2018 edition, which is led by Elias Ribeiro, the recently appointed market director, will feature an expanded and content focused market.
The festival will take place from October 9 – 19, 2018 at venues across the V & A Waterfront in Cape Town, South Africa.
The CTIFMF has reached out to various industry stakeholders in a collaborative effort in keeping with its theme, of Create, Collaborate, Celebrate, to develop a programme with tangible outcomes and a view to the long term growth of the industry both regionally and across the continent.
According to Ribeiro, a number of key programmes have been finalized, all designed to maximize opportunities for emerging talents and to establish long term inclusive programmes.
“As the CTIFMF, learning from many who have paved the way, we have taken great care in crafting an offering that is complementary to current industry offerings. We hope to strengthen our bonds with partners such as the Durban Film Mart and together foster a dynamic and vibrant ecosystem that will contribute to assertive impact in film projects, our financial instruments and funders, policy designers and audiovisual makers at large. We also have prioritised an Audience Development program called Engage, with the faith we will in the long term make local films more sustainable in the domestic market”, Ribeiro explains further.
As well, Jehad Kasu, marketing director of the CTIFMF, assures on the vision of the CTIFMF to reposition South Africa’s film industry offering through meaningful industry collaboration. “If we harness our collective resources we can achieve an infinite amount of collective growth and success. This will, of course, take a reasonable amount of time and commitment to achieve. So, we implore all film industry stakeholders new, established, private and state owned to support one another and become active participants in elevating the presence and contribution of the South African film industry within the global ecosystem”.
According Kasu, as the most important element of a market is its content, the CTIFMF has developed a programme that aims to elevate the bar for African content in terms of quality and innovation. A maximum of six works in progress will be selected from the African continent to show to international industry experts. High calibre decision makers and experts will be hand-picked to view the selected films and then give detailed feedback, with the goal of increasing the artistic quality and challenging the core creative teams to think about audiences beyond their own territories.
This initial viewing will be followed by a screening of a segment of the same works to a wider audience of invited industry stakeholders comprising of festival programmers, sales companies, distributors and post production financiers. The Work In Progress programme will disburse finishing awards to the most promising projects: grading, final sound mix, VFX, online editing, subtitling and DCPs, with the generous support of South African post production facilities such as Priest Post, Rhapsody, The Refinery and The Work Room Audio Post.
“We have confirmed attendance from Berlinale’s European Film Market and Berlinale Africa Hub, Tribeca, TIFF, London BFI; international sales companies such as Pyramide International, Flourishing Films, Talent Agents Casarotto and Curtis Brown, Mnet, Indigenous Films, Ster Kinekor, and Post Production South Africa”, the marketing director says.
Considering that one of the most challenging and pressing issues for local films is to earn the trust of local audiences that then translates into box office success, the CTIFMF will have a special focus on audience design and development.
A group of marketing and industry experts with an understanding of these challenges will be convened for a three-day workshop under the guidance of Valeria Richter. This outcome based workshop will equip these professionals with the most current and powerful tools designed to assist films in finding their target market and core following.
At the end of the workshop, each participant will be assigned a project from the WIP and will be expected to deliver an Audience Design Strategy, with a cash prize awarded to the most prolific two of the lot to craft an Audience Design Strategy in collaboration with the Festival Board for CTIFMF 2019.
Aimed at publicists, marketing and sales professionals, distributors and others within the field, applications are open until August 17, 2018. More details on the programme, outcomes and prize can be found at www.filmfest.capetown, or email zahrah@filmfest.capetown.
CTIFMF’s Adapt programme will bring together creatives, producers, and rights holders from the publishing and film industries to explore the possibilities of cinematic book adaptations as well as to develop an economic model and business practice around this that accounts for our African realities.
A number of toolbox sessions and workshops will be led by Selina Ukwuoma on translating from book to screen. She is no newcomer to South Africa as she has been working closely with Realness as well as Talents Durban over the past three years.
Selina is a freelance script consultant who began her career at literary agency Curtis Brown working on a number of adaptations including 2008 BAFTA winner BOY A. She has since gone on to advise on award-winning indie films such as 2014 Teddy winner THE WAY HE LOOKS and this year’s Goyas triumph Summer 1993, both Foreign Language Oscars entries from their respective countries.
The industry programme of the CTIFMF will see four days of panel discussions, keynote speeches and workshops with participation from experts from South Africa, the rest of Africa, and across the globe. There will be a variety of relevant topics covered, all aimed at inclusive and constructive dialogues that foster the development of a cohesive and continually developing film industry. These topics include mentorship, financing, AR/VR, animation, blockchain and crypto currency.
Entries are due no later than August 10, 2018. For full details interested applicants should visit www.filmfest.capetown or email zahrah@filmfest.capetown.
Filmmakers from all over the world are invited to submit their films in the following categories: feature films, documentary, animation and short films.
The organisers are encouraging producers, directors and scriptwriters from South Africa and Africa who are creating local/African content to submit high quality entries into competition.
Only films completed not more than 18 months prior to the Call for Entries of the festival will be considered for competition purposes.
The deadline for entry submission is July 31, 2018.