Fresh Film Festival – showcasing the moviemakers of the future
In this edition of the Arts, we look at this year’s Fresh Film Festival, the Czech Republic’s annual international showcase of movies made by students and debut directors, which was held in Karlovy Vary last week.
Now in its fifth year, the Fresh Film fest specialises in showing innovative work by young moviemakers from film schools all over the world. Fresh Film’s venue is Karlovy Vary, a town that is better known for its A-Category international film festival, which regularly attracts Hollywood megastars such as Robert de Niro and Robert Redford.
Although Fresh Film cannot quite match the glitz and the glamour of Karlovy Vary’s main movie event, it has found its own place on the international festival circuit and was attended this year by established Czech film directors like Jan Němec and Věra Chytilová..
“Well I think its liveliness is one thing. And a different approach to films itself. And maybe there’s a different approach to living the festival. A lot of it is about films but a lot of it is also about socialising, sharing experiences, networking and even just partying.”
With thousands of young people attending Fresh Film over five days, Martin Pošta says that the festival has gradually evolved into a large-scale event, which offers an extensive programme of high-quality movies in various categories such as feature debuts, animated film and experimental movies.
“It’s quite big considering that it’s a student festival. And it’s also professionally organised, which would be a unique characteristic of an event of this nature. Normally, when you hear about a student film festival, it’s usually a punk kind of event. This is not supposed to be like that. We’re actually growing and becoming one of the more significant events of this kind, especially in Central and Eastern Europe.”
This year more than 900 films were submitted for screening at the festival, and only about 200 of these were selected.
Martin Pošta says that an event like Fresh Film has specific criteria for choosing films, which help ensure that the festival retains its distinct student identity:
“We try to stay fresh by all means possible. The team that makes the festival is quite young. But also the approach towards films is intended to present movies that are different and which have a new approach. Maybe, they don’t necessarily have to be technically perfect, but they should have a different view and a different mindset. They may deal with things that have been described already, but they should do it in a more unique way. Our main focus is definitely not technical quality or professionalism. We are mainly looking for ideas.”
This year’s main competition winner Elevator is typical of the low-budget, high quality movies that are something of a Fresh Film specialty. This harrowing tale of two teenagers trapped for days in a lift only cost around 200 euros to make and was just one of many cinematic gems on offer at the festival, which may have been overlooked by mainstream events.
With its strong emphasis on student films, Fresh Film also gives young directors who are learning their trade a chance to gauge audience responses to their work.
Despite the fact that most of the movies shown at Fresh Film are made by extremely young directors, this does not necessarily mean that the quality of the work is a lot worse than that produced by more experienced filmmakers.
Oscar-nominated Hungarian animator Géza M. Toth was on this year’s jury for the festival section devoted to animated film.
He says that the standard of student animation, which is screened at festivals like Fresh Film, is often extraordinarily high:
“Traditionally, animated film likes the environment of schools of universities, because animation needs lots of time. It also helps if there is a lack of other distractions taking their share of the filmmakers’ energy and time. I find that student years are really very optimal for making animated film. You have lots of time. You follow learning programme and there is lots of equipment: And you also don’t have so many other possibilities to distract you. You are still not famous, etcetera, etcetera. So students have the chance to make really, really good films wherever they are in the world.”
Before being established five years ago, Fresh Film was a sidebar at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. Now that it is an event in its own right, it has the advantage of ensuring that films shown here are more likely to have a higher festival profile and won’t be overlooked by audiences.
Nonetheless, it has been argued that if these films made by students and young directors remained within the framework of Karlovy Vary’s main movie festival, they would have a better chance of being spotted by film industry types, who might be able to arrange distribution deals and offer other opportunities to these budding filmmakers.
Screenwriter and actor Max Hoffman, son of Dustin Hoffman, who was on this year’s Central European film jury and is himself a former student of Prague’s FAMU film academy, says that the benefits of specialised student film events like Fresh Film definitely outweigh any perceived drawbacks.
“It would be foolish to say that there isn’t a place for it, because here it is… People are coming to the event. Theatres are packed and the students are proud to be a part of it. In a larger festival it might well be overwhelmed by the mainstream work and considered to be not as credible. Here the student work is its own thing in its own right. And it’s clear that a lot of these students have professional standards. I don’t know if these films can go on to bigger events and get distribution deals, so it’s great to have a separate festival for them.”
Attending Fresh Film has certainly done previous participants in the event no harm. Among the festival’s many success story is that of Romanian director Corneliu Porumboiu who came here in 2004 and later went on to win the Golden Camera award for young directors at Cannes.
As always, Fresh Film this year also had an extensive programme of accompanying events. With thousands of young people arriving in Karlovy Vary for the festival, Martin Pošta says it was vital to ensure that film was not the only form of entertainment open to them:
“This year we arranged the programme quite thoroughly, because we want to present new upcoming bands. Consequently, we have three bands playing every night. I think its quite important for people when they get intellectually exhausted from watching films that they can set their minds straight while listening to music or networking.”
Although Fresh Film might not have the same cache as the bigger international film festival in Karlovy Vary, it certainly offers a broad programme of excellent films with plenty of side events to keep visitors occupied.
For seasoned film professionals like Géza M. Toth, the sheer “freshness” and vigour of Fresh Film offers a pleasant change to the normal grind of the film festival circuit.
“Actually I prefer this kind of familiar festival to really big A-Category festivals. This was my first visit to the Fresh Film Festival, but hopefully not my last. I really enjoyed it. I like the atmosphere of the old city of Karlovy Vary. I also think that the festival itself is very nice and I would like to come back. Maybe next year…”
www.freshfilmfest.net
