The New Zealand International Film Festival has decided to take this year’s programme online. Here’s how it’s going to work.
From Cannes to Tribeca, the current global pandemic has affected film festivals worldwide – and the New Zealand International Film Festival is no different. While Aotearoa may be moving out of Level 4 Lockdown, COVID-19 restrictions are likely to remain in place for the next few months. Because of this, NZIFF 2020 will be moving to a completely online format.
From 24 July to 2 August, Kiwis will be able to screen the NZIFF programme at home. This includes their typically world-class curated films, NZ film premieres, virtual red-carpet events, filmmaker Q&As, special ‘one-off’ events, and NZIFF-exclusive films that won’t have other NZ screenings.
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To make all this work, NZIFF and their OnDemand provider Shift72 have greatly boosted the tech powering their current VOD platform to accommodate the muscular online programme and live-streaming events.
More details – including the full programme, costs, and viewing windows – will be announced on Monday 22 June. See below for comments and info from the official press release.
“This is an extraordinary situation and we need to adapt and find a creative solution for 2020,” says New Zealand Film Festival Trust Chair Catherine Fitzgerald. “The shared experience of cinema and the power of storytelling to bring communities together has always been our driving force. With the current, and evolving situation, we believe in the value and importance of cinema now more than ever.
“We cannot do without the Film Festival in July and so we are excited to be able to upgrade our online platform to ensure we can bring the best of new cinema to our audiences with new ways to share the experience and interact with the filmmakers and fellow audience members.”
NZIFF Director Marten Rabarts added: “After the initial realisation and heartbreak of not being able to provide our Film Festival whānau an in-cinema experience this year we’ve worked quickly, while leaning on our strong relationships with filmmakers, distributors and sales agents, to ensure we are able to confidently adapt the way in which we’ll present their films to our dedicated audience across the country.”
Bringing the NZIFF 2020 programme to life is a team of programmers led by Festival Director Rabarts, newly promoted Head of Programming Michael McDonnell, Paris-based Programmer Sandra Reid, and specialist programmers Nic Marshall (For All Ages), Ant Timpson (Incredibly Strange), and Malcolm Turner (Animation Now), and new for 2020, a quartet of international guest curators.
The four international guest curators for 2020 are Argentinian film producer and Venice Film Festival programme consultant Violeta Bava, American curator and creative producer Alesia Weston whose track record includes Sundance International and the Directorship of Jerusalem Film Festival, former Director of Hong Kong Lesbian and Gay Film Festival and programming associate for Toronto International Film Festival Vicci Ho, and Director of Sundance Institute’s Indigenous Program Bird Runningwater.
“We are excited to introduce our guest curators for the 2020 Festival. These four curators are highly respected programmers globally and we are delighted to be able to draw on their knowledge of specialised territories and their diverse backgrounds to enrich this year’s programme,” Rabarts said.
Rabarts added that NZIFF is also looking to the near-future when COVID 19 gathering restrictions will once again allow a return to an in-cinema programme “In January 2021 we hope to be celebrating that return with a special summer programme of films in our flagship venues in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and Dunedin,” he affirms.
“We are fully committed to a return to cinemas in 2021 and we understand our audiences cherish the experience of sharing the festival films with others as much as we do, but until that’s possible you’ll find us no further away than the NZIFF website or app when we launch our At Home – Online programme in June.”
