The business of audience festivals: Calgary International Film Festival 2012

Quantifying the global film festival circuit: Networks, diversity, and public value creation

“…Although the general understanding is that films seek out festivals, the festivals also need films to facilitate the construction of their identities [8,50]. Programming is a complex task to find a compromise between satisfying artistic inspirations and activist intentions versus the audience tastes while balancing between too little variation and too much choice [51], and simultaneously considering outreach and practical limitations [2], such as the temporal event sequence, premiere requirements, etc. Having control over programming, however, also enables festivals to sidestep dominant and streamlined commercial distribution patterns and quickly respond to topical issues, in turn enriching the public sphere and democratizing audience access to films [52].…”

“…While any dimension reduction is approximate, and the space appears largely contiguous, the roughly five visible groups do correspond to the industry topology discussed in prior qualitative research. Most festivals primarily program drama content, forming a cluster which compares to general events [2]. The other two clusters fit into the categorization of specialized, thematic genre-based festivals [2]: a group of primarily B-list events (except the A-list Krako ´w festival) positioned around the documentary, biography, art-culture, and social issues tags correspond to documentary festivals [102]; and a semi-separate cluster in-between action-adventure, fantasy, science fiction, thriller, and horror tags represents what has been referred to as genre festivals [103].…”

“…Most festivals primarily program drama content, forming a cluster which compares to general events [2]. The other two clusters fit into the categorization of specialized, thematic genre-based festivals [2]: a group of primarily B-list events (except the A-list Krako ´w festival) positioned around the documentary, biography, art-culture, and social issues tags correspond to documentary festivals [102]; and a semi-separate cluster in-between action-adventure, fantasy, science fiction, thriller, and horror tags represents what has been referred to as genre festivals [103]. Other clusters align with the identitybased film festival category that targets specific communities or demographics [2], namely queer festivals [104] which surround the LGBT tag, and children's festivals [105] that fall between family, animation, and children's tags.…”

“…Over 12,000 film festivals happen around the world each year [1], ranging from major industry events like Cannes or Sundance to medium, small, and even tiny local events [2]. Festivals differ in sizes of their budget, programs, and audiences, as well as profiles, spheres of action, and specializations [2,3].…”

“…Over 12,000 film festivals happen around the world each year [1], ranging from major industry events like Cannes or Sundance to medium, small, and even tiny local events [2]. Festivals differ in sizes of their budget, programs, and audiences, as well as profiles, spheres of action, and specializations [2,3]. They form a global festival circuit, a vital, organic part of the film industry, interconnected via the flow of films (participating in multiple consecutive festivals) and characterized by emerging complex network structures of individuals, companies, and events [4].…”