Constraints and possibilities: Lima Film Festival, politics and cultural formation in Peru

The Festival de Cine de Lima (Lima Film Festival) launched in 1997 and, from humble beginnings, each year now introduces around 300 films to diverse audiences across the Peruvian capital and beyond. In 2014, for the first time in its history, four of the nineteen films selected for the feature competition were made by Peruvian directors, signalling a growing recognition of national talent by programming panels and critics that had tended to look beyond national borders for inspiration and challenge. Despite the relative paucity of co-ordinated film production activity in Peru, it is argued here that the flourishing of Lima Film Festival provides evidence of a deep sense of film appreciation that conveys a commitment to all forms of cinema. This essay reflects critically on the local, national and international impact of this Festival, its influence on the development of film policy in Peru, and explores its role as a ‘key building block of film culture’ (Iordanova, 2013) across a complex national framework

The Hindered Drive toward Internationalisation: Thessaloniki (International) Film Festival

Originally a site for the promotion of the Greek film production, the Thessaloniki Film Festival, founded in 1960, gradually evolved to showcase international cinema, with a special emphasis on Balkan film. By focusing on the festival’s international aspirations, this account highlights certain under-researched parts of its history during which the festival offered parallel, competitive or not, programs of non-Greek films. In exploring this history, this article foregrounds tensions among key stakeholders, and maps these over the country’s broader sociopolitical dynamics, as well as in relation to broader developments in the European and international film festival scene

I festival cinematografici come campo di studio. Metodi, teorie e pratiche

“I festival cinematografici come campo di studio. Metodi, teorie e pratiche” is an anthology which includes and, for the first time, translates in Italian the most relevant contributions in Film Festival Studies. The volume is aimed at offering a rigorous, analytical assessment of the festival scene, at a time when festivals have become an increasingly vital component of film culture. In this regard, this anthology will be of enormous use to both students in Italian universities as well as to professionals. The volume will be used in Italian universities for undergraduate and master level courses dedicated to the study of film festivals, their histories and economies. Further, this anthology will be of great interest to festival organizers and film practitioners