I waited almost a little too long to interview Michael Lumpkin, Frameline's former Executive Director, before his unexpected retirement. I told myself not to hazard the same mistake twice and to make a more concerted effort to get to know and interact with his successor K.C. Price and, further, to become more involved with Frameline's championing presence in the Bay Area. I dropped the ball last year on meeting up with Price but rallied this year. My thanks to K.C. for so graciously considering my 35mm complaints even as he invited me into Frameline's office at the Ninth Street Film Center for a conversation. He carries on Frameline's ongoing tradition of being responsive to its constituency. A tall, affable and well-spoken gentleman, I sensed our conversation would be the first of many in years to come.
* * *
Michael Guillén: K.C., I was Googling you last night to see who the heck you were and I kept getting all these hits on this Black evangelist fleecing his flocks....
K.C. Price: Frederick K.C. Price!
Guillén: That's right. But I found very little on you and so would like to start out this morning by securing a little background information for a brief profile. You've clearly been around for a while?
Price: Yes, I've been working for Frameline directly or indirectly for 11 years now.
Guillén: Were you originally on their board?
Price: No. Michael Lumpkin hired me in 1999. I came on then and worked for four years as their Development Director. Frameline, CAAM, and the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival co-own the Ninth Street Film Center and—when Frameline moved into the building—we enhanced that partnership. All of a sudden the Center became its own non-profit so I moved from the Frameline position and became the Managing Director of Ninth Street. I did that for five years. I was still basically working closely with Michael and Frameline through those years. When Michael left, I applied for the Executive Director position and that's how I came back into the office directly.
Guillén: What are your duties as Frameline's Executive Director?
Price: The Executive Director in a non-profit typically oversees all the departments. Normally, you'll have a program department, an administration and finance department, and a development / fund raising department. I manage all three of those larger areas and am ultimately responsible for the organization. I'm the one who reports directly to the Board of Directors.
Guillén: So you've been in this position two festival years now? How are you settling in? Have you been enjoying yourself?
Price: Absolutely! I feel lucky to have this job. No doubt about it. Of course, anybody working in the non-profit sector with the economy right now has been facing financial challenges—especially at the end of 2008 when all this started—but, we have weathered all that very well and things are going great. No, I couldn't love this job any more. Being in this role last year during my first festival—especially following in Michael's footsteps—felt pretty terrifying sometimes; but, at this point, going into my second year, it feels so much more comfortable to me.
Guillén: Are you from San Francisco?
Price: No, I've lived here for 15 years. I'm from North Carolina.
Guillén: Is that where you were educated?
Price: I went to undergraduate school in North Carolina and then went to graduate school in Washington, D.C. for a number of years. Then I lived abroad for about 2½ years.
Guillén: With regard to this year's edition of Frameline, I'd like to focus on the two sidebars I'm most anticipating—the focus on South American queer cinema and the mini-retrospective of the queer shorts of Andy Warhol—and the festival's overriding attention to history. As you went to organize the festival, did these themes present themselves in the submissions received or did you sift through the submissions in search of works to fit chosen themes?
Price: That's an excellent question. I would probably say it's a little bit more of the former but there is a little bit of the latter to help bring it all together. For one thing, in terms of the films that we're looking at that are being screened at the larger film festivals—Toronto, Sundance, Berlin—we'll be able to see the brightest gems in LGBT cinema that are out there. On top of that we have about 500-600 submissions during Frameline's submission process; a lot of shorts but a large number of narrative features and documentaries too. So you will start to see some themes that are gelling out there in the zeitgeist in terms of what filmmakers are making.
I noticed last year that in a lot of the films that were coming in—and, of course, we were going for the high-end artistic quality films—there seemed to be a lot darker themes and more violence in the films last year. I remember some audience members mentioning that to me and all I could respond was, "That's what the filmmakers are making right now." I don't know if that was a consequence of the administration....
Guillén: Let's blame them for bumming us out.
Price: [Laughs.] Or maybe it was the war in Iraq?—I don't know—but, it was interesting to see that. Whereas this year—in terms of finding a theme—the whole South American program was definitely what was happening, which was really interesting. Back in December-January, people were asking, "What are you seeing?" and it was all these films from South America. When we drew close to the programming decisions in March, it was an easy thing to do. It wasn't just that there were a large number of films from South America, it was that there were at least 10 really great films from South America.
Guillén: Latin American cinema is primarily what I cover so it's always great when there's a respectable LGBT sampling and this year is just fantastic. As I was researching Frameline's selection, it was heartening to see these films popping up in other queer film festivals in the U.S. and Canada, most recently Toronto's Inside Out, which just wrapped a few weeks ago. How much does Frameline coordinate with other queer festivals to bring these films to North American audiences? Does it help to acquire the films since they're already on the festival circuit? Does their availability influence your programming decisions? Do you interact with these other LGBT festivals?
Price: We do interact with them—not necessarily to make the programming decisions—but, we have a lot of close relationships with several of the other queer film festivals. We get to know each other at the larger film festivals. They're wonderful people working at the other festivals. We have a great working relationship, for example, with Outfest in Los Angeles. One thing we do get out of knowing the other programmers is that sometimes we can check in with each other for tips or if we're looking for information on a particular film; but, it's not a close network in terms of making mutual programming decisions.
You do have to remember that there is a limited body of work that's being made each year that is high quality LGBT cinema. A natural consequence of that is that you're going to see some of the same films programmed at other festivals as well.
Guillén: In terms of the spectacular dimension of the festival and inviting talent to accompany their works, there's not any coordinated efforts between LGBT festivals to finance travel costs for—let's say—bringing in directors from Argentina, Brazil or Peru to attend their screenings? I imagine the complication there would be the calendaring?
Price: You've described what the issue would be. It is mostly about the calendar. As I mentioned to you, one of the things I learned from working for the consortium at the Ninth Street Film Center is that it's not always easy to collaborate. Collaboration is beautiful and it's wonderful when it works; but, it's also a tremendous amount of work.
Guillén: It looks good on paper?
Price: [Laughs.] Yes, it looks good on paper. It sounds really great when you're describing it but then there's the whole level of actually doing the work, which can sometimes be very challenging. When you can make it work, though, it's really exceptional in the non-profit world. As you say, if you can combine resources to finance travel, that's great; however—though there are some queer festivals close by to our's—sometimes they're just not close enough to make the travel work. For example, as I said, we have a great relationship with Outfest in Los Angeles and would love to partner more on travel with them because they're situated not too far after our own festival, maybe a week or so after Frameline; but, it's always almost impossible to split costs because, no, talent can't hang around for two and a half weeks inbetween festivals.
Guillén: Does Frameline receive much consular assistance for some of the films you're bringing in from other countries?
Price: Yes. We have a number of partners that help us in different years. For example, in the two years I've been here, last year we had generous support from the Swiss consulate and some from Sweden, I believe. This year, the Israeli and Norwegian consulates are supporting us.
Guillén: Being that you have such a strong South American sidebar, are you receiving any consular support from the South American countries?
Price: No, we're not. Usually we can make the consular support happen when we already have a working relationship. Sometimes it just doesn't work because—by the time we confirm that a guest is coming in and the amount of work it takes to get the consulate's support—it doesn't work for the timeline. It always sounds really good, but—when you get to it and try to make it all happen—the timing doesn't work unless there's already an established relationship. One of our longest supporters was the Canadian consulate; but, we haven't been receiving support from them in the last couple of years. I don't know if that's due to a change in government or if there have been budget cuts.
Guillén: So let me be clear, when you're saying "support" do you mean financial support? Or administrative support?
Price: Most of the time, it's usually financial support to bring in filmmakers. That's what we use it for.
Guillén: And—since, as you know, I have a vested interest in waning 35mm culture—do the consulates help out at all with print trafficking costs?
Price: Sometimes we'll ask if they can help with print trafficking costs; but, mainly we ask for support to bring in a director.
Guillén: Can you speak to Frameline's collaborations with Bay Area community organizations? Are there any new organizations that you're particularly proud to be working with this year?
Price: We have two different types of sponsorship support. We have corporate sponsorship where companies, businesses and sometimes non-profits donate either corporate financial gifts or in-kind gifts. The other part of it is the co-presentations where we work with different community organizations—this year I think we have more than 60 different community groups, mainly all non-profit organizations—and they help us get out the word about Frameline and the festival and we get to talk about them at the screenings as well as provide tickets to their constituents so they can attend the festival. Servicemembers Legal Defense Network is one of our relatively new co-presenters that we're excited about this year. They're co-presenting two wonderful films related to Don't Ask Don't Tell: A Marine Story (2010) and Out of Annapolis (2010).
Guillén: Taking the South American sidebar as an example, do you reach out to the Latino community?
Price: Sure, absolutely.
Guillén: Do these Latino community organizations meld with the queer community?
Price: Oh sure. We work with particular partners [Amor Sin Fronteras, El/La Program Para Trans-Latinas, Queer Latina/o Artists Collective, Somos Familia] that serve the Latino community in terms of getting the word out about this special program that we have in the festival so that the constituents they serve are aware that these films coming from South America are available. Then we give free tickets to them as well.
Guillén: I note this year that Lucho Ramirez, who I believe is affiliated with Cine+Mas, wrote up your program essay on the South American sidebar.
Price: Our Community Engagement and Communications Coordinator Harris Kornstein is amazing and has done a great job with the co-presenters this year. I'd say more than half of our programs have a co-presenter associated with them and, typically, in the introduction before the film starts we acknowledge the co-presenter; but, unfortunately, we can't get into much detail in the introduction because it will just bog things down. We're wondering if there are other ways that we can talk about co-presentation so that our community understands how many non-profit groups we work with? One of the wonderful things about the festival is its relationship with the larger community, as represented by the co-presentations.
Guillén: I might suggest profiles of your co-presenters on Frameline's recently-launched blog? That strikes me as the perfect place to get the word out. As you mentioned earlier, the other arm of sponsorship is corporate. This year Yahoo! joins Frameline as one of its premiere corporate sponsors. Talk to me about the value of that association and how it benefits the LGBT community.
Price: Frameline's been fortunate to have a long, successful set of relationships with corporate sponsors for decades now. Some of our sponsors have been with us on and off since the '80s and early '90s. What's fascinating is how these major companies have developed these rich relationships with us, supporting us so generously, which shows how far the community has come in terms of how eager these corporations are to be a part of a film festival that serves the LGBT community. That's exciting. Yahoo! has been a sponsor for four, maybe five, years and this year they went up to one of our two highest levels of sponsorship.
Guillén: As a non-profit with a festival arm, how much support do you receive from the City?
Price: Grants for the Arts is one of our largest funders. I believe about 5% of our budget comes from Grants for the Arts. They're a significant funder to Frameline and have been for a really long time. We couldn't do without Grants for the Arts!
Guillén: Then the remaining bulk of financing comes from memberships and ticket sales?
Price: We have about a $1.6-1.7 million dollar budget to run the organization year-round and the way it breaks down is that for contributed income we have individual donations and membership, which is close to about a third of our support. Our donors and members have been so much of what's made Frameline strong through the years. It's just like the audience itself, which has always been there for us. The foundation also gets government grants, along with the corporate sponsorship that we've talked about, and then we have a set of earned income and the primary one, as you said, is ticket and pass sales. We also have earned income from our distribution department through film rentals and DVD sales.
Guillén: Speaking of the distribution arm, I'd like to follow-up on a question I asked Michael Lumpkin when we spoke a few years back. I expressed to him how much I admired the "Send It Home" program that Frameline initiated back in the late '80s, I believe, and he told me that the program had been discontinued due to administrative complications. He mentioned, however, that it had morphed into Frameline's "Youth In Motion" program, a carryover of the "Send It Home" initiative. Can you speak to where Frameline stands with its "Youth In Motion" program?
Price: Educational facilities have always been the main, fundamental customer base for Frameline Distribution, which has been around for more than 20 years now. We have about 250 titles. The "Send It Home" program from a number of years ago was a specialized program where people could order films that they could send back to the libraries and colleges of their choice, provided they were accepted. [Laughs.] Once in a while, they weren't. So—though someone might have wanted to send a title home to Nebraska—we had to check to see if they even wanted it.
The "Youth In Motion" program that Michael talked to you about has been in effect for almost two years now. The concept for the program was based on "Send It Home", but basically what we did was we made four DVDs that each covered a separate theme, such as gender identity, LGBT marriage, there's one on the Latino LGBT community, and the fourth one is on visionary leaders (for example, we have a film we've distributed on Harry Hays). So, we took different titles and grouped them into these four DVDs and created action guides and curriculum for each of the DVDs and then we started working with gay-straight alliances throughout the state of California to get them into the GSA network clubs and sometimes into the more liberal schools especially and they're using the DVDs as teaching tools in these GSA clubs so that they have discussion topics and films that they can watch. It's a great way to help end homophobic violence within schools. The program has been incredibly successful. We've confined it to the state of California because we've standardized the DVDs to conform to California curriculum.
Guillén: Another question I asked Michael but I pose it to you because I think it's important to revisit this question every so often: with increased mainstream acceptance of queer cinema—not only through the inroads we've made into outlying communities through festival, theatrical and television programming, but in the accessibility and increased visibility of our queer stories on many of the new exhibition platforms—how long will it be necessary to have LGBT identity-based film festivals? Are they still relevant? Do they continue to serve a necessary purpose for our community? Do they still help in organizing identity and community?
Price: Yes, yes, and yes. [Laughs.] It's really wonderful that we do have all these new platforms and options to see things on television that we didn't used to see; definitely a plethora of queer images in media that weren't available, say, 10-15 years ago. On the other hand, though, Frameline's festival as well as the other LGBT festivals throughout the country still fulfill a really important need of bringing out a large collection of independent, really wonderful LGBT films that you're not going to have access to. If on your cable networks or your IPhone—should that be the medium you prefer to watch films—these films were available, I wonder if it would be a different question? Yet, it isn't. LGBT film festivals really are the only opportunity people will have to see a lot of these works.
Another thing around this is that—although we do have a specific community we serve and our films are about LGBT content—there's still this whole dimension that is no different than any other major film festival in the Bay Area. There's this other piece of it. Yup, we're offering you most of our films for the first time and giving you a chance to see them because they haven't been on television or shown up at the theaters yet. Plus, of course, the wonderful opportunity to see these works with your community in the Castro Theater. Because of those things, I don't see how queer film festivals are going to be diminished. I'm reminded of the argument made 100 years ago when the phonograph was invented that there wouldn't be any reason to meet for a symphony or an opera anymore because you could just listen to a record. As we know, that argument hasn't panned out. Queer film festivals will be around for a long time. There is a need there around it that you can't replace in a living room. Also, our numbers have not been going down. We've been increasing the last few years in terms of audience size.
Guillén: The attendant question would be whether it's become more difficult to coordinate programming with other festivals in the Bay Area who are now prone to incorporating LGBT cinema into their line-ups? Do you find yourself more in competition for some of the major titles?
Price: That's a really good question and the answer is no. Again, it's based upon collaboration. For example, within our building, we have incredibly rich relationships with the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival and the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, and outside of the building with the San Francisco International Film Festival. There are crossover titles; but, we always talk about it. San Francisco International will sometimes show queer titles but we're in communication with them about what we are and are not showing. Based on those great relationships, competition for titles is not a serious factor of concern.
Guillén: A case in point would be François Ozon's Le Refuge, which I caught at Toronto, and which Frameline has included in its line-up, but which was also shown previously in the Bay Area at a preview screening at the recent San Francisco International. I'm curious, did they situate the film in their festival in that way because they knew you were going to be showing it at your festival?
Price: Those decisions are usually made by the distributor. The distributor then lets us know what they're doing and we usually just sign off on it. "Okay. Sounds great. Love it." Both festivals benefit.
Guillén: Returning to Frameline Distribution, are any of your titles available through Netflix Instant Play?
Price: I'm glad you asked. They're available through Amazon and TLA. You can actually buy some of our DVD titles through Amazon or our website directly. We've also just started making a selection of our titles available for downloading through TLA and Amazon. The benefit of associating with Amazon and TLA is that Frameline secures access to their broader market. For us to set up download streaming is cost-prohibitive so it's better to work through those partners and their technology and allow them to do it.
Guillén: With regard to the historicity that has become the underscored theme of this year's Frameline festival, was this a theme you already had in mind? Or was this again the case of recognizing what was out there on the circuit?
Price: More of what was out there. We didn't purposely do that. We did more consciously program the Warhol sidebar just because of a number of things that had happened over the past few years. We thought it would be a nice add-on after the underground cinema we programmed last year. Plus, we were motivated by the wonderful Centerpiece documentary Beautiful Darling: The Life and Times of Candy Darling, Andy Warhol Superstar.
Guillén: Is Canyon Cinema providing the Warhol prints this year?
Price: No, we worked with Canyon Cinema last year for our special program on underground cinema; but, this year we're working with MOMA for the Warhol films since they had the 16mm prints. They just came in the other day. I was excited when the big box arrived. Ron Gregg, the Yale film studies professor who's curated the sidebar, is absolutely marvelous and I'm personally looking forward to his lecture as well.
Around your question regarding the historical theme, that one came up after we had started programming and we started looking at what was the theme and we thought, "Wow. There are a lot of historical dramas here or films about our history in terms of narrative features."
Guillén: Do you have a take on that? Why historicity has become a thematic focus out there in the LGBT zeitgeist?
Price: I don't have a take on it. I haven't given it much thought as to why that has happened. I am interested, though, and I don't know if we could ever answer this question because it's just so mysterious what causes themes to happen. Is it just coincidence? Personally, in terms of my own taste in GLBT film, I love historical queer films. I find them fascinating. I come from a point of view of history that we didn't just start happening a few years ago. I don't feel that we've had a rich enough sense of history—whether through novels, films or art—and, for me, there's something lacking so there can never be enough of it.
So, for example, I was really excited how much you loved The Consul of Sodom. I did too. One of the things that just fascinated me about the film so much was that I would never think that a person such as the poet portrayed in that film would have led such a life in post-World War II Franco Spain. It surprised me; but, then—watching the film—I thought, "Well, of course." I would have thought it would have been a more oppressive time where a gay man couldn't live quite as openly; but, then again, when you come from such a wealthy family, you can get away with a lot more.
Guillén: That's a valid point. I felt the same thing watching Frameline's opening night selection The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister, where the individuation of a young lesbian was furthered by her social station and class privilege. Those are certainly factors worth consideration in assessing how individuals like Anne Lister and Jaime Gil de Biedma got away with as much as they did in the times they lived. But what captures my imagination even more is how the sheer driving force of their individuality pierced through oppression and repression. In each of them was their fierce desire to live an authentic life.
Price: Exactly. And just imagining the challenges that they must have been up against, especially someone like Anne Lister in Regency England. I wasn't familiar with Anne Lister when I previewed the film for the festival, although I've since found out that she is well known in women's studies courses—she's often been called Britain's first modern lesbian—but, otherwise, I didn't know anything about her. I think it's absolutely wonderful that films like this can bring a person such as Anne Lister back to a wider audience, especially since she has such a strong historic significance for the LGBT community.
Guillén: So to wrap up here, what are you hoping Frameline's audiences will take away from this year's festival?
Price: I hope that everybody gets to as many films as possible because I'm completely blown away by the breadth of excellent films in this year's festival. I keep shaking my head in disbelief at just how many beautiful films there are day after day after day. It's an especially strong year so I hope that people get to as many films as possible and don't miss out.
Guillén: I'm likewise invested in several of the projects chosen this year. Scott Boswell's The Stranger In Us is dear to my heart and I'm so pleased it sold out its original Roxie engagement, such that you've added a second screening at the Castro.
Price: Yes, we're doing a repeat screening at our first TBA slot.
Guillén: I saw my own youth in The Stranger In Us and it confirmed for me that all I have to do is look in the mirror to experience the selfsame historicity that has thematically veined Frameline34. Having arrived in San Francisco in 1975, not only has my entire adult life been lived here; but, I've been witness to the gay liberation of the '70s, including watching Frameline grow as a festival since its early beginnings. All these years later, my interest remains in how the festival shifts along with current trends. I'm glad to see the festival continuing to grow, that you have settled in so well into your stewardship, and I look forward to participating in this upcoming event.
Price: Thank you, Michael. I appreciate it.
Cross-published on Twitch.
Despite its boasting 219 films from 31 countries, Frameline's 34th edition will be offering only 11 features and 3 shorts in 35mm projection. That's a shocking imbalance in exhibition formats; but, mine is more an expression of disappointment than a direct criticism of the festival's programmers. I'm not naïve. Print availability, rental fees, and trafficking expenses coupled with green efforts to reduce carbon footprints have long factored into the films chosen for any festival lineup and—perhaps even more pertinent to Frameline—we're fortunate that the marginalized narratives of LGBT programming exist at all, albeit in digital format, set apart from the cost-prohibitive privileges of mainstream film production. Asked at the Frameline press conference if any of the films were "political" in nature, Festival Director Jennifer Morris responded (quite appropriately) that just to share these LGBT narratives is a political act in itself, and with that I have no argument.
Notwithstanding, Frameline's heavy reliance on digital projection breeds specific concerns. For starters, the term "film" as in "film festival" appears to have capsized in order to accommodate alternative exhibition formats, and I'm not so sure this practice should be blithely accepted. Perhaps I'm being old-fashioned, but for me a "film" is on film. Anything else is digital media and should be understood and specified as such. I'll grant that both can be called movies. Has the time come to qualify that Frameline is the world's leading LGBT film and digital media festival? At what point is transparency required? I would say from hereon in.
Earlier this year at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival (SFIAAFF), I was impressed that exhibition formats were detailed in CAAM's festival catalog. CAAM won high points for this gesture towards transparency. There's no denying that filmgoers are consumers and deserve to know what they're getting when they slap down $7-$10 (if not more) for a ticket. I'm disappointed that the San Francisco Film Society and now Frameline have not followed SFIAAFF's commendable lead in this regard. Perhaps they are operating off the mistaken assumption that filmgoers don't care how they see a film projected? Or that they can't tell the difference between a 35mm projection and a digital projection? Or that filmgoers are more concerned with narrative integrity than visual quality? And should that—woefully—be the case, who is responsible for training audiences in visual acuity and format discernment? Nonprofit advocacy groups such as the Film on Film Foundation or the Film Noir Foundation can only do so much. Organizations such as the San Francisco Film Society and Frameline are more in a position to advance such discernments to their respective constituencies by—at the very least—spelling them out in their program capsules. I encourage them to do so in the future.
Perhaps this would not be so much an issue if the equipment necessary to project digital media were state-of-the-art; but, by contrast to the pristine digital projections I've experienced at, let's say, the Toronto International Film Festival or even the Palm Springs International—digital projection at The Castro Theater, the Roxie Film Center and the Victoria Theater (Frameline's San Francisco venues) leave a lot to be desired, if not in the in-house equipment itself, then in the physical product offered by filmmakers for screening.
Case in point would be the two films screened at last week's Frameline press conference. The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister (dir. James Kent 2010 UK) and Undertow (Contracorriente, dir. Javier Fuentes-León 2009 Peru) were both sufficiently intriguing narratives to warrant recommendation—the first being Frameline's Opening Night feature and the second its Centerpiece presentation—however, both viewing experiences were marred by poor digital projection that washed out skin tones and leached color from the imagery. Granted, Frameline will offset this deficiency with the value added from the on-stage appearances of talent and the anticipatory and conciliatory vibe of its audiences; but, the dilemma remains: these films are not being seen at their best. Despite its interesting story, I find it highly problematic to recommend that anyone pay $30-$35 ($75-$90, if you're inclined towards the gala) to view Frameline's opening night film The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister. At least with its opening night selection, I would have hoped for a 35mm print to launch the festivities appropriately. And should a 35mm print not be available for this title, I would have preferred an alternate selection which would be available in 35mm. Undertow requires a lesser investment of $10-$15, but even so—as its Centerpiece—Frameline should have exerted a bit more effort and considerable more care in the quality of projection.
Truth is that I will probably take advantage of my privilege as press to watch the bulk of Frameline's digital fare on screener. I might as well. As much as I have complained in the past about being forced to watch festival fare on screeners, the more digital the festivals become, the more attractive the alternative of home viewing becomes.
Now lest I be thought of as biting the hand that feeds me, let me be quick to quote from the introductory editorial to the Summer 2010 issue of Cineaste (via Dave Hudson at MUBI) whose thematic focus lands squarely on the at-home DVD viewing experience and the so-called "new cinephilia", but which lends commensurate insight to my concern with digital theatrical exhibition: "[W]hat's important is not necessarily to privilege one mode of movie-watching over another," the editors argue. "Rather, the point is to maintain a sensitivity to how a particular film is affected by the circumstances in which it's viewed—something that's increasingly important as individual films come to be available from a dizzying variety of sources." And, it might be added, a dizzying variety of formats. Here, I must defer—as referenced earlier—that the anticipatory enthusiasm of Frameline's audiences and the collective experience of enjoying a "film" with such a like-minded audience is a strength that helps to offset any weakness in exhibition formats. I would still prefer, however, that—as an audience—we celebrate not only our unique stories but their visual quality as well. For those who care, here are the Frameline films being shown in 35mm:
Short films
Close (Pod Bluzka, 2008)—This nine-minute Polish short by Lucia Von Horn Pagana will have its US premiere as part of the Tough Girls shorts program.
Masala Mama (2010)—This nine-minute Singaporean short by Michael Kam will have its world premiere in The Golden Pin shorts program.
The New Tenants (2009)—Joachim Back's 21-minute short is part of Frameline's popular Fun In Boys' Shorts program.
Features
Going South (Plein Sud, 2009)
Grown Up Movie Star (2009)
Hideaway (Le Refuge, 2009)
I Killed My Mother (J'ai Tué Ma Mère, 2009)
Last Summer of La Boyita, The (El ultimo verano de la Boyita, 2009)
Mädchen In Uniform (1958)
Man Who Loved Yngve, The (2008)
Sasha (2010)
Purple Sea, The (2009)
Spring Fever (2009)
Topp Twins: Untouchable Girls, The (2009)
Cross-published on Twitch.
Continuing with my survey of the diasporic dimension of San Franciscan film festival culture, Chi-hui Yang—Festival Director for the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival (SFIAAF)—invited me to the offices of the Center for Asian American Media (CAAM) to discuss the Center's mission objectives and the Festival's ongoing relationship with Bay Area Asian and Asian American communities. Chi-hui is a graduate of Stanford University and the founder of the Stanford Asian American Performing Arts Series. He has written about culture, music and film for Spin, Giant Robot, and other magazines and on-line outlets and has curated film programs that have been screened at venues and festivals nationwide, including the Seattle International Film Festival and Minneapolis' Sound Unseen Festival.
The San Francisco-based Center for Asian American Media was founded in 1980. Formerly known as the National Asian American Telecommunications Association (NAATA), CAAM has grown into the largest organization dedicated to the advancement of Asian Americans in independent media, specifically in the areas of television and filmmaking. In 1986, CAAM took over planning, programming and management of the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival. Since then, SFIAAFF has become the largest festival of its kind in North America.
* * *
Michael Guillén: Chi-hui, what prompted CAAM's decision to create the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival?
Chi-hui Yang: When NAATA was founded in 1980, its main purpose was to present works on public television. Then we added the film festival, then our Media Fund which funds documentaries, and then our educational department. Most recently we've added a digitial media department.
The public television work had a national focus. CAAM is one of the five minority consortia funded by the U.S. government through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The funding for the entire organization is relying upon commercial appropriations. The money that we get is the same money that ITVS and PBS gets, committed towards building public media.
Guillén: So, in contrast to several of the other film festivals in the Bay Area, you're receiving funding on the Federal level?
Yang: For the organization. The Festival's resources come from a different pool of money, primarily from earned revenue, corporate sponsorship and foundation grants, which is the same as every other festival. The Federal money that comes into CAAM funds our public television and our film funding efforts.
Guillén: What was the perceived need to develop a film festival?
Yang: At that point in the late '70s, early '80s, there was a loose confederation of Asian American filmmakers. There had been a lot of movement in the early '70s in Los Angeles and New York with community-activist filmmaking happening through Visual Communications in Los Angeles and Asian Cinevision in New York; but, those were very much regional. All those groups and more came together for a convening in Berkeley in 1980 to found a new organization which would try to fulfill the promise of public television, or hold public television to what it promised to do: i.e., offer diverse programming for the entire nation that reflected the composition of the country. At that point there was very little Asian American programming on public television. It was still primarily imported British programming. That calculation was strategic in that—with regard to interest in terms of sheer audience reach—nothing can really compete with a public television broadcast. It couldn't then and even still you can reach millions of viewers through one broadcast, which is the large impact the founders thought they could have. That's the reason why the organization was started: to take advantage of American public television to reach modern audiences with Asian American content.
The festival component came after that when the organization decided that it wanted a local component that built community and interaction in the Bay Area as opposed to just a national broadcast that was beamed into homes but didn't actually bring people together.
Guillén: In determining the content that you wanted to show at the festival, what were you looking for? Was it specifically Asian American representation?
Yang: Yes.
Guillén: Yet, you also profile Asian film?
Yang: Our interest is to look at the continuum that happens between Asian American and the diaspora from Asia, to really see what the connections are because in a lot of ways the original impulse was to offer more diverse views of Asian people with a focus on Asian American filmmakers. There's an interesting tension that happens between Asian American and Asian programming in that—politically, in the U.S.—Asian and Asian American often are conflated to be the same thing. They might presume someone from Japan is the same as a Japanese American, even though they couldn't be more different. With cinema there's a strong tension to disassociate Asian from Asian American as a political statement; but, then there's so many interesting cultural, linguistic, and different types of artistic linkages between Asians and Asian Americans that flow back and forth. Part of our interest is to address that tension and look at what it produces. Also to look at what Asian filmmakers in other parts of the Diaspora are creating to reflect upon the cinema from the U.S. Increasingly, you have Asian American filmmakers who are working not in the U.S. but somewhere else. For example, you might have an American indie that is being shot in a non-English language. Those ideas are starting to blur a bit but are the ideas that we're interested in exploring.
Guillén: By giving Asian American filmmakers the opportunity to strengthen themselves, has that cross-pollinated Asian cinema? Is the tension you're referencing a collaborative tension?
Yang: I think it definitely is and the areas where we see it the most are actually where there are the most Asian Americans returning into Asia to make films. A good case study is Vietnam. There's a strong Vietnamese American film movement happening now. There's a number of filmmakers, including people like Ham Tran who made Journey From the Fall (2006), Stephane Gauger who made Owl and the Sparrow (2007), and others who were raised in the U.S., went to film school in the U.S., grew up within the domestic scene here, and returned to Vietnam to reinvigorate Vietnamese cinema. Vietnam is an interesting example, as is Taiwan where Taiwanese Americans are making investments in Taiwanese films. A different model is Korea where a lot of Korean Americans are finding work in Korea. It's not so much about Korean American filmmakers going back to Korea and changing the film scene there, but more that the Korean film industry has seen a route to finding a market in the U.S. to make money for Korean films; their vehicle being Korean Americans. So there's a number of different interactions happening, some based upon personal dynamics, others more on the global film industry processes.
Guillén: Which addresses the question: do Asian American film festivals provide a distribution/exhibition channel by which Asian films can reach diasporic audiences situated in the U.S.? When you're programming content for your festival, how much are you aware that your audience is more than just Asian American? Especially here in San Francisco where the last census revealed that more than one third of the city's population is of Asian descent?
Yang: Our audience demographics tell us that about 60% of our audiences are Asian and the other 40% is a mix of other communities. Our audience is broad. The films that we show are a mix of English language and a lot of other languages too. The audiences that we have are primarily second-generation. As a rough estimate, one fourth of our audience is first-generation where their first language is a foreign language. That dynamic is interesting because a lot of the films that we show are more independent or artistic in nature. We don't show a lot of commercial films. We found that a lot of first-generation immigrants don't gravitate as much to independent films as to commercial films. There's an interesting barrier there that we are trying to address. At the same time, when we show films like Mother India (1957) or other important classic films for certain communities, we see those folks come out. There were certainly a lot of people from the Indian diasporic community who came out to watch that film.
Guillén: Would you say that—by placing a revival screening within your program—you broaden your constituency?
Yang: Absolutely. What's interesting about this idea of what "Asian American" is, it's a term that some people embrace while other people don't quite know how they fit within it. Certainly, within second-generation Asian people living in the U.S., they are the group that embraces that identity more, which is essentially the identity of the festival. At the same time a lot of the offerings that we present are just as interesting to either first-generation immigrants or other groups which haven't historically identified as Asian American but whom we see as part of that.
About 10 years ago we did a big focus on cinema of the South Asian diaspora. At that point we noted that our audience stats for the South Asian community were fairly low and—from talking to people in research—we understood that a lot of folks didn't identify solely as Asian American; they were more South Asian. So that was our effort to bring in and build connections with that community. That program worked well and was about the time that we started working with 3rd i to build in-roads into that community. In this coming year, 2010, we will have a focus on the Filipino American community. In the Bay Area, after the Chinese community, the Filipino American community is the second largest. It's quite big. For that community, there are a lot of ties to homeland, a lot of movement back and forth, both culturally and linguistically, and in terms of travel. There are a lot of first-generation Filipino immigrants in the Bay Area and so that's another community that we want to build connections with and bring into the festival.
Guillén: Is your demographic data from the last census, now 10 years out of date?
Yang: Yes. But we also do a lot of data gathering at the festival so we have a sense of who's coming matched up against the last census information for the city. Also, we acquire information anecdotally, just from being in the community and understanding where those communities are at. The place we've actually found the most interesting demographic data is with advertising agencies who work with us closely. Their intent is to move into the Asian American market and our festival is actually the largest Asian American arts event in the nation. We offer them a great laboratory and an in-road into the Asian American community in the Bay Area. Those advertising agencies actually have the most up-to-date information because they've done a lot of their own in-market research.
Guillén: Having attended SFIAAF for about 10 years now, I've noted that your festival's audiences stand out as some of the most fun, ebullient and engaged audiences of any film festival in the Bay Area. Clearly, as you've been indicating, you have built this audience through community outreach. Do you have a specific community outreach position within your festival staff?
Yang: Yes.
Guillén: So when you're bringing in Asian American content to your festival, its audience is presumed; but, when you're bringing in Asian content, such as Vietnamese or Filipino, as you've mentioned, how do you shape your audience? How do you reach your first-generation, second-generation Asian audiences? What efforts does your community outreach perform specifically?
Yang: There are a number of different key ways that we do that. We work with ethnic press first. We also connect with community social service and cultural organizations, and we work through them to reach communities who often need to be communicated to in their first language. By example, we create a lot of in-language publications and flyers to the Vietnamese and Korean communities.
During the festival, we usually partner with 80-100 community-based organizations. Our marketing, promotion and community outreach strategies exist both on broad-based publicist PR to mainstream publications, all the way to going to grass roots organizations, going to community events, and working through their lists. We have found that these organizations want to be a part of CAAM and the festival. In a way it's a win-win because it allows them to have exposure at the festival and helps them reinforce their relationships with their communities.
Guillén: How do you fit your community organizations to a specific film? I imagine you have a rolodex of opportunity; but, how do you know which organization to approach to co-present?
Yang: Our approach is to go as specific as we can. For example, we often show films about adoption, and if we show a film about Vietnamese adoption, we'll zero in on the handful of organizations that deal with that and invite them to participate in the festival. We'll send them information about the film and make sure it agrees with their politics, as a lot of these social issues are quite contentious within the community.
Guillén: How about consular assistance?
Yang: Consulate help is usually for resources and hospitality; bringing in filmmakers. For example, we had Kiyoshi Kurosawa this last year and the Japanese Consulate hosted a reception for him and helped with travel support.
Guillén: How much is your festival supported by regional collaborations with sister organizations on the West Coast? Do you pool resources to coordinate the visit, let's say, of high-profile talent to the West Coast?
Yang: Not so much. We're good friends with the Los Angeles festival; but, because of the time gap between our festivals—they're a month and a half after SFIAFF—it's harder to coordinate that way. The main way that we coordinate is that every year at the festival we have a convening of all the Asian American film festival organizers in the country. We usually have about 15-17 cities represented, about 40 people, who all come to our festival because it is strategically the first Asian American festival of the year and the largest. A lot of them come to our festival to look for films to lock into their programs. So we have an afternoon meeting to discuss common challenges, collaborations, the state of the field, and how we can help each other out.
Guillén: With the documented proliferation of film festivals world-wide, there is some concern that there is more competition than collaboration among festivals. As most of them are organized on a similar non-profit model, competition for both economic and demographic resources has become a pressing concern. Though that might be generally true, I seek to suggest that in the Bay Area—with its incredibly high incidence of film festivals—there is a strong collaborative ethic between our community-based film festivals, who often co-present for each other, weaving their audiences into each other. Do you find this to be true?
Yang: Yes, film festival work in San Francisco is much different than other cities where they are more competitive for audiences and films. While we do compete for audiences and films in San Francisco, we have found that we have gained more by cross-pollinating audiences. One study that hasn't been done and would prove interesting is how much overlap there is between audiences from Frameline, the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival, the San Francisco International Film Festival, and 3rd i, to determine what the percentage is of people who attend all these festivals or just a few of them. We don't really know; but, what we do know is that we're all working with a similar group of people that we're trying to engage with film. We've found that if we collaborate or even just communicate programmatically—What are they going after? What are we going after?—it helps save a lot of time and effort. If we co-present, then we get our festival in front of their viewers and give a benefit to our membership too, in terms of letting them know about something that's exciting. A lot of times, a film that we might co-present at another festival is a film that we might have wanted to show but couldn't show because it's showing up at another festival, but which we continue to want to support.
Guillén: CAAM and SFIAAF are ahead of many of the other community-based film festivals for having an active arm of distribution/exhibition, specifically through your public broadcasting. What is the protocol, if any, of determining which films that have played at your festival become eligible for further exposure through public broadcast?
Yang: We look at the organization as, in a way, a full-service organization for filmmakers. There's a particular type of film that might make its way through all strands of the organization. Starting with our funding department, we fund primarily non-fiction films for public television broadcast; for example, a film like Hollywood Chinese (2007) by Arthur Dong or Daughter From Danang (2002) by Gail Dolgin. Often when the films we've funded for public television are finished, we will show them at the festival and then present them on public television, and then follow up with the educational distribution to colleges and universities. Every year there are a handful of films that go through all those phases. Then again, there are a lot of films that don't. For example, we did everything with Hollywood Chinese except the educational outreach; Arthur Dong did that on his own.
Though ordinarily it is the non-fiction films that make their way through these stages, this year we produced Fruit Fly (2009) by H.P. Mendoza. We funded it, produced it, showed it at the festival, and the next step would be whether we get it onto public television or educational distribution, which we're still working out to see if its appropriate for either of those channels.
Guillén: And this opportunity for "full-service", as you say, is specifically for Asian American filmmakers?
Yang: It is, though we have a fairly expanded idea of that. For example, a recent film we funded was City of Borders (2009), a documentary about a gay and lesbian bar in Israel. It's about Palestinian-Jewish communities there. Under the broadest possible definition, you could conceive of that documentary as being Asian American—by way of the Palestinian story, which caters to a very broad definition of Asian—but, moreso, we're supporting a talented Korean American filmmaker Yun Suh who had this important film to make.
Guillén: So you're saying that it's not that the content of the film must be specifically Asian American? That the director is Asian American qualifies its inclusion?
Yang: Our interest is in supporting our audiences and filmmakers. A lot of times those interests will coincide where—though we know our audiences want to see Asian American stories and we also want to support the work of filmmakers—a film may have Asian American content and be made by an Asian American filmmaker; but, there are other permutations.
Guillén: How does SFIAAF address the value added of the spectacular dimension of film festival culture?
Yang: We realize we need a good balance between our offerings. Programmatically, our inclination is to go towards smaller, more director-driven projects, because those are the films that have the least support and which audiences would have the least chance seeing. At the same time, knowing our audiences are diverse with a broad range of interests, we do want to balance with some commercial films, namely blockbusters from Asia. Unfortunately, there are no Asian American blockbusters, though—when they happen to come along—we will show the Harold and Kumar movies or films like that, which have a broader recognition. Above all, we want our audiences to have a good time and in a lot of ways the festival is—speaking of the spectacular—as much a community gathering point as it is a festival. Some people come for the films but just as many, or more, come to be a part of something, which they can't find anywhere else. For that reason, we want to enhance that experience by—not just having films—but providing outdoor screenings, concerts, parties, multiple social events where that kind of community gathering happens. That way we can also take a look at Asian and Asian American artists who are working in different mediums than film to explore what the connections might be in Asian American culture between, let's say, music and film. There are a lot of overlaps.
Guillén: You usually include at least one open air free-to-the-public screening at the festival?
Yang: We usually do two a year. We'll stage one in the summer—which we did last week with Kamikaze Girls (2006)—and then we'll stage one during the festival.
Guillén: I see community building as the participatory and celebratory aspect—the "festive" part—of a film festival. You're saying SFIAFF is committed to that?
Yang: Yeah, absolutely. But it's not just fun-for-fun's-sake either. There's a real social value to creating a space within the festival that allows ideas, creativities and connections to be made. Normally at a film festival, those connections you see are often more business-driven or industry-driven; but, here at SFIAFF, it really is more community-based. You see a lot of film projects or collaborations that might emerge out of a casual conversation. Or we have those 80-100 community organizations involved who become part of the mix and other ideas are born from there too. So the festival is a real gathering point for the community and also for people who are outside the Asian American community to see what else is happening.
Guillén: Absolutely. I have to commend that embrace. As a Chicano, I took great pride when your former cohort Taro Goto invited me to contribute a capsule to SFIAFF because it was an open invitation into your community. By contrast, the International Latino Film Festival never once invited me to write a capsule, and barely acknowledged me as press.
Yang: In a lot of ways it's born out of this idea that the Asian American community is so diverse that it's almost contradictory. It's impossible to sum up. Linguistically and culturally it is vast and growing. Out of that, there has to be this acknowledgment of multiplicity. It's inherent within the Asian American experience.
Guillén: I would say that acknowledgment of multiplicity leans into the future, moreso than adherence to identity politics. Local artist Guillermo Gomez-Peña has deeply influenced me with regard to looking past identity politics to explore questions of allegiance in the future: what do you have when a Salvadorian boy and a Korean girl fall in love, marry, and have a child? To what community will that child identify?
Which leads me to ask, is there a point at which your festival will not be necessary? Is there a point where your community, your audience, will be so woven into the multiplicity of the general populace that it will no longer be necessary to specifically address and express the Asian American experience? Or, alternately, with international film festivals broadening their European predilections to include cinema from Asia and the Global South, will a specific venue for such cinemas still be necessary?
Yang: Well, I look at it in two ways. One is through the lens of a specific ethnic original community. The second is in terms of independent media. I think there will always be a need for venues to show independent media, which is primarily what we focus on. In terms of the Asian American focus, sure, there is more integration and assimilation; but, in terms of representation in mainstream media, it actually hasn't progressed very much. In a lot of ways that goes back to why our audiences are so enthusiastic. If you look at, say, other more identity-based film festivals in the Bay Area or across the country—gay and lesbian, Latino, Jewish—they all have more mainstream media representation than Asian Americans.
Guillén: Why is that? I've spoken with Eric Byler about this. He complains about how Hollywood will fly in talent from China or Japan to star in some blockbuster before they think of casting an Asian American actor. Do you have a sense of why that is?
Yang: It's a complicated dynamic. There are marketing researchers saying that American audiences are more comfortable with an Asian foreigner than an Asian American. It's bizarre; but, people are familiar and accustomed to what they have already seen. They want to see more of what they have seen. What they have seen on television or at the movies is that foreigner. That's the dominating image you see of Asians. So when you see an Asian who's an American, it confuses people a little and—when you confuse people—that doesn't make you money. That's one of the overriding dynamics which controls this. Because, certainly, there's no lack of talent.
Guillén: When I think of mainstream Asian cinema, I think of genre. When I think of genre, I think of audience appeal. Does independent Asian American cinema concern itself with genre?
Yang: I would say independent Asian American cinema is a response to genre, to that pigeonholing. Most Asian American filmmakers aren't interested in that, or—if they are—they're doing it in an ironic way to escape the pigeonholing. What's interesting is that there is this idea of the qualifier. You're watching a film and it's crazy, or it's a new action film, right? It's the same thing as the debate over having or not having a hyphen for "Asian American". The hyphen is a qualification. There's a qualifier that has to happen for people to watch certain things that have an Asian American or an Asian in it. Without that qualifier, it's not that interesting—it's a domestic drama; it's a romantic comedy—but, it's not an absurd, spectacular crazy film that would qualify you to see it, even if it has a non-White cast.
Guillén: Do you think Asian American cinema has any influence on Asian cinema, by way of style, themes?
Yang: I don't think there's a whole lot of that. I think Asian filmmakers are probably looking to some of the big American auteurs. Certainly, I think they might look to people like Ang Lee, M. Night Shyamalan, or Mira Nair, who are well-established filmmakers; but, not so much to independent filmmakers.
Guillén: Shifting to the festival's interaction with press, do you tier press?
Yang: No. But I have encountered that at Cannes.
Guillén: Cannes is the mother of all press tiering, which adheres strictly to their spectacular dimension. I understand what's going on there. You could be Manohla Dargis and have trouble getting into a film.
Yang: I can also understand the administrative, logistical and business aspects of press tiering. If your festival is big enough that you have hundreds and hundreds of members of the press attending, then you need to figure out how to accommodate their various needs. You would probably have to figure out some kind of tiered press system because you wouldn't be able to accommodate all their needs. You'd have 100 interview requests for a single director, which you can't accommodate, so you have to figure that out. That's the only reason I can think of. But, no, we don't tier press. I don't see any reason to. It also has to do with a philosophical approach towards marketing, outreach and publicity. What do you value? We certainly value the mainstream press—television, radio and print—but we know that equally as important, perhaps even more important, is community-based ethnic online bloggers who dictate people's tastes and interactions just as much or more than the mainstream press. There has to be that recognition. That's something SFIAAF really values.
Guillén: So SFIAFF draws no separation between print and online press?
Yang: No, not really. We're aware of the value of having a photo placed in The Chronicle; that's great. That's gaining us a lot of people. But equally important to us is having good, critical, more-in-depth coverage, which a lot of times print can't allow for space issues, which online can. This is not to criticize anyone, but sometimes when you have short pieces in print, it doesn't allow room to go into depth. Online coverage gives good copy to our filmmakers that they can take home and do something with. That's the reality of it.
Guillén: I'm heartened to hear that. Beneath the aegis of film festival studies, consideration of the "written record" of any given film festival has become of importance to me. Much of it is manifesting online where the actual experience of a film festival can be chronicled, relying less on a thumbs-up thumbs-down critique of content. Social networking, microblogging, have become a new frequency of immediate and intense buzz for a festival.
Of related interest:
Want to ask the programmers your own questions? The San Francisco Film Society is sponsoring a SFFS Arts Forum panel on Monday, October 12, 7:30PM—"Meet the Programmers"—at The Mezzanine. Panelists include Nancy Fishman (SFJFF), Jennifer Morris (Frameline), Rachel Rosen (SFFS), Jeff Ross (SF IndieFEST), and Chi-hui Yang (SFIAAF), moderated by SF360's Susan Gerhard.
Film International Special Issue on Film Festivals (Vol. 6, Issue 4)
Film Festival Yearbook 1—A Response to Section One
Film Festival Yearbook 1—A Response to Section TwoDiaspora By the Bay: SFJFF—The Evening Class Interview With Program Director Nancy K. Fishman and Program Coordinator Joshua Moore
Diaspora By the Bay: 3rd i—The Evening Class Interview With Artistic Director Ivan Jagirdar and Administrative Director Anuj Vaidya
Photo of Chi-hui Yang courtesy of Jay Jao. Cross-published on Twitch.
I waited almost a little too long to interview Michael Lumpkin, Frameline's former Executive Director, before his unexpected retirement. I told myself not to hazard the same mistake twice and to make a more concerted effort to get to know and interact with his successor K.C. Price and, further, to become more involved with Frameline's championing presence in the Bay Area. I dropped the ball last year on meeting up with Price but rallied this year. My thanks to K.C. for so graciously considering my 35mm complaints even as he invited me into Frameline's office at the Ninth Street Film Center for a conversation. He carries on Frameline's ongoing tradition of being responsive to its constituency. A tall, affable and well-spoken gentleman, I sensed our conversation would be the first of many in years to come.
Michael Guillén: K.C., I was Googling you last night to see who the heck you were and I kept getting all these hits on this Black evangelist fleecing his flocks....
Price: No. Michael Lumpkin hired me in 1999. I came on then and worked for four years as their Development Director. Frameline, CAAM, and the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival co-own the Ninth Street Film Center and—when Frameline moved into the building—we enhanced that partnership. All of a sudden the Center became its own non-profit so I moved from the Frameline position and became the Managing Director of Ninth Street. I did that for five years. I was still basically working closely with Michael and Frameline through those years. When Michael left, I applied for the Executive Director position and that's how I came back into the office directly.
Price: Absolutely! I feel lucky to have this job. No doubt about it. Of course, anybody working in the non-profit sector with the economy right now has been facing financial challenges—especially at the end of 2008 when all this started—but, we have weathered all that very well and things are going great. No, I couldn't love this job any more. Being in this role last year during my first festival—especially following in Michael's footsteps—felt pretty terrifying sometimes; but, at this point, going into my second year, it feels so much more comfortable to me.
Guillén: With regard to this year's edition of Frameline, I'd like to focus on the two sidebars I'm most anticipating—the focus on South American queer cinema and the mini-retrospective of the queer shorts of Andy Warhol—and the festival's overriding attention to history. As you went to organize the festival, did these themes present themselves in the submissions received or did you sift through the submissions in search of works to fit chosen themes?
Price: We do interact with them—not necessarily to make the programming decisions—but, we have a lot of close relationships with several of the other queer film festivals. We get to know each other at the larger film festivals. They're wonderful people working at the other festivals. We have a great working relationship, for example, with Outfest in Los Angeles. One thing we do get out of knowing the other programmers is that sometimes we can check in with each other for tips or if we're looking for information on a particular film; but, it's not a close network in terms of making mutual programming decisions.
Price: We have two different types of sponsorship support. We have corporate sponsorship where companies, businesses and sometimes non-profits donate either corporate financial gifts or in-kind gifts. The other part of it is the co-presentations where we work with different community organizations—this year I think we have more than 60 different community groups, mainly all non-profit organizations—and they help us get out the word about Frameline and the festival and we get to talk about them at the screenings as well as provide tickets to their constituents so they can attend the festival. Servicemembers Legal Defense Network is one of our relatively new co-presenters that we're excited about this year. They're co-presenting two wonderful films related to Don't Ask Don't Tell: A Marine Story (2010) and Out of Annapolis (2010).
Guillén: Speaking of the distribution arm, I'd like to follow-up on a question I asked Michael Lumpkin when we spoke a few years back. I expressed to him how much I admired the "Send It Home" program that Frameline initiated back in the late '80s, I believe, and he told me that the program had been discontinued due to administrative complications. He mentioned, however, that it had morphed into Frameline's "Youth In Motion" program, a carryover of the "Send It Home" initiative. Can you speak to where Frameline stands with its "Youth In Motion" program?
Price: Yes, yes, and yes. [Laughs.] It's really wonderful that we do have all these new platforms and options to see things on television that we didn't used to see; definitely a plethora of queer images in media that weren't available, say, 10-15 years ago. On the other hand, though, Frameline's festival as well as the other LGBT festivals throughout the country still fulfill a really important need of bringing out a large collection of independent, really wonderful LGBT films that you're not going to have access to. If on your cable networks or your IPhone—should that be the medium you prefer to watch films—these films were available, I wonder if it would be a different question? Yet, it isn't. LGBT film festivals really are the only opportunity people will have to see a lot of these works.
Guillén: A case in point would be François Ozon's Le Refuge, which I caught at Toronto, and which Frameline has included in its line-up, but which was also shown previously in the Bay Area at a preview screening at the recent San Francisco International. I'm curious, did they situate the film in their festival in that way because they knew you were going to be showing it at your festival?
Price: More of what was out there. We didn't purposely do that. We did more consciously program the Warhol sidebar just because of a number of things that had happened over the past few years. We thought it would be a nice add-on after the underground cinema we programmed last year. Plus, we were motivated by the wonderful Centerpiece documentary Beautiful Darling: The Life and Times of Candy Darling, Andy Warhol Superstar.
Price: No, we worked with Canyon Cinema last year for our special program on underground cinema; but, this year we're working with MOMA for the Warhol films since they had the 16mm prints. They just came in the other day. I was excited when the big box arrived. Ron Gregg, the Yale film studies professor who's curated the sidebar, is absolutely marvelous and I'm personally looking forward to his lecture as well.
So, for example, I was really excited how much you loved The Consul of Sodom. I did too. One of the things that just fascinated me about the film so much was that I would never think that a person such as the poet portrayed in that film would have led such a life in post-World War II Franco Spain. It surprised me; but, then—watching the film—I thought, "Well, of course." I would have thought it would have been a more oppressive time where a gay man couldn't live quite as openly; but, then again, when you come from such a wealthy family, you can get away with a lot more.
Guillén: I'm likewise invested in several of the projects chosen this year. Scott Boswell's The Stranger In Us is dear to my heart and I'm so pleased it sold out its original Roxie engagement, such that you've added a second screening at the Castro.
