VTIFF

About

VERMONT INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL™
OCTOBER, 19 – 28 2012

The 26th Vermont International Film Festival is now over. It ended Sunday Oct 30th with a bang: Sleepless in Burlington was a resounding success, with 4 colleges participating and a full house at the screening. With 39 feature length films from 20 countries, many shorts, the Vermont Filmmaker showcase – all in 5 different venues – our attendance rose substantially.

We have already started planning 2012. Please sign up to receive occasional information. Spread the word to friends and colleague, and join us on Facebook or twitter. Contact info@vtiff.org to let us know your thoughts and comments. Let’s make it Our Event.

If you enjoyed the festival and would like to support it, do consider making a donation. Any amount is appreciated and even $100 entitles you to some free tickets. Larger donations and sponsorships will see your name on screen, your ad in the press and a range of other benefits. The festival is totally dependent on your generosity.

Thanks to all who made this year successful, including you, the audience.

As in previous years VTIFF 2012 will screen:

  • OUTSTANDING FILMS – The best in independent films from around the world
  • VERMONT FILMMAKERS’™ – Offering the largest selection of films made by Vermont filmmakers
  • FILMMAKERS OF TOMORROW – exciting, provocative, and innovative student films.
  • SPECIAL APPEARANCES BY NOTABLE DIRECTORS, ACTORS, FILM INDUSTRY PEOPLE – Q & As, discussion, unique perspectives on today’s cinema

This year VTIFF 2011 will focus on Themes:

These film groupings – whether narrative or documentary, short or long – around specific themes, or strands, will highlight and suggest context and connections. Each one of the films within a strand approaches the theme from an entirely different perspective and with a different aim. What they have in common is their cinematic excellence.

NEW VENUES

As part of VTIFF’s commitment to be a force in the community we are extremely happy to announce that in addition to our association with Palace 9 Cinemas in South Burlington, the festival will be screening in a range of venues: FLYNN SPACE downtown Burlington, NORTH END STUDIOS in the Old North End, THE FLEMING on the UVM campus and THE ESSEX CINEMAS in Essex Junction. Palace 9 with its commitment to independent cinema and to encouraging filmmaking in Vermont remains our official venue and sponsor, but it is exciting for us to reach out to new neighborhoods and new audiences.

HISTORY

The Vermont International Film Festival was born from the anti-nuclear movement in the 1985, making it the world’s oldest environmental and human rights film festival. Founded by two longtime peace and social justice activists, George and Sonia Cullinen, the inspiration for the festival came from the success of their 1981 film, From Washington to Moscow, which documented a Walk for Peace between two rural towns — Washington and Moscow, Vermont. The film won the UNESCO prize at the 1983 Hiroshima International Film Festival in Japan and taught the Cullinens that film and video could motivate people to become involved in their own communities and elsewhere in the world. VTIFF grew out of this vision.

The first Vermont International Film Festival was held in 1985 at Marlboro College in southern Vermont. About one hundred people attended the inaugural event. Now based in Burlington, VTIFF has earned a loyal audience for its annual presentation of groundbreaking films spanning the globe, especially films focused on the environment, human rights, and war and peace. Past festival guests have included such activist artists as actor Danny Glover, Bread & Puppet Theater founder Peter Schumann, and historian and playwright Howard Zinn, among others.