..aaaaand ACTION!

So, here we are. A couple of months ago it seemed the Isle of Man wasn’t going to have a Film Festival this year, due to various unfortunate cutbacks. But in less than a month, right here on the tiny Isle, there will be all KINDS of fun film stuffs going on – guest speakers, workshops, premieres, panel discussions and more! Howzat you say?

Previously run by the Isle of Man Arts Council, the IOM Film Fest has consisted of the Young Filmmaker of Mann, Short Film Competition and outdoor films screenings (“Under The Stars”). MannIN Shorts were honoured to be invited to host the opening night of the past two years; it started in 2010, when we launched our scheme with a panel of distinguished guests (Oscar shortlisted Chris Jones, Hamish Morrow from Future Shorts, Lee Boardman from HBO’s Rome among others); then last year we  screened our own short film ‘Ghostgirl‘ and fab ManxMade MiniMovies by Will Sutton, Danny Lumb and Daniyel Lowden, alongside a programme of international films from Future Shorts. This year, we had high hopes to premiere our very first completed ‘finalist films’ from our scheme – so when the whole event was thrown in doubt just a few short months ago, we threw caution (& our own sanity) to the wind and decided to put a proposal in to the Arts Council ourselves to run a three night extravanganza – and it was accepted… arg!!

Thankfully, we have some brilliant and ever helpful friends in the film making world both on and off Island and so, we are pleased to be able to bring you:-

• Isle of Man Film Night (a full length feature made on the Island, introduced by the filmmakers and with a Q&A after the screening)
• ‘An Evening With the Indies’ (a panel of special guests introducing, screening – & premiere’ing in some instances – their own material, with Q&A after the screening)
• MannIN Shorts ‘Big Ideas, Little Films’ MannMade MiniMovies night! (with premiere’s of several of our Finalist Films, including “I Do” and “Hide & Seek”, clips from forthcoming films “Closet” and “Solace in Wicca” alongside material by several other Isle of Man filmmakers)

and

• The IOM Arts Council Young Filmmaker of Mann competition (screenings on the afternoon of Saturday September 15th, with two winning entries to be shown again as part of the ‘Big Ideas, Little Films’ programme)

There are also workshops on the cards for the days of, preceding and following the festival itself. Keep one eye on this blog and on our Facebook and Twitter feeds for information as we can release it.

There will be a very small ticket fee of £5 per night of the festival, with a full weekend pass for just £12. Which we hope you agree is a bargain for all the screenings and upclose&personal discussion with the filmmakers themselves. Details for all of this to follow very soon…

We are indebted to the IOM Arts Council, without whom we wouldnt – couldn’t – be running a festival at all, to Isle of Man Film for hosting the opening night and also to Fiona and Shaun at the Villa Marina who were able to move things around for us to be able to use the beautiful Broadway Cinema for our screenings. And a special thanks to PokerStars, who have supported our MannIN Shorts workshops from early on and without whom, we wouldn’t have a scheme!

Also to our fab filmmaking friends both here and off Island who are giving up their time to help us put this programme together at very short notice.

Looking forward to seeing you there!