Virginia Film Festival reports near record numbers

CHARLOTTESVILLE - The 22nd-annual Virginia Film Festival brought in a bit more than $71,000 in ticket sales, marking an 87 percent increase over the previous year’s festival and just barely missing an all-time record.

“It really was remarkable,“ said Jody Kielbasa, the festival’s new director. “It was really strong, even though we’re in this tough economy.“

The four-day festival - which was themed “Funny Business” - wrapped Sunday night with a screening of “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” at the University of Virginia’s amphitheater that featured an appearance by star Matthew Broderick.

“It ended the festival with a bang,“ said Yasminca Wilson, a fourth-year anthropology major at UVa who interned with the festival and helped organize the screening. “He stayed a long time, answering questions and posing for pictures. It really meant a lot to the students.“

The festival attracted a record-breaking 19,000 moviegoers to its more than 80 films and an array of lectures, parties and special events.

This year’s festival - which is hosted by UVa - came up just short of its all-time ticket sales record, set in 2006 when the festival featured visits by Robert Duvall, Morgan Freeman and Liev Schreiber.

The 2009 film festival featured its own share of celebrity guests. In addition to Broderick, there were appearances by cult filmmaker John Waters, actress Cherry Jones, Academy Award-winning director Norman Jewison and CNN political commentator Candy Crowley.

One highlight, Kielbasa said, was a Sunday morning event featuring Alan Ball, writer of the 1999 film “American Beauty,“ creator of HBO’s “Six Feet Under” and writer and director of HBO’s vampire series “True Blood.“ More than 500 people turned out to UVa’s Culbreth Theatre to listen as Ball offered his shot-by-shot analysis of a “True Blood” episode and took questions from the audience.

Another big draw was the festival’s “Family Day” that featured $1 screenings at the Paramount Theater of “Pixar Shorts” and “The Little Mermaid.“ Later that afternoon, a sizable crowd showed up to watch the documentary “More Than a Game,“ which follows basketball player LeBron James and his high school teammates and coach.

Also noteworthy, Kielbasa said, was the screening of “Locked Out: The Fall of Massive Resistance,“ a documentary that looks at the movement 50 years ago to close Virginia’s schools in an attempt to prevent desegregation. The screening of the film - which was produced by UVa’s Center for Politics and WHTJ - featured a panel discussion with the director of the Center for Politics, Larry J. Sabato, and former Gov. Douglas Wilder.

Kielbasa said he was pleased with how smoothly his debut Virginia Film Festival went.

One likely change for next year’s festival, he said, is that it will probably do away with the idea of having a theme.

“I think it may be time to move away from themes,“ he said.

While Kielbasa said no final decision has been made, he thinks the festival could be better without its annual theme. Some great films, he said, are often an ill fit for the theme.

And a theme must be picked a year or so before the festival, making it impossible to know what contemporary films will be coming out at the time.