Film festival gets grant

The Wisconsin Film Festival scheduled April 4-7 has received a $10,000 grant from the Academy Foundation of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

The festival, a public program of the UW–Madison Arts Institute, was one of 14 festivals nationwide chosen by the Academy Foundation to receive grants for calendar year 2002 programming. The 14 festivals were selected from among 41 that had been invited by the academy to send proposals, which were voted on by the Academy’s Festival Grants Committee, chaired by producer Gale Anne Hurd.

Other festivals receiving grants include the New York Film Festival, Mill Valley Film Festival, San Francisco International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, Ann Arbor Film Festival, and Human Rights Watch International Film Festival.

The Academy Foundation grant will be used to support Festival programming, including retrospective programs, filmmaker tributes, and craft-focused series, and in particular, programs that give independent filmmakers exposure to and feedback from audiences.

The Wisconsin Film Festival is Wisconsin’s premier independent film event and only major film festival. The four-day annual festival that takes place each spring in Madison in both UW–Madison campus and downtown venues. The festival presents the best new independent film (feature, documentary, experimental), world cinema and new media; cultivates discovery through talks, panels, performances and coffeehouse discussions with filmmakers; and showcases the work of Wisconsin filmmakers through juried competitions. In 2001, the third annual festival featured 110 films from 21 countries, 60 local and visiting filmmakers and speakers, and had ticket sales of over 14,000.