The IFFR counted 353,000 visitors to the films, exhibitions, live shows and events, including the 8,000 film lovers who attend the fully booked Volkskrant day on Sunday 7 February. The 40th International Film Festival Rotterdam will take place from Wednesday 26 January to Sunday 6 February 2011.
With audience figures slightly up and with a significant increase in filmmakers’ and industry professionals attendance, IFFR Festival Director Rutger Wolfson said about this edition in the festival newspaper Daily Tiger: “Solidarity has been the watchword as filmmakers, film-goers and industry delegates have come to Rotterdam in vast numbers for a festival celebrating cinema at its most innovative.”
Among nearly 400 filmmakers in attendance, the International Film Festival Rotterdam welcomed prominent directors Yoshida Kiju accompanied by his wife, actress Okada Mariko, Tsai Ming-liang (Visage), François Ozon (Le refuge), Kore-Eda Hirokazu accompanied by art designer Taneda Yohei (Air Doll), Nicolas Winding Refn (Valhalla Rising), György Pálfi (I’m Not Your Friend), Bruno Dumont (Hadewijch), Jessica Hausner (Lourdes), Harmony Korine (Trash Humpers), Pedro Costa (Ne change rien), Samuel Maoz (Lebanon) and Sai Yoichi (Rotterdam 2010 Filmmaker in Focus).
The IFFR extended its already broad spectrum of support to film makers. The online Cinema Reloaded initiative, which encourages festival-goers and film lovers worldwide to ‘become a producer’ by buying coins to invest in three shorts has made a promising start. The second half of the festival saw the launch of IFFR 2010’s extensive focus on African cinema. The IFFR’s Hubert Bals Fund plans to strengthen yet further its ties with Africa, by organizing, in close collaboration with IDFA’s Jan Vrijman Fund, a showcase of eight HBF and JVF supported films from Africa in twelve African film festivals. The Kino Climates conference brought representatives of small independent cinemas together for the first time. March 3-9, fourteen films from the VPRO Tiger Awards Competition and five short films from the Tiger Awards Competition of Short Films screen in NYC’s BAMcinématek. Following their premieres in Rotterdam, many films will find their way to festivals worldwide.
Wolfson underlines the importance of Rotterdam for the industry: “We have a very, very high profile. The industry knows that Rotterdam offers outstanding possibilities to launch adventurous and innovative cinema, either in CineMart or when it is finished as a premiere.”
Also in the Daily Tiger, CineMart Manager Marit van den Elshout reflected on the event’s continuing importance as a key facilitator within the finance of global independent cinema: “Last year CineMart played out against a mood of depression, but now the market was extremely active. We received great feedback about the selection and all of the thirty-three projects had a very impressive schedule of meetings. With a 20% increase of CineMart participants on 2009, Van den Elshout observes that delegates came well-prepared for a more targeted assessment of the market offerings and expressed satisfaction with a Rotterdam Lab programme that is now considered a staple of the Rotterdam and CineMart experience.
39th International Film Festival Rotterdam in figures:
Total number of visits: 353,000 (2009: 341,000)
Total number of unique visitors to festival website: 290,000 (2009: 292,000)
Page views during festival period: 3,125,000 (2009: 2,600,000)
Number of festival guests: 2,602 (2009: 2,128)
Number of festival guests from The Netherlands: 829 (2009: 710)
Number of international festival guests: 1773 (2009: 1418)
Number of attending filmmakers, visual and performing artists: 393 (2009: 295)
Total number of journalists: 384 (2009: 357)
Total number of international journalists: 164 (2009: 149)
Total number of journalists from the Netherlands: 220 (2009: 208)
Total number of CineMart guests: 890 (2009: 790)
Total number of international CineMart guests: 769 (2009: 605)
Total number of CineMart guests from The Netherlands: 221 (2009: 185)