Cambridge Film Festival
The Cambridge Film Festival is the third longest running film festival in the UK. The festival historically took place during early July, but now takes place annually during August and September (28 Aug-9th Sep in 2014) in Cambridge.
Established in 1977 and re-launched in 2001 after a 5-year hiatus, the Cambridge Film Festival shows a range of UK and international films that debuted at leading film festivals, including the Cannes Film Festival and Berlin Film Festival, as well as hosting UK premieres of films, alongside a broad range of specialist interest, archive, and retrospective strands. All films are open to the public to watch.
In 2005 the Festival showed a retrospective of the works of Soviet documentary maker Dziga Vertov alongside a season of a Studio Ghibli films.
The Festival has a long running relationship with Woody Allen which has seen him offer the UK premieres of many of his films, including Crimes and Misdemeanors, Midnight in Paris, Blue Jasmine and in 2014, Magic in the Moonlight which marks the Woody Allen's 20th preview at the Cambridge Film Festival.
Other UK premieres at the Festival have included Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs in 1992, Pirates of the Caribbean starring Jonny Depp and Jim Jarmusch's Broken Flowers with Bill Murray.
Each year the Festival awards audience awards to the Best Feature (The Golden Punt Award), Best Documentary (Silver Punt Award), and Best Short Film (Crystal Punt Award).
2014 programme
The 34th Cambridge Film Festival runs from 28 August - 7 September.
The Festival's opening films include Magic in the Moonlight which marks the 20th Woody Allen preview at the Festival, and The Kidnapping of Michel Houellebecq for which the Festival hopes to welcome both director Guillaume Nicloux and Michel Houellebecq himself to this premiere of the film.
The full programme of events can be downloaded from the Festival's website
The Family Film Festival
The Family Film Festival returns in 2014[1]
Venues
The Festival takes place in Cambridge’s three-screened Arts Picturehouse, a local arts cinema run by Picturehouse. Since 2005 the Festival has expanded to take in other formal arts venues such as the nearby Cambridge Cineworld multiplex, arts venue The Junction, and Sawston Cinema, as well as interesting non traditional venues such as pedestrianised Cambridge streets, local churches and the colleges of the University. Some special outdoor screenings are held each year, most notably the Movies on the Meadows screenings at Grantchester Meadows shown on an inflatable screen.
Movies on the Meadows 2014
Six Films, Three Screens, Two Nights, One River, Millions of Stars.[2]
Movies on the Meadows is an outdoor screening event held at Grantchester Meadows, Cambridge. Over the August bank holiday weekend six films screen over two nights on giant inflatable screens. Three films show simultaneously each night and audiences tune into their preferred film using a radio set and headphones.
Saturday 23 August 2014 was family themed and screened:
Sunday 24 August 2014 was Sci-fi themed and showed:
Audiences can bring their own picnics or browse the varied food and drink on offer from local vendors. In 2014 the local vendors included Planet of the Crepes, Caffe Mobile, and Steak and Honour
2013 Audience Award Winners
Golden Punt Award for Best Fiction Feature - The Forgotten Kingdom
Silver Punt Award for Best Documentary - Black Africa, White Marble
Crystal Punt Award for Best Short Film - Rhino Full Throttle.
The festival also has touring events across the Eastern region of England including Norwich, Ipswich and Ely. Notably in 2006 the Festival held an outdoors screening of A Cock and Bull Story at Felbrigg Hall, one of that film’s shooting locations.
In 2006 the Cambridge Film Trust was launched, a new charity aiming to support and promote the film festival and film culture in Cambridge.