In terms of organizing your festival, there are logistical aspects to consider and there are promotional aspects to consider. We have provided a practical checklist and a set of suggestions on promotion and publicity below. There are also a variety of downloadable elements and examples of materials that you can replicate to help make your festival a success.
A critical component of organizing a successful festival is an enthusiastic, involved staff. Seek out a group of dedicated volunteers from your school, your organization, your community, and/or other interested groups: film enthusiasts, activists, etc.
Delegate specific tasks. A set of suggested categories is listed below. If possible, appoint one volunteer to oversee each category:
Outreach and Publicity - See Publicizing and Promoting your Festival.
In-Kind Support - Form partnerships with organizations who can offer in-kind support or donations. Equipment, screening space, publicity, refreshments, time, labor, and sponsorship of opening/closing night festivities or other special events during the festival are all examples of in-kind support.
Festival Logistics - You will need someone to organize and schedule ticket sellers, ushers, speakers, panels, catering, audiovisual/technical support, shipping, and security - if necessary.
Audiovisual Needs - Equipment and tape/DVD checks are an essential part of the festival. Many sites will have in-house technical support, but if you are using volunteers make certain that they are familiar with the screening equipment and presentation formats being used.
Regardless of how you choose to present the Festival, consider holding an opening/closing night event and providing some forum for interaction after the screenings - be they Question and Answer sessions or group discussions. Such events provide an excellent opportunity to extend invitations specifically to press, faculty, community members, and others. They are also an ideal occasion for audience members and Festival participants to mingle and exchange ideas.
This is perhaps the most complex aspect of organizing a successful Festival. You can approach it from a variety of perspectives - from promoting the Festival as a whole, to promoting specific themes, to promoting individual titles.
Encourage Festival previews and reviews by using advance copy DVDs or VHS casettes and special invitations to members of the press. Take advantage of free listings in local newspapers, on local and/or college radio stations, on community and/or university websites, and in local newsletters.
These can include program flyers, posters, postcards, programs and even T-shirts. For images and logos to use on such materials, you can utilize the films’ individual pages and websites as well as visit our general HRWIFF Press page. Websites such as Cafepress.com and modernpostcard.com can produce these materials for you if you do not have a local vendor who can.
Consider utilizing the DVDs and cassettes in the following ways: show clips to advertise the Festival at other events; hold preview screenings for members of the press and/or faculty members; circulate the preview copies individually on a limited basis to members of the press and others to garner pre-Festival publicity.
Choose a specific title that you feel has general mass appeal. Promote this title specifically as a means of drawing a larger audience for the Festival as a whole.
Promotion to specific audiences, including mailings to those audiences, can be extremely effective. See the examples below.
Create a flyer based on a given program theme and target relevant community groups, university departments, and student organizations. There may also be specific publications or radio and television shows which target these groups. In turn, these groups can then further assist you in your outreach efforts by distributing materials, posting the Festival schedule and program on their web site or in their own publications.
Many of the titles in the Festival come from specific countries or regions and are often in another language with English subtitles. Focused outreach to communities originally from these countries and regions is an excellent strategy and will greatly enrich the discussions following these screenings.
As it is possible to license the Festival from a weekend up to a semester (sixteen weeks), there are many presentation options. Some venues choose to hold back-to-back screenings, screening the entire Festival over the course of one weekend, while other sites stagger the screenings, presenting one program per week.
Screenings as an Integral Part of a Course or Curriculum
Many of the programs in the Festival focus on historical or current human rights abuses. The medium of film is particularly effective in articulating the causes and consequences of such atrocities and in conveying the impact that these events have on individuals’ lives. By incorporating certain titles into a class or program relating to human rights, educators and students can base their discussions on individual examples - be they fictionalized or factual - and examine human rights in a more personal, and perhaps realistic, manner. For example, a USC student group devoted to human rights developed this “How To HRWFF” guide in 2002 (pdf file - 3 pages, 166Kb) for student groups doing university-based programming. For curriculum and additional films targeted to youth please visit our High School Program web site http://hrw.org/iff/2006/classroom/index.html.
Collaborative Screenings with Other Organizations
We encourage venues to work as a coalition of organizations who jointly present the Festival. For example, a group of student organizations can come together to present the Festival; a museum or cultural center can team up with a university; or a civic association and a high school can form a partnership to present the Festival.
Consider obvious choices first - film / cultural / art / anthropological / historical / educational organization: museums, local theaters, high schools, universities, professional organizations, etc.
Then, consider perhaps less obvious partners in your community: libraries, senior citizens groups, nonprofit organizations, faith-based organizations, etc.
Collaborating with other organizations provides:
- broad outreach possibilities, and consequently, a more diverse audience
- reduced financial burdens
- greater organizational and administrative support
- the sense of a true community event
Regardless of whether you hold multiple screenings or screen one title per night, we strongly suggest framing each title with an introduction, and if possible, a question and answer session following the screening. We have found that this approach provides a richer context for the titles and strongly encourages an interactive, more participatory role on the part of the audience. Audience members greatly appreciate the opportunity to both express opinions and pose questions.
If the filmmaker cannot be present, try to have an expert on hand who can speak to the issues raised by a given title and field questions after the screening. It is important to have someone from the Festival introduce speakers and panelists, making sure to connect their background and expertise to the themes evoked in the film. A member of the Festival staff should also introduce each title using the background information provided on the individual films’ program guide pages and their websites.
If you incorporate the Festival into your annual programming, you will find that each year your audience will steadily increase and evolve. While staff for your Festival may be temporary, it is important to ensure ongoing interest within your organization and to engender some form of institutional memory and support. By making a commitment to hosting the Festival on an annual basis, you can avoid making the vent dependent on one individual.
We highly recommend having a post-Festival meeting to record and discuss Festival presentation and organization. Suggestions for improvement should be recorded such that you can avoid reinventing the wheel each year. Through effective outreach, promotion, and presentation, the Festival can develop an enthusiastic group of core supporters and become an event that is anticipated annually in your community.
Sample Program
This sample of our printed program (16 pages, 9.2 Mb PDF) was distributed at the 2006 HRWIFF New York. As you can see, it lists all our films, their screenings, and additional elements of the festival such as our photo exhibit and the Media That Matters Online Film Festival.
Sample Press Release
This sample press release (10 pages, 214 Kb PDF) announces the New York festival, lists the press screenings, and discusses the films included in the festival.
Logos for for the HRW International Film Festival
You can download Human Rights Watch and Human Rights Watch International Film Festival logos by scrolling to the bottom of our Press Page. Please note that our font is Meta and the blue for our logo is Pantone 285.5 and its equivalents.
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