Mobile Motion Film Festival – Official Selections Announced
How did that happen? It seems only yesterday we were wrapping up the last festival in Zürich, taking a breath and looking forward to a break. Now here we are again, announcing the official selections for the festival this year.
We have a cool date for the event in Zürich, Switzerland: 4th-5th April, 2020. Or… 0404 2020.
So this year’s festival will either be a celebration of the best smartphone filmmaking talent from around the world. Or the beginning of the apocalypse. Either way, it’s going to be a weekend to remember!
Amazing Filmmakers
Once again, we received a very high level of films – short and long. However, this year for some reason we had a a lot of excellent feature length films submitted. I think a lot of people have seen well known filmmakers such as Sean Baker and Steven Soderbergh shooting successful features on iPhones and have been inspired to have a go themselves.
Unfortunately, we can’t show every film and rejecting films is no fun at all. Especially when we know how much of themselves people have put themselves into their films.
Selection Process
As a filmmaker, I’ve had a number of film festival rejections myself and I always take it very personally. If there’s one thing I suck at, it’s rejection. It starts as pain and then turns to anger and defiance, then to “what’s the point?”, before I finally accept it and move on.
But seeing things from the other side of the selection process is really eye-opening.
In the jury there are 6 of us in total and everyone gets to score the films from 1-10. In the 6 years we’ve been running only twice has the film I gave highest marks to ended up winning the main prize. The ones that win tend to be those that get a solid mark across the board.
Some films get very high marks from one jury member and very low from another. Sometimes it feels like we watched different films. Well, it’s no different when you go to see a movie with a bunch of friends. We all experience films differently and have different opinions on what is good and bad.
That’s what art is all about. If we all agreed on what was good there’d be no point making art in the first place. Art is here to challenge us, provoke us, get us thinking. And the selection process is all about thinking, questioning the films, and maybe even questioning ourselves.
Ultimately, it’s all about taste
One thing as a filmmaker that’s hard to understand is how much taste comes into the selection process. I might score a film 10/10 while the rest of the jury are unanimously underwhelmed. And visa versa.
But it seems that some films are more to the taste of more people than others. And I guess that’s basically how it works, isn’t it? The films that make it to the big screen and command big audiences are to the taste of more people than the films that didn’t.
That doesn’t mean they’re the best films. Because there’s no real way to quantify that. Remember that classics like Citizen Kane, It’s A Wonder Life flopped on release. Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining was nominated for a series of Razzies (awards for worst filmmaking) on release. Some decades later it was voted the best horror film ever made.
Which just goes to show you taste in movies is constantly in flux.
So, congratulations to those selected! Whatever your taste, I think we have at least one movie which will appeal to you. For us, the real hard work begins now, organising and making sure everything runs as smoothly as possible.
But we’d love to see as many of you as possible at the festival in Zürich in April. So we’ll cross our fingers and hope you’ll select us as something valuable to do with your time on 0404 2020 (and 0504 2020)!
Simon & Andrea
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