Tag archives: film festival
The NatureTrack Film Festival began in 2018 as a way to raise funds and draw attention to the then-seven-year-old nonprofit NatureTrack Foundation, which brings schoolchildren out into nature for docent-led treks along trails in the Santa Ynez Valley. With nature now even more important during the pandemic as outdoor activity is far less conducive to […]
The red carpets have all been rolled back up, the klieg lights turned off, and filmmakers have gone on to the next festival along with their movies. But there’s still one final freebie for local film lovers before SBIFF calls it quits on its 35th festival. That would be the Third Weekend screenings, which although […]
For decades Santa Barbara has had a bohemian tone to its art and culture. From the fantastical floats and costumes of the Solstice Parade to the old artists’ lofts of the Funk Zone, the area has long played with whimsical art and culture. And over the years, no organization has been at the core of […]
It’s easy to see why Katharine O’Brien calls her Montecito upbringing “a Cinderella Story.” The future filmmaker was just nine years old when her mother, Carla, a Santa Barbara native who had moved back home after years on the East Coast following a divorce from Katharine’s father, met Stephen Hahn, the distinguished billionaire art dealer […]
Santa Barbara International Film Festival has hired veteran Benjamin Goedert as its new development director. In his new role, Goedert will be responsible for generating funds to support the fest’s dynamic arts and educational programs through sponsorships, grants and donations. He moved to our tony town 11 years ago to attend City College where he […]
What could be more fun than spending a Friday evening with your friends watching a free classic film outdoors in a gorgeous garden setting? That’s basically the premise behind UCSB Arts & Lectures and the Santa Barbara County Office of Arts and Culture’s annual summer film series at the Courthouse Sunken Gardens downtown – a […]
Pianist Jeremy Denk isn’t the only MacArthur Fellow returning to town under the auspices of Arts & Lectures this week. Michelle Dorrance, the founder of the New York City-based dance company that bears her name, won the prestigious prize back in 2015. ETM: Double Down is the title for her latest evening-length work that merges […]
The show business adage is never follow children or a dog. Glenn Close was definitely up staged by a dog at her tribute during the Santa Barbara International Film Festival (SBIFF). I’m sure she didn’t mind since it was her own dog, Pip, who sneaked out of the green room and came prancing out on […]
Babysplitters offers a decidedly fresh take on the age-old struggle of couples coming into agreement about having children. The film, which had its world premiere earlier this month at SBIFF, dives headlong into unforeseen and decidedly risky territory as two couple who are close friends choose to have a single baby and split custody and […]
Making Apes: The Artists Who Changed Film has its world premiere on Friday and Saturday at SBIFF under the Santa Barbara Features sidebar only because its director, William Conlin, lives in town. Also the film’s co-star, co-writer, and co-producer Thomas R. Burman began working on the piece while he was taking Shelly Lowenkopf’s memoir writing […]
Last January, the Santa Barbara International Film Festival considered cancelling the city’s premiere cinematic event in the wake of the Thomas Fire and the devastating Montecito debris flows before ultimately deciding to go ahead, partly as a healing offering. This Wednesday, SBIFF 34 kicks off with a locally-produced opening night film catalyzed by another Montecito-related […]
The calendar is crammed as the new arts season arrives in earnest, although the biggest place in the land is more of a warm-weather venue. That would be the Santa Barbara Bowl, where it’s actually, unironically, unlikely to rain when Alanis Morissette takes the stage on Friday, September 27, followed two days later by the […]
The Santa Barbara Club turned into a mini film festival when there was a preview screening of a new documentary called The Romancing & Reaping of Riven Rock. The executive producer was Frank McGinity. He told me, “I went to some of my Riven Rock neighbors and said that I needed $500 from each to […]
The Santa Barbara Jewish Film Festival (JFF) got its start back at the turn of century, when Barbara Greenleaf and her husband, Jon, decided Santa Barbara needed its own fest devoted to Jewish films to add to the cultural community after attending a similar one in San Francisco. The fest ran for more eight years […]
