Started in 1998 in Brevard, N.C., the RiverRun International Film Festival has made its home in the “City of the Arts” for most of the past decade. The festival, hosted on the campus of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, has grown each year. That growth continues in 2010.
For the first time, RiverRun will stretch out 11 days and straddle two weekends. The festival runs April 15-25.
“Over the past few years, we’ve been very fortunate to receive continued support from our audiences as we expanded the size and scope of the Festival,” said Andrew Rodgers, RiverRun’s executive director. “For the 2010 Festival, we are excited to grow RiverRun even further by adding a second weekend, which will allow us to offer more films and screening opportunities for our audiences.”
For most of RiverRun’s history, the Festival has been a three- or four-day event. In addition to raising the Festival’s profile nationwide, its expansion also dramatically impacted the organization’s bottom line: From 2006 to 2009, RiverRun’s ticket sales more than doubled (from $42,146 in 2006 to $85,720 in 2009).
“Extending the run of the Festival to an eleven-day event is a big step for us. It’s something that we’ve talked about for a long time,” said Rodgers. “Based on the feedback we receive from our audiences and supporters each year, we like to make adjustments so that our Festival fits the needs and wishes of the community. With that in mind, this move to a longer festival — which should allow more people to attend our films and events — is an experiment that we hope will become permanent.”
The 2010 RiverRun International Film Festival will utilize many of the same Winston-Salem venues it has for the past few years, including the Stevens Center (405 W. Fourth St.), the Ace Cinematheque Complex on the campus of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (1533 S. Main St.), the Reynolda House Museum of American Art (2250 Reynolda Rd.) and The Garage (110 W. 7th St.). Additionally in 2010, RiverRun will use the soon-to-be-completed a/perture cinema (311 W. 4th Street) in downtown Winston-Salem.
RiverRun is a competitive event that annually showcases new films from both established and emerging filmmakers around the world. Each spring, RiverRun screens new narrative, documentary, short, student and animated films, offering both audience and jury prizes in competition categories. : :
info: riverrunfilm.com