Social distancing in one theater is hard enough. Doing it through an entire film festival seems impossible, but it’s happening. Deco’s Alex Miranda is here with the new look of a Fort Lauderdale fave.
The Fort Lauderdale Film festival has been around for 35 years. Plot twist, though: they weren’t expecting 2020 to play out like some sci-fi movie. But you know what? They now get to flip the script on film festivals and do something we all probably should have been doing the entire time: taking it to the water.
The Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival is adjusting to 2020 in the most Fort Lauderdale way ever.
Gregory von Hausch, executive director, Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival: “We thought, ‘Well, jeez, this is the yachting capital of the world. Let’s take advantage of our location, location, location.'”
Starting Nov. 5, by land and by sea, FLIFF will be showing 176 movies in all sorts of new ways: virtual screenings at home, dinner-and-a-movie events at local restaurants, drive-in movies.
Gregory von Hausch: “There’s something really romantically retro about the whole idea of being in their own little environment, seeing your friends. I think it’s fun.”
And boat-in movies! Yes, like a drive-in, but with a boat. Kind of like this one in Paris.
Gregory von Hausch: “You could bring your own boat. You could rent one of the boats that we’ll have already docked there.”
They’re also showing in regular movie theaters, of course.
The 35th annual festival will giddy up this year with the new, star-studded comedy “The Comeback Trail,” with one of our very own South Florida girls, Kate Katzman, right at the center of this story about the making of a Western movie. She plays the director.
Alex Miranda: “On set you were surrounded by Academy Awards all over the place. What was that like?”
Kate Katzman: “They took me in to do the scene, and there’s Robert De Niro sitting behind that big desk, and to the side of him is Zach Braff, and to the other side is Tommy Lee Jones. and they’re like, ‘Go ahead, act!’ And I’m like, ‘OK!'”
And she nails it! Plus, Kate’s doing us some good right now.
Kate Katzman: “This is just a pure, simple, funny movie, and I just think that, with everything going on in the world, that people need an escape and they need to laugh.”
Congrats on all of Kate’s success.
The Fort Lauderdale International Film festival runs Nov. 5-22. Buy you passes on their website, fliff.com.
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