“Festival production during the COVID-19 pandemic”

In November this year Malta Film Foundation virtually visited festival CINEMAFORUM in Warsaw, Poland.

Last year at the same time, the Foundation participated in the festival through the Erasmus + programme in a multinational workshop called INTERFILMLAB 3.0.

This year due to the worldwide situation related to COVID-19 the festival had a different formula.

Many festivals are now being held in different forms and shapes than those we know for years.

CINEMAFORUM as part of their platform INTERFILMLAB 4.0 invited film festival organisers from Europe to discuss new challenges that many organisations are facing this year.

“Festival production during COVID-19 pandemic” brought together:

• Laura Abbaleo - Associazione Cinematografica e Culturale Laboratorio dei Sogni, Italy

• Joyce Grech - Malta Film Foundation, Malta

• Błażej Hrapkowicz - CINEMAFORUM, Poland

• Karim Kourani - KINOGRAPHE, France

• Artur Liebhart - Millennium Docs Agains Gravity, Poland

• Illia Svidler - Cinemahall, Ukraine

Panelists discussed challenges and opportunities that brought a different perspective of organising a festival during pandemic times:

How the festivals organisers responded to the pandemic?

How different financial models adapted to the pandemic and how big was their role in decision making?

Is an online form of events a solution for the future? What are the pros and cons of the online formula?

What are the ways of promoting festivals online? What is important when planning a promotion campaign?

We would like to invite you to listen to the debate and find what the guest experienced while organising their events.

The panel discussion was moderated by Marta Sikorska