Funding

One of the trickiest elements of putting on a film festival is raising enough money. We proved last year that it's possible to run an entirely free festival with very little financial input - we were lucky enough to get support from Vue cinemas for the final venue, have help from three pubs in Angel and we used our own resources for a few minor, administrative costs. However, this meant missing out on some important elements that can really make a difference, such as decent prizes for the hard-working film-makers who enter, better advertising to increase our audience and more promotion to create the kind of buzz that starts to bring industry recognition.

So, this year I've been working hard to get funding for our second year. There's surprisingly little out there for festivals. Of the big funding bodies, the British Film Council only fund internationally, the Film Council have no funds for film festivals this year and the Arts Council referred us to the Film Council. Why this lack of money for a developing and worthwhile field?

The other route to funding gives a clue. This is corporate sponsorship, which is an equally difficult area. Though many companies now have corporate responsibility offices, these operate in very defined areas, such as the environment or child education. It's very difficult to convince a company that a film festival mainly held in pubs is beneficial to education!

This narrowness of funding areas is damaging to film festivals and explains the prevalence of focused film showings, rather than general festivals held for mainly the sake of entertainment. Films are educational and fun and festivals are an opportunity to meet others interested in the same world - shouldn't that be a sufficient reason to set aside money for it?

Fear not, there are many options available for funding the Angel Film Festival and I'm positive that we'll have the opportunity to be bigger and better this year. I just wish that more funding bodies recognised the positive value of just watching and making film, without feeling the need to apply a label and ask for far too narrow criteria.

Terrie