I checked the Film FantasticI site a few days ago and was dismayed when I saw that they’d pushed back the date to 2008, instead of the confirmed Halloween weekend this month. I emailed them a week ago but have had no reply, so it doesn’t look too promising that the Gold Coast will keep it’s only annual feature film festival.
If you’ve been in the last two years you might have noticed attendance was down considerably – the hammer horror specials of 2004II would have only drew a crowd of no more than fifteen people each, and that was after they provided free popcorn. 2005 had no free food, but screened film-fan favourites like Little Shop of Horrors, Beetlejuice, and my personal favourite of the bunch The Princess Bride. While more people turned up for these, the cinema was still under 50% full.
Last year we didn’t have enough time to see everything, and with the theme this year being Bollywood (no thanks) we only managed to catch the animated-noir Renaissance, the “evil cow on a farm” flick Isolation, and the amazingly original Pan’s Labrynth. It was also the first year the the new venueIII, and away from the awful Robina Cinemas with their conjoined chairsIV. Another nice feature were the live zombies giving everybody walking by a hard time. 
Let’s hope that 2008 brings not only the Festival back but the classic film as well – there’s something great about about old flicks at the movies.
- The only Gold Coast film festival, which has been operating since 2001. [↩]
- At least the ones I saw, they canceled the most anticipated Lust for a Vampire at the last minute [↩]
- the Reading Cinemas at Harbour Town. [↩]
- Anybody that’s been there knows all too well – chairs are attached to each other in groups of twenty, so if somebody ten seats across leans back, everybody leans with them. [↩]
