This year has been a banner year for Raindance. Let us outline the things we feel were highlights:
January:
– Guillermo Arriaga attends for a brilliant workshop.
– Groupon and Saturday Film School. We presented this amazing one day class to over 3,000 people
February:
– Berlinale Live!Ammunition!
May:
– Cannes Film Festival washout
The weather really sucked, but we met dozens of filmmakers and came back with hundreds of DVDs
June:
– Festival submissions closed with a record breaking 4,000 submissions from 43 countries
July:
– We moved to the Raindance Film Centre just off Trafalgar Sqaure
September:
– It was the 20th anniversary of the Raindance Film Festival – record crowds with attendance up nearly 40% from 2011.
– A new intake of Raindance Postgraduate Film Degree students starts studying
October:
– We get a new website – the first new one since 2007. And it is developed and built in-house by resident filmmaker Christian Bell.
– We launch the Online Raindance Postgraduate Film Degree programme with Staffordshire University
November:
– 2 shorts from Raindance, Asad and Buzkashi Boys (which only became eligible through our Oscar partnership) make the shortlist for ‘Best Short Fiction Film’ at the Academy Awards in 2013.
December:
– We hosted again the 15th edition of the British Independent Film Awards
– Raindance Toronto move offices to a trendy loft in Toronto’s Film District – a short walk form Toronto’s Pinewood Studios
– We complete the business plan for online distribution
And we have lots new exciting things up our sleeves for 2013.
Hope you have a great holiday.
The Raindance Team