Gold Coast Film Festival takes short film festival, industry gala awards online

Would-be cinema-goers can stream the festival's short films all Easter weekend

Following its cancellation due to the coronavirus pandemic, Gold Coast Film Festival has announced it will salvage two of its major events by turning them into online livestreams.

The 12-day festival will take its short film festival SIPFest and The Screen Industry Gala Awards online over the Easter weekend. The former usually takes place on the beach.

SIPFest’s 13 films are all available to stream here over the dates of April 9-14. Viewers can watch all of the films for free in a nearly two and half hour period, and vote for their favourite to win the People’s Choice Award, a $1,000 cash prize.

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The Screen Industry Gala Awards will cap off the online festival on April 16, live-streaming the dispensation of awards in 14 different categories recognising the best short films, webseries, feature films and scripts that were due to feature at the festival. There is a total of $20,000 in prize money.

“While we were heartbroken the festival was cancelled after it had already been curated and announced, we were more devastated for the filmmakers. Filmmakers have poured so much of their talent, money and time into their films – sometimes over years – and it is a such a loss to not have the opportunity to screen or premiere now,” Lucy Fisher, Gold Coast Film Festival CEO/Festival Director said in a statement.

“We have worked to find the best way to support filmmakers and we are so grateful to our prize sponsors who have still committed to cash and prizes for this event. I’m sure the prizes will come at a vital time for many in the screen industry right now.

“Hopefully, we can all join together for one night and celebrate the winners in this difficult time and support Australian short films by watching SIPFest for free.”

On Tuesday, the Melbourne International Film Festival also announced the cancellation of its August event for the first time in 69 years. In a statement, MIFF suggested the development of “other means of continuing to engage its audiences”, in a likely suggestion toward an online festival. The Sydney Morning Herald pointed out any virtual version of the festival would largely consist of “the more obscure titles only”, due to the difficulty in negotiating streaming agreements for larger titles.

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