Universal Cinema Film & TV Journal’s Amir Ganjavie interviewed Grainne Humphreys, Festival Director of the Dublin International Film Festival. Their conversation touches on the film selection process and the not always lovely life of a festival programmer.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Amir Ganjavie, UniversalCinema Magazine (UM): Can you introduce yourself and tell me about your role in your organization?
Grainne Humphreys (GH): Yes. My name is Grainne Humphreys. I’m the festival director of the Dublin International Film Festival, which is a position that I’ve held since 2007, late 2007. This is coming up on I think my 16th Festival, which is a long time. It feels like I’ve been through many iterations of the festival, but it’s an audience festival that takes place in February. It’s about 10 days in the city center, with a small number of screens there. It generally is a kind of best-to-the-fest kind of festival. So, we show a lot of films that I would have started seeing probably from around Cannes and through the summer.
Obviously, in parallel to that, we’ve actually had quite a change in the Irish cinema. The festival has grown up in these last 21 years, to see a lot of new names and new generations of filmmakers coming through that we’ve also kind of supported. My background was in film studies in university, and I worked in the Irish Film Institute, which is like a national cinematheque, for 13 years, so that’s my background.
(UM): Does this mean that you don’t accept films with no previous festival screening(s) at your festival?
(GH): No. I don’t think it’s correct to say that we’re only interested in films that have gone to other festivals. It’s more that the festival kind of sits within a landscape in Ireland, which is actually quite a conservative kind of distribution. So you will find that not all the films that compete in Cannes for instance, or even the films that will win awards in Cannes will get distribution in the UK. We find that a lot of the time, we’re compensating for the somewhat cautious distribution. But there is very definitely, and has probably in the last 10 years been a very strong focus on first and second-time directors, looking at women directors trying to find national cinemas and movements that are not already being included in either the art-house or cultural cinema exhibition plans in Ireland.
But equally, I think there’s a very interesting thing, which is that the festival has tried to bring different audiences in. I’m kind of intrigued by watching other festivals do something similar. That 18 to 25-year-old audience, which is increasingly difficult to get to come in, in the same way that the previous generations were just used to seeing everything. But it feels that when I’m teaching my classes in university that that age group does not have the same relationship with cultural cinema. The intrigue for me is to show them the kind of new work that they can see if they were to go to festivals like Cannes, or Toronto, or Locarno, but equally, if they lived in a cinema-loving city, like Paris maybe, or even New York.
(UM): What is the relationship between Irish culture and art cinema, generally speaking?
(GH): I don’t know how much you know, but our Irish distribution, for the most part, comes from London. There are four very small distribution companies that would run and operate in Ireland, but most of them handle UK, sort of smaller UK distributors. For many years, they have shied away from anything that would be too niche, too challenging, and too difficult. There isn’t really a place for experimental or even essay films. There are small pockets usually for some avant-garde cinema in a festival context, but even then, it will be very small. Sort of even, God, even very basic, kind of elements to festivals.
Silent cinema is something similar. There’s very little support for silent cinema. There’s not as much support as there was in the past, or even retrospective or classic cinema. It’s an ongoing issue that in some ways, I don’t know if people – it feels like it’s been a slow draining to me. I know in Toronto that you had the Light Box. There’s nothing like that in Dublin.
(UM): I understand that securing venue is a big challenge for many festivals, so I’m just curious about your experience.
(GH): We had a perfect scenario where we had an amazing 800-seater, which was our big gala space, and that was our opening and closing. It was the place that we were able to really kind of galvanize large crowds. We lost those through the usual trials of a venue about 10 years ago, and we haven’t replaced it. What we do have is we have two kinds of cultural cinemas. One is the IFI, which I worked in many years ago, which has quite small screens and an aging population. But that’s probably, in some ways, the kind of place that we would show our experimental artistic documentaries. Then the other is wonderful. It’s called the Light House, and it’s a four-screen purpose-built cultural cinema, not dissimilar to the Light Box, actually, in many ways.
It has a bar. It has a younger audience. It does themed nights. It’s like having parties. It’s run by Element Pictures, who are the producers of films like ‘Room’, for instance, and ‘The Favorite’. That’s where we kind of gravitate to, and there is a multiplex, there’s a Cineworld, but I think Cineworld in many places has changed in recent years, so we don’t really work with them. They have the biggest screen, an IMAX screen, but it doesn’t really work for a kind of gala space. We’re not bad. I mean, I’m not happy, as you can probably tell, but we’re not bad. The Cork Film Festival, which is the longest-running Film Festival in Ireland is really troubled by the lack of venues that they have. They’re trying to put projectors into theaters in order to try and create some kind of capacity, and it is an issue.
Because the Galway Film Fleadh will be coming up and again, quite small screens. Not necessarily the very best or best experience for people to watch films. Not enough legroom for instance, and acoustics. It’s embarrassing when you go to some festivals and you realize the beauty that they actually watched many of the films, and the equipment is of a much higher standard.
(UM): How are you trying to differentiate yourself from the Cork Film festival or other regional film festival?
(GH): It’s interesting that you ask that because one of the things that we’ve been looking at is exactly that. I mean, the Cork Film Festival has run for very many years. It’s probably the strongest festival for short films. It has, for many years, probably shown more kinds of documentaries. In a way, we’ve shied away – we do have a documentary competition, we have a strand that we fund with the Art Council, but I’d say that our world cinema program is the area that we probably focus on. The Irish cinema, primarily we found that we’re very good at doing and launching new Irish works. We usually have about 17 new Irish films. With each one of them, we feel like we give it a good kind of send-off and platform.
The other element is our guests. We’ve been quite successful at getting high-profile guests, or international filmmakers to come for a couple of days and to talk about their work. We have an award that we give, and we’ve had some fantastic guests from Paolo Sorrentino to François Ozon to Paul Schneider to Charlie Kaufman. Also, as a capital city, we feel like there’s a dynamic that we need to really kind of try and promote film culture. So, we try to bring in people, critics, writers, and composers, events that maybe will bring ii a slightly more mainstream audience into the actual festival.
We have silent cinema presentations we’ve had for many years. Those are the kinds of elements that we like to attach ourselves to. Then the other element is in the last five years, we’ve worked very hard on film students. Maybe because I was teaching, I felt very embarrassed that they weren’t coming to the festival I was involved with. We’ve really worked to bring them in. We have a competition for them. We run courses at events. That’s kind of a piece that I think is different from the other festivals where it’s maybe not so visible and not so central.
(UM): The younger generation are not very interested in coming or supporting the film festival. It’s mostly 39 or over that age. How are you trying to address this?
(GH): The first thing that we realized, and it’s funny because people don’t necessarily see it, is that for many people in festivals, you work six months on, six months off, so we have a very small team, right? Part of that was realizing that we couldn’t just do that. We had to start finding ways of connecting with them in between festivals. We started bringing them in. Bringing them parts of the programming team, making them part of screeners. Inviting them to events, trying to get a sense of what are the things that they’re interested in.
I think cost has got a certain amount to do with this. We’ve very definitely tried to keep our ticket prices the same, not to find any reason for people to say that it’s too expensive to go to see films. That’s very important just to kind of make sure that we started bringing our festival out into the suburbs, and into campus screenings, for instance, and pubs, in some cases. There’s a pub that does screenings as part of a kind of space to the side of the bar. It’s about finding ways of nearly accidentally having an audience actually experience it.
We don’t have any support for foreign language films through our broadcasters in Ireland, which is embarrassing. But you find that that’s actually one of the blocks. You find that there isn’t knowledge, maybe a world cinema in the way that I think there may have been through the media through the film critics. The way in which people just engaged with, particularly cinemas like French cinema, seems to be far more embedded in our culture than it is now, and the actors seem to be more recognized.
There’s very definitely a post-COVID glitch. Do you know what I mean? Where people are used to just sitting on their computers, and they don’t go to the cinema. So, they don’t really understand what that value is. What the art form can give them. So, part of it is very definitely trying, as I said, ways to make them aware. Also recognizing that 39-year-olds are very smart, educated people. They’ve been around for 39 years. They know how to find an arthouse cinema, and they know how to find films.
They have alerts. They have friends. They have networks to talk about the film they saw. 22-year-olds don’t do that. They don’t read films. I’ve just done a list of the film critics that they follow. They’re not film critics. Do you know what I mean? It’s Instagram, it’s a different way of communicating. I think a lot of us who are over 39 think that everything has stayed the way it was. So, a printed catalog or a radio interview, or a TV interview is the way that you will get audiences. It’s not, and it hasn’t been for maybe three or four years, maybe even more.
(UM): What about marketing on new social platforms like TikTok or Instagram? Have you explored these channels?
(GH): We’ve done our best, the social media thing. I definitely leaned on my colleagues on the social media team, and asked them to try and come up with different ways. One of the things that’s problematic is that film lends itself obviously to social media in so many different ways. But then there’s also the dynamic where you’re also holding on to someone else’s IP. There’s a dynamic about what you do with people’s clips or images. That’s something that we’ve been very conscious of.
We had this conversation with the 22-year-olds last week or the week before. They don’t understand nuance. You have to do it very, very simply. You have to say this is a film about a black queer man because to them, it’s new and it’s fresh. Putting endless credits, like a winner in Locarno, or from the director that brought you, ‘When Four Swallows Across The Sky’ means nothing to them. You need to stop doing that, which is exactly what you would do if you were talking to someone like you. You would load it up with the information to surround this. Whereas they don’t need that, that’s not the way they evaluate their choices.
Also, they’re working two days on weekends now. Many times, it’s the middle of the week that they’re interested in going. They don’t go to late nights because they’re too tired. There’s a lot of factors that we didn’t think about 20 years ago.
(UM): I know that with inflation things are becoming very difficult for the festival. I’m just curious how you’re trying to deal with it.
(GH): Well, we actually did it in reverse. So, for 21 years, we had a title sponsor, and this year, we decided not to have a title sponsor. We actually looked at our costs, and we very definitely pulled them down and shook them out. We had a lot of support from people who understand the value of an art form. So, we raised our patrons, with a lot more kind of engagement from people knowing that we were going to pass on their support to the audiences. It’s been really interesting that we discovered that a corporate sponsorship blocks people in some ways. They start asking for more things, or they start believing that you don’t need support because you’ve already got it in the shape of a sponsor. Our funding is from the Irish government. It’s from the Arts Council.
Then we also have Screen Ireland, which is the National Film Agency. Both of those have increased their funding. Then we, as I said, had a necklace of other sponsors that came in supporting us to, if you like, mitigate against having to raise our box office prices. Or to pass on those figures to any of our elements, whether it was charging more for screens, or any other parts. But we’ll see, it’s year on year. I’m very conscious that 15 years ago, your prices, everybody told you, it wasn’t about money. It was about what you were showing. Now, I think it is very definitely a decision for people.
Also, they will make that decision until later. I know when I started, you had a lot of your tickets sold in advance. You knew what kind of money you actually had before you actually had the event. Things like that have changed. Packages, season tickets, all of these kinds of big kinds of investments have changed the way in which people participated in festivals.
(UM): How is your relationship with controversial filmmakers or controversial subjects? Suppose that Polanski submitted you a film or Woody Allen, would you consider them for your festival, or it’s a big NO?
(GH): It’s interesting that you say that because actually, I went looking to see the Polanski film, and it was really hard to see, which I thought was really funny. I remember contacting a couple of sales agents. I was going, “Well, can I have a look at it?” It never came back. I think if you asked me that question, maybe six years ago, I would have said, “We will go ahead and we will show it because of the film. It’s the film and it’s not the filmmaker.” I think that’s changed now.
I think that everybody is trying to make sure that there are no barriers to any audience wanting to participate. That the controversy, or the speculation, or the media outcry would distract from the core message. That’s now the argument that I’ll probably use, which is, unfortunately, I think it would be very difficult for me to say, yes, because I could see that as taking away potentially valuable space, energy, and time from putting on a festival.
I would separate controversial directors from controversial films because I think controversial films have to be shown. People are shying away from showing films that challenge or provoke or are difficult, and I think that that is a very important thing for festivals to do. I think the dynamic around the media interest in the creators is often a distraction, but I think the films should be shown if they’re there.
If you feel like as a programmer you want to include them, then you should because I don’t think there’s any other way that they will be shown in Ireland. You will hear about them maybe at some other festival, or some other space. A lot of the films that I think are going to be controversial, they aren’t. So, it kind of feels like that’s the other side too.
(UM): What is your policy right now in regard to Russian filmmakers?
(GH): It’s actually somewhat similar. In that, for instance, we only had one Russian film, so this was last year through the submissions. I kind of went with that, but that’s kind of strange because actually we usually get about eight or nine. I haven’t gone searching for them, if I’m really honest. I’ve kind of left it as a kind of piece where it sits there. We have tried to show and support Ukraine and Ukrainian filmmakers in whatever way. I’ve taken a side as such, but it’s more that I find that it’s interesting whether or not there’s already a kind of censorship going on that people just aren’t applying, or aren’t sending the films in.
But I also know that I have friends who programmed for other UK festivals, and they’ve said something similar that it’s just presumed that there’s no point.
(UM): In terms of quota, do you have any kind of race, gender, or geographical quota in your festival?
(GH): We didn’t, to be quite honest, except that we tried to always make sure that we had our balance. Then we decided, there was a 2020 pledge that everybody kind of signed on in Cannes. I think everyone became way more aware of it. I don’t know, we try. I think we’ve got to about 35-30% in terms of female-male balance, and we’ve definitely started to implement changes in terms of diversity in both our team and across the program.
(UM): I talked with some programmers, and they told me that right now, because of the diversity, sometimes it’s becoming very challenging or time-consuming for them to program films. They need to make sure that is the correct film, or this is an authentic representation of a culture or stuff like that. So, I’m just curious if this is also the case in your festival?
(GH): It actually started a while back where we actually went out and recruited screeners from more diverse backgrounds that we were able to include into our selection. I feel like that’s one of the things that this kind of quota dynamic has actually helped us with. It’s that we’ve actually put a better structure in place. The argument is that there’s still way too many terrible films being made, and so a lot of time, people are just watching terrible films. When it comes to the good films, or the films that we kind of are arguing about, I think it is a longer process than it was before. But I’m also aware that we only have about 80, 90 films a year. It’s not a large number.
I just feel like Ireland’s in a bit of a weird position when you look at films where there are kinds of other capital cities, and they have this wonderful kind of range of festivals that I think give their audiences an opportunity to get immersed in a culture or a country or a subject. I think sometimes we can be a tiny bit superficial, and I tried to argue against that.
For instance, we have a lot of African films this year. We’re having quite a big argument about how you do a season, and what’s the best approach given the films that are there, and what films will be available. It’s just something we’ve kind of put our screener team to work on, but I think, from my perspective, I would love to have a festival maybe double the size. That would allow you to include more, to give people a better sense of where the film is coming from, rather than it feeling like one film, one subject, one film, one country. We’re all trying to do our best. But I feel sometimes it’s only when you see films side by side with another film, possibly from a similar perspective that you actually are able to do it genuinely – it’s a different way of seeing them. It’s a joy that only I think programmers get, and I’d love to pass some of that on to audiences.
We had to increase our staff and we had to be very aware of the fact that the online years, as we call them, were very difficult. I’m talking to you from my bedroom. Everybody works from their home now. There is no separation and everybody is expected to do favors. Your salary is not increased in huge numbers. The community is now slightly fractured, I think from the way that it was. I think there was a lot more pressure. There’s a lot more films, and I think there’s a lot more difficulties with platforms and availability in materials.
I feel and I don’t know if this is fair, but I feel like maybe post-COVID, everything is a bit more emotional. I know that filmmakers get very angry, and very upset. There’s a lot more really intimate aspects to submit into festivals. People don’t take rejection in the way that they possibly did before, and I feel like that’s very definitely part of it. I also have a bit of an argument going on in my head, or with the odd person about the idea that we cherish artists, and we cherish filmmakers, but we often forget about programmers, or curators, or the people who are the connection between those audiences.
I’d love to kind of see a way of, I’m not saying they need to be given awards, or clothing allowances, or vast amounts of money. But I often think that they are the people who have taken a lot of the heavy lifting if you like, to maintain festivals, cinemas, that is very visible. You see the front has very obviously recognized the projectionists because if they’re not there, it doesn’t happen. But I think the programmer can often be somewhat sidelined. I think their contribution very much has been put into the box of, well, they love it, so they’ll be happy to keeping doing it. Do you know what I mean? I just think if you’ve watched 10 films over a weekend, and there’s not one that you will use or cherish. That’s not necessarily the best thing for people’s sort of fantasy.
(UM): I realized that the life of a programmer is also not a very easy life. They usually work for two or three months for a festival. At that moment, they receive too many films. There is a kind of instability in their work. Any experience on that to share with us?
(GH): Hard to sustain. I’m always shocked when festivals crashed, or when people are let go because it doesn’t give you a career path. It’s very much something where it’s based on contacts. I’m going to say it again, but there’s an idea it’s such a lovely job, that you will do it for nothing, and yet, you have rent and food and families and all of these things to do. I do feel quite strongly that it’s not a very popular conversation, but it is one that should often be just flagged just so that people are aware.
(UM): How did the landscape in your festival change with the arrival of big names like Netflix, Amazon Prime?
(GH): We’re actually doing a screening with Netflix next week, but it was a film that we wanted that they had, but they didn’t know what they were doing with it because that’s the trouble. They don’t have a distribution mind. I can see that they can get audiences for people in the absence of having a television, or a broadcaster that can bring world cinema, or world languages or cultures to an audience, I’m quite happy to have streamers. But if I want one of their films, I wish they knew how to use an email, or they used to know how to use a phone because communication is very very difficult. You find that you’re having conversations that just don’t make sense, and filmmakers very often are not part of that conversation.
Also, they very rarely seem to have the same people there. They seem to change very, very quickly. There’s always new people coming in who you have to kind of explain the world of a festival to. Then obviously, one of the things I regret about the streamers is that they’ve taken up space that means we’ve lost others. I feel like those are usually the more kind of avant-garde or challenging kind of distributors are the ones that have gone. Do you know what I mean? So, a quite conservative kind of middle-brow material is being offered to us when the really exciting, maybe more niche distributors have ceased to operate.
(UM): At the end of our conversation, I wonder if there is anything left that you think might be interesting for our audience to know?
(GH): The only thing I would say, and I think is really important is that we have a lot of new staff coming through. One of the things that I’m really conscious about this incoming generation,because I’m now 52, is that when I started, I volunteered for a festival. I think that’s still a really important thing for filmmakers, for would-be curators is to just go and watch films and see people coming in and out, and filmmakers coming in and out. There is nothing quite like being part of the festival team. It’s very hard to describe to people the power of having an audience in a standing ovation, or laughing or crying because of something that you were connected to.
I feel like I see it when it happens, and I see my colleagues suddenly feel part of the team. Again, talking about the role, if you like, of festivals, the role of programmers, but I think there is a power that isn’t very often discussed, which is actually the power of what the cinema can actually do and say about the world, and the way in which somebody’s involvement and connecting that to an audience can genuinely be kind of transformative and really important. I still can remember when a film connects with an audience, and how that made the audience, the filmmaker, and anybody who was involved in that experience.
There’s a power and a joy of experiencing a film, and being part of the reason why it’s happening to this audience for that filmmaker at a particular time. I’m still quite excited that we do it, but I am very conscious that every year the factors change. I’m just I suppose ending on a plea that we remember that the live experience is still why we have film festivals. Whether it’s for the standing ovation, or it’s for the film going out of rack, or breaking down. It’s all about saying I was there.
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