For five days, CMWorld 2016 will host 80 sessions presented by brand marketers from around the world covering strategy, integration, measurement, and is set up to offer B2B companies, consumer-driven companies, non-profts/associations and small businesses with their own specialized sessions. One focus of Content Marketing World and Expo will be to get marketing and PR professionals be better equipped to design and execute successful content marketing strategies for their clients. Attending content managers and creators will be relayed advice and rules of thumb on everything from generating crowd-sourced content, finding their blogging sweet spot, scaling a content marketing effort, and managing the ins and outs of content publishing and promotion on social channels. A “Meet the CMI Team” event happens on September 5 in downtown Cleveland, and at the end of the official expo opening first day, an Opening Night Reception happens at the FWD Day + Nightclub.
Mark Hamill, veteran of stage, screen, television and new media, both here in the USA and abroad, and with such roles as Luke Skywalker in George Lucas original Star Wars trilogy and BAFTA award winning work as DC’s iconic villain the Joker, is slated to deliver the Closing Keynote address on September 8. The comedian, author and director, known simply as Michael Jr., is slated to make a presentation, Finding Your Way – A Comedic Look at Finding Your Brands Mission, the morning of September 8. There is a CMWorld Concert set for September 7 featuring the band Cheap Trick, and a CMWorld Afterparty to follow the concert.
The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) is generally acknowledged to be one of the largest and most influential film festivals in the world. TIFF’s primary focus is independent cinema and the festival features retrospectives of national cinemas and individual directors, highlights of Canadian cinema, and a variety of African, South American, and Asian films for the 11-day festival. The September 8 opening screening of the festival series will be Dont Blink: Robert Frank, directed by Laura Israel, a documentary about the photographer and filmmaker Robert Frank, who has defined his career crossing into new aesthetic and cultural boundaries. The planned TIFF Industry Conference will have speakers, discussions and innovative strategies imparted from creative and business leaders. This includes Mogul sessions with Cheryl Boone Isaacs (President, Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences), David Glasser (President and COO, The Weinstein Company), and Jonathan Olsberg (Chairman, Olsberg-SPI).
Although TIFF does not give out awards like other festivals for categories such as “Best Film” or “Best Actress,” because it is non-competitive and lacks a jury, it does award a prize, the People’s Choice Award, to a feature-length film with the highest ratings as voted by the TIFF-going festival attendees. And although TIFF is not an Oscar qualifying festival, the award is often considered as a predictable indicator for what has gone on to garner Academy Award nominations. TIFF also presents seven other awards for People’s Choice Best Documentary, People’s Choice Best Midnight Madness film, Best Canadian First Feature, Best Canadian Short Film, Best International Short Film, FIPRESCI’s Special Presentation Winner and FIPRESCI’s Discovery Section Winner.
The planned TIFF Master Class series will deliver a varied selection of international directors and artists who have endeavored toward social progress and innovations in storytelling within their projects. At TIFF 2016 the industry lineup includes Doug Liman on VR (Invisible), Mira Nair (Queen Of Katwe), Feng Xiaogang (I Am Not Madame Bovary), and a live performance by Canadian composer Mark Korven (The Witch) co-presented with the Screen Composers Guild of Canada. The Dialogue series, supported by the OMDC, will have discussions on business and creative topics, including Brexit and UK Film Industry: What Happens Now?, Know Your Film: New Online Tools for Monetizing and Marketing, and Casting Society of America presentation The Dream Team: Directors, Casting Directors, and Actors, to name a few topics to be tackled. A new session introduced this year is The Guardian, featuring exclusive Q&A sessions with some of the most notable actors and directors at the Festival, interviewed by The Guardians editorial team.
Oldenburg International Film Festival is in its 23rd year and opens from September 14-18. Among the many things that can be said about the festival, an unusual aspect of Oldenburg is that it screens part of its regular program to incarcerated individuals who share the experience with members of the general public in an actual high-security prison environment. The Festivals German premiere of ‘Foreign Affairs’ (Pasha Rafiy, Director) will bring out Luxembourgs Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jean Asselborn, who will be in attendance on September 17th as a guest of the Festival. Foreign Affairs is a glimpse into the life of Jean Asselborn, Europes longest serving Minister of Foreign Affairs.
In this 23rd year, the Oldenburg International Film Festival honors Christophe Honor a filmmaker who is a part of contemporary French cinema, and where he has established himself writing for the Cahiers du Cinema, before he made his directorial debut with “17 fois Cecile Cassard” in 2002. Films in which he has worked with greats of French cinema, Catherine Deneuve and Isabelle Huppert, as well as casts of complete unknowns such as in his Ovid adaptation “Metamorphoses” (2014), will be on show in Oldenburg as an international premiere, as his latest film “Les malheurs de Sophie” (2016).
And again this year, Oldenburg will host the European Film Academy jurors for the European Discovery Award – Prix FIPRESCI. The award is dedicated to a first feature film by a European director. The jury will gather in Oldenburg on September 17 and will announce the official final five nominees during the Festivals Closing Night Gala at the Oldenburg State Theater on September 18. Separately,the film festival team at Oldenburg has organized an initiative for developing projects by experienced filmmakers as well as emerging talents. The one-day inaugural event whose main objective will be to provide film professionals with an environment to connect with others and open opportunities for future collaborations, will have new international voices alongside established filmmakers such as Chan-wook Park, Arto Halonen and Phedon Papamichael.
In addition to supporting the discovery of new artists, the Oldenburg Film Festival has hosted the German Premiere Screening of films by such acclaimed filmmakers as Darren Aronofsky, Brian De Palma, Steven Soderbergh, Michael Polish, Johnnie To, Monte Hellmann and Larry Clark, amongst others. Guests of honor have included Jim McBride, Philippe de Broca, Andrzej Zulawski, Ken Russell, Jerry Schatzberg, James Toback, Radley Metzger, Ted Kotcheff, Phedon Papamichael and Mania Akbari who have all attended the festival for Retrospectives of their work.
The CINEC in Munich is a trade show that is held on an every other year basis. It is relevant to anyone engaged in the field of the moving image, displays, as well as new developments in camera technology, camera support and all other camera accessories and production-related services. CINEC gains additional cachet from its future-focused CineCongress. The cinecAwards are presented by the Society for CineTechnik Bayern (CTB), and awarded to participating exhibitors for innovative and trendsetting products and developments of the Motion Picture Technology industry. Ancillary programs of CINEC include the cinecForum for product presentations, the cineCongress that outlines policy, and seminars, and workshops.
The cineCongress will start one day before the official opening of the show on September 17. Prof. Franz Kraus will open the program with a seminar. cineCongress then continues during the regular CINEC opening with camera trends, latest developments of LEDs, IP Infrastructures, and Virtual Reality. The final day of the program on September 19 will cover display-technologies and neurophysiological aspects in the field of film production. Producers in the film, TV, and video industry attend to present their latest developments to professionals who are involved in taking content from creation to consumption. CINECs hands on activity and face-to-face access to program featured industry professionals create a path to network, discuss, and learn and provide unique insights in technical achievements, impacts of new market structures, new delivery systems, and new consumer expectations of modern audiences.
IFP Screen Forward Conference will be taking place during annual IFP Film Week taking place over five days in Brooklyn, showcasing how film projects can connect with audiences and made to stand out in a crowded marketplace. The conference daily program is broken down along the following topic areas: September 17, Media Trends; September 18, Creative Storytelling; September 19, New Narratives; September 20, Documenting Truth; September 21, Meet the Decision Makers. During its 35-year history, IFP has supported over 8,000 projects and offered resources to more than 20,000 filmmakers, including Debra Granik, Miranda July, Michael Moore, Dee Rees, and Benh Zeitlin.
The conference will offer close-up encounters with film organizations such as Cinereach, Chicken and Egg Pictures, Fandor, Tribeca Film Institute, Sony Pictures Classics and YouTube, in the conferences Meet the Decision Makers segment. The SAGIndie run New Voices! Screenplay Reading Series features screenplays participating in RBCs Emerging Storytellers program at Independent Film Week performed live. The Independent Filmmaker Labs will offer a Sneak Preview Showcase, presented with Rooftop Films that gives audiences a first-look at exciting new films, before their festival premieres. Founded in 1979, the Independent Filmmaker Project (IFP) champions the future of storytelling by connecting artists with essential resources at all stages of development and distribution. IFP represents a growing network of 10,000 storytellers around the world, and assists in various ways in developing 350 new feature and documentary works each year.
IFP guides storytellers through the process of making and distributing their work. It offers creative, technological and business support through year-round programming, which includes Filmmaker Magazine, Independent Film Week, Envision, The Gotham Independent Film Awards, and the Independent Filmmaker Labs. IFPs latest initiative, the Made in NY Media Center by IFP, is an incubator space developed with the Mayors Office of Media and Entertainment, where storytellers from multiple disciplines, industries, and platforms can create, collaborate and connect. Through its programming – which also includes seminars, conferences, and mentorships – IFP creates exciting opportunities for promising new voices from a diverse range of racial, ethnic, religious, ideological and sexual perspectives.
The Americana Music Festival and Conference covers the interests and needs of artists, managers, labels, radio stations, publishers, agents, promoters, retailers, legal and business affairs executives, merchandisers and new media professionals. As defined by the AMA, Americana is contemporary music that incorporates elements of various American roots music styles, including country, roots-rock, folk, bluegrass, R&B and blues, resulting in a distinctive roots-oriented sound. With engagement venues straddling Franklin and Nashville, the Festival opens September 20 with the Green Room Music Source East Nashville Party, that will feature performances by Kevin Gordon, Wild Ponies, Amy Speace, Ben de la Cour, Anne McCue, Michael Fracas, Tim Easton. Immediately following that is the Americanafest Kick-Off Bash.
This year, scheduled into the segment of conference panels and workshops, there will be a performance and Q&A with Bob Weir of The Grateful Dead. Another special presentation will be made by Del McCoury on the legendary Woody Guthrie. Other programming highlights include sessions from: Dwight Yoakam, T Bone Burnett and Jonathan Taplin, Margo Price and Friends, John Paul White, Lori McKenna, Wanda Jackson. Conference and Festival closes September 25 with the Sister City Jam at George Jones Museum. The Americana Music Association conducts an ongoing publicity campaign to help brand and raise awareness of Americana, host the annual Americana Music Festival and Conference, publishes the weekly Americana Airplay Chart, produces the annual Americana Music Honors and Awards show, and many more outreach events on behalf of the Americana music genre.
A Kick Off party set for September 23 at the Hard Rock Cafe, San Francisco opens the two-day conference. Early in the conference program, You Ought to be in Pictures, surveys how music is used in a movie, and attendees are encouraged to bring a song that will be synched to a screening. A little later on that day, music producers, including Ken Caillat, Robert Berry, Scott Mathews, Howard Benson, Cookie Marenco. Moderator Kevin Casey, form a panel to take on the topic, The Producers. Along with more panels and talks, rounding out the first day will also be song screenings, one on ones, and performance showcases. The Mentor Center will be a place to get your questions answered by the in-house group of music professionals.
On day two of WCS, more panels include The Big Picture – TV and Film Placement, with Monica Benson, Darian Cowgill, Jerome Rossen, and Marcus Barone as moderator. Later on, a keynote panel with Gary Burr, Georgia Middleman, Dan and Susan Hodges, Nancy Peacock, Mod by Antoinette Olesen, take part in, Nashville Now, how to survive in the Nashville scene. The remainder of the day is balanced off with Song Screenings, One on Ones, and performance showcases to close the event. The conference will also feature the WCS Center, a place for services and products and where conference attendees can bring their CDs to be sold during the duration of the conference.
The above events are only a sample of what is fully listed. Complete details are on the Calendar of Global Media and Showbiz Industry Social Networking Events page. If you like this report and other content found on The Actors Checklist, please consider liking the Facebook page at this link. This months photo placement shows (starting from top of page) animation feature My Entire High School Sinking Into the Sea at Toronto International Film Festival, Mark Hamill at CMWorld 2016, Oldenburg International Film Festival, CINEC convention in Munich, IFP Screen Forward Conference in Brooklyn, Nikki Lane performing at the Americana Music Festival and Conference. As a preview for next month, here are some global calendar events for the month of October to be aware of. Hamptons International Film Festival will take place in East Hampton, Woodstock Film Festival will be in Woodstock, Chicago International Film Festival will be in Chicago, American Film Festival will be in Warsaw, the FCPX Creative Summit will be hosted in part from the Apple Campus in Cuppertino, International Cinematographers Guild holds the Emerging Cinematographer Awards in New York City, the Production Music Association (PMA) will bring their Production Music Conference back to Santa Monica, Festival of Media – LatAm will be in Miami, the entertainment content marketplace, MIPCOM, returns to Cannes.
