The International Family Film Festival is celebrating its twelfth year at the Regal/Edwards Cinemas on Town Center Drive September 22 – September 30, 2006. According to Chris Shoemaker, IFFF Executive Director, “This is a special year for the festival. Not only is it our twelfth year in the Santa Clarita Valley but it is the 100^th anniversary of Fritz Frelong, the Father of Warner Bros. animation and the namesake of our Lifetime Achievement Award, The Fritz. There are lots of thrills and surprises planned for the festival. This promises to be a year no one wants to miss.”

 

The Submissions deadline for both feature films and short films is July 20, 2006. The submission deadline for student short films (produced by students in professional film schools) is July 20, 2006. The submission deadline for screenplays is August 1, 2006. The screenplay Finalists will be announced on September 5. 2006. For Guidelines and Submission, Fees and Form visit www.iffilmfest.org. www.withoutabox.com or call the Competition Programmer, Patte Dee McKee at (661) 257-3131.

 

As a mission “The International Family Film Festival (IFFF) promotes and encourages the creation and sharing of family films through seminars, networking and featuring international competitions of exciting new films by emerging filmmakers and student filmmakers, global premiere showcases of the latest works by film masters and red-carpet gala premieres.” The festival offers filmmakers and screenwriters networking, a market, workshops, seminars, galas and an introduction to the film industry in the SCV Valley.

 

Films are accepted in both short and feature format in the following genres: drama, comedy, animation (both traditional and computer-generated), documentary and educational. Screenplays are accepted in both short and feature formats in the following genres:  drama, comedy animation and science fiction/action adventure. According to Patte Dee McKee, the Competition Programmer, “This promises to be the best competition and film market to date. Last year saw distributors pick up all of our feature films and a number of our short films. Several screenplays were optioned and one of the Finalist screenplays has already been completed as a film and been submitted to the film competition for this year. Family films have always been a crowd pleaser, add to that the growing popularity of independent films and we have a recipe for a great IFFF in 2006.”

According to Suzanne Shoemaker, Director of Marketing, “There has never been a better time to be an independent filmmaker interested in stories about the family.”

 

The Festival is always recruiting members and volunteers. To get involved with the Festival contact the Executive Director at chris2@actsofcreation.com. For sponsorship and advertising information contact the Director of Marketing at Suzanne@actsofcreation.com. For information on film and screenplay submission contact Patte Dee at ifamilyff@sbcglobal.com.