This September, Oak Park residents can enjoy a new cultural tradition: the Oak Park Illinois Film Festival.
Over the past few years, I have been fortunate enough to travel to numerous film festivals in several states and even France to promote a film I was in. As I attended these festivals, I found that some were much more entertaining and better planned than others. It got me thinking about how creative Oak Parkers is and that it would be the ideal location for the ideal festival.
I knew I couldn’t do it alone. I posted a few ads on social media, called a meeting and waited to see if anyone would come. And sure enough, nine people showed up. When we introduced ourselves, one said, “I could build the website,” another said, “I can do the editing,” etc. So I had a talented group of people to work with who had the technical skills I lacked. Now I knew the festival was a possibility
The event grew in popularity over time. A board member, Mike Awe, suggested starting with a Hollywood movie to generate publicity and excitement. I thought that was a good idea, as long as the movie had a connection to Oak Park. I made a list of Hollywood movies related to Oak Park and was amazed at how long it was.
We finally decided on “The Abyss: Special Edition,” which stars Oak Parker Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio.
One of the many challenges we faced was finding and renting the right locations to film. We were able to rent the historic Lake Theatre. Classic Cinemas was a great help in many ways, including the difficult challenge of obtaining the rights to show the film. There will be a red carpet atmosphere on the night, Thursday 12 September, with photos against a backdrop and speakers before the film.
The following Saturday, we will present the Independent Film Festival at the Madison Street Theater and screen some of the films submitted to the jury. There will also be a panel discussion, Q&A, breakfast for all, and a guest speaker flying in from California.
We didn’t know how many films would be submitted, of course. When asked for an estimate, I gave the hopeful figure of 25. After all, no one knew us at that point, and we limited ourselves to films with some connection to Oak Park. It turned out we had 61 submissions! Way more than we could show.
Planning the festival was a much bigger challenge than I ever imagined. It was almost a full-time job. When we started, we had no funding and the board members simply put expenses like printing costs on their credit cards.
Fortunately, the village recognized the value of the festival and gave us seed money. We also received sponsorship from Hoyne Bank and several smaller donors. The Madison Street Theater agreed to be our financial sponsor so we could obtain nonprofit status. The board members did a great job. The Chamber of Commerce helped.
There is a cliché that says “it takes a village,” and in this case it is true in more ways than one.
Information and tickets can be found on our website opilff.org. There you can also sign up for the email newsletter.
It’s exciting and I hope to see a lot of Oak Parkers there.
Joyce Porter is founder and chair of the Oak Park Illinois Film Festival.
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