Plans to hold an international film festival in Cayman next year have been put on hold.
Lesley-Ann Thompson, head of marketing at the Cayman Islands Department of Commerce and Investment, which includes the Cayman Islands Film Commission, said the aim was to launch the festival in 2013 instead.
In July, the department issued an invitation to interested parties to submit proposals for a film festival and received three submissions.
“A committee comprised of stakeholders met and reviewed three proposals,” said Ms Thompson. “However, as we went through the details and discussed them against our objectives, the group felt that while there were elements in each that were good, no single proposal aligned closely enough to the blueprint of what we envisioned overall.”
She added that the proposed time frame of the first to second quarter of 2012 “was deemed too sudden to launch an International Film Festival with the impact that is necessary to make the right first impression, so the decision was taken to put this on the 2013 calendar of activities instead.”
“We needed a longer lead time,” she added.
The Film Commission’s board and committee are planning to go back to the drawing board in January next year and begin formalising plans for the film festival.
Proposers were asked to provide an overview of the proposal; details of a committee responsible for managing and organising the festival; a schedule of proposed events with dates and times; a marketing, operations and development plan; a list of sponsors; a budget of expenses; and a festival guide, which would include movie descriptions, director and writer profiles, proposed guests, guest speakers and volunteers.
Before the invitation to pitch plans for a film festival, three separate companies or individuals had already suggested ideas for or were planning an international film festival, but now the Department of Commerce and Industry is warning against anyone running their own film festival without the endorsement of the Film Commission.
“We have subsequently written and strongly discouraged any company or organisation from misrepresenting the Cayman Islands Film Festival by printing or promoting materials that indicated it was the festival’s owner,” said Ms Thompson.
Any film festival that goes ahead would need to be endorsed by the Cayman Islands Film Commission, she said, although the festival would be private sector driven.
“The Film Commission will not be able to drive it; we will endorse it and work with the organisers,” she added.
The Cayman Islands Film Commission was set up in January 2009 to promote Cayman to filmmakers, documentary makers and producers and offers duty waivers on the importation of film equipment that will be taken off island when the projects are completed, as well as work permit concessions for film crews.
When it was initially set up, it offered 30 per cent rebates on money spent by movie makers filming in Cayman, but those rebates are on hold, Ms Thompson said.
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