Latest / Indie Film Podcast / A Packed, Electric Night for Indie Filmmakers | IFP Reviews: Portland Under the Stars

Transcript

A Packed, Electric Night for Indie Filmmakers | IFP Reviews: Portland Under the Stars · Indie Film Podcast

• 0:00
  Welcome to an indie film podcast, Film Festival review.
• 0:02
  I'm Vic. And I am Chuck.
• 0:04
  Today we're going to be talking about our experience at the
• 0:06
  Portland Under the Stars Film Festival in Portland, OR.
• 0:11
  It was located at the McMenamins Mission Theatre on August 16th,
• 0:15
  2025. It was a one day festival,
• 0:17
  however Portland Under the Stars is sister festivals with the LA
• 0:20
  Under the Stars Festival and the Austin Under the Stars Film
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  Festival. Do you want to start off with
• 0:24
  the review metrics, Vic? Absolutely.
• 0:27
  As the film submitter, I dealt with the communications from the
• 0:30
  festival, which I would rate at a 10 out of 10.
• 0:32
  Excellent. The films themselves, I'm going
• 0:35
  to say that they are an 8 out of 10.
• 0:36
  They were all very good. I put the films at a nine out of
• 0:39
  10 and the attendance audience I put it a 10 out of 10. 10 out of
• 0:44
  10 I would give it at an 11 if I could.
• 0:46
  The networking and events that were available, I put that at
• 0:49
  about average 7 out of 10. I put that at an 8 out of 10 and
• 0:53
  the theater and tech I put out a nine out of 10.
• 0:56
  I'd say it was closer to an 8 out of 10 and awards.
• 1:00
  I rated those a nine out of 10. I also rated those a nine out of
• 1:03
  10. The town area that the Film
• 1:07
  Festival and theater were in, however, I definitely rated A10.
• 1:10
  And 10 out of 10 for me as well. I love Portland, OR which gives
• 1:14
  my overall rating an 8.6 out of 10.
• 1:17
  And my overall rating a 9.3 out of 10.
• 1:20
  Should we talk a little bit about the Portland Under the
• 1:23
  Stars Film Festival then? Absolutely.
• 1:25
  So I want to talk a little bit about the submission value
• 1:29
  overall. It was $36 to submit for a
• 1:32
  narrative short. I do not remember if that was an
• 1:34
  early bird pricing or not, unfortunately.
• 1:36
  I wish I knew off that top of my head or by looking at my receipt
• 1:40
  from Film Freeway. Yeah, however.
• 1:42
  A little pricier for a short. Film, yeah, definitely a little
• 1:46
  bit more expensive as far as a short submission goes.
• 1:49
  However, by submitting to the Film Festival, getting into the
• 1:53
  festival or even just attending the Film Festival, they also
• 1:56
  give out discount codes and some special offers for some of their
• 1:59
  sister festivals. So if you wanted to expand your
• 2:02
  festival run or just attend those other festivals, you would
• 2:05
  be able to do so, which is kind of a nice benefit that they can
• 2:07
  offer. Yeah, and I want to point out
• 2:10
  that the festival itself was fine and cool.
• 2:14
  It was amazing there. Were four blocks.
• 2:17
  We were able to attend three of them because we drove in from
• 2:20
  Boise and the theater was standing room only by the time
• 2:26
  you got to the last block. The two-story theater with the
• 2:30
  mezzanine and floor. It was packed in there.
• 2:32
  The back of the theater is a bar, so it kind of had that vibe
• 2:36
  to it to where people were very engaged.
• 2:39
  A lot of people from the local community came out to see these
• 2:42
  films. There were a lot of local film
• 2:44
  makers that were featured in this Film Festival.
• 2:47
  The Portland Film Makers, y'all are awesome.
• 2:49
  They were super solid. So much.
• 2:51
  Fun, really good films. Forward, which I appreciated.
• 2:55
  The writing was really solid on these films and the audience was
• 2:59
  cheering. They were jeering against the
• 3:02
  villains. It was loud.
• 3:05
  The theater audio system was cranked to 11 as well.
• 3:09
  It was. It was.
• 3:10
  Compensate for all the audience noise because there was a lot.
• 3:13
  People were having drinks, they were having a good time, and we
• 3:17
  were fortunate enough to show up to the final block early enough
• 3:21
  to be able to get a seat. But like I said, there were
• 3:23
  people just packed into that theater, so many people excited
• 3:27
  about indie films, and that's just kind of a Portland, OR
• 3:30
  thing. I feel like the community felt
• 3:33
  very involved in the arts. Yeah, it wasn't just, oh, I have
• 3:37
  a film playing at this festival, so I'm going to go.
• 3:39
  It was Portland cares about the arts community, and everyone in
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  the arts community was just really excited to go watch indie
• 3:46
  films. Yeah, and we went out after the
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  Film Festival ended. It was probably 1111 or 11:30 at
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  night. And Portland has recovered from
• 3:57
  the pandemic, it feels like more so than some of the other cities
• 4:01
  I've been to, AKA Seattle. The the town was out and about
• 4:05
  on a Saturday night. You won an award for Dive at the
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  Film Festival, and as we were walking around downtown getting
• 4:13
  food and drinks, you had countless strangers ask you what
• 4:18
  was your award for? And it opened up a lot of
• 4:21
  opportunities for us just to talk to other restaurant and bar
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  patrons about indie filmmaking, and they were all very open and
• 4:29
  very curious. And interested in having the
• 4:32
  conversation about indie film, which you don't, you don't
• 4:34
  necessarily see all the time. Yeah, I'm sure a lot of you out
• 4:37
  there that are indie film makers, you were used to having
• 4:40
  to kind of like maneuver the conversation to the topic of
• 4:44
  indie film so you can promote the thing that you're doing.
• 4:48
  But the community in Portland was just great, great people,
• 4:52
  very curious, very supportive of the arts.
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  Yeah, and I would say I loved the variety of the films.
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  And no, it, it wasn't necessarily a genre festival
• 5:03
  anyway, so there was going to be variety, but it was such a vast
• 5:09
  difference between all the different types of films.
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  There were music videos, there were a lot of art house esoteric
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  things. There were animated shorts,
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  There were entire ROM coms and pilots and dramas and horror.
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  And, uh, there was just, there was so much and there was so
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  much encouragement for younger or novice or student film makers
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  to be there as well. An entire category is dedicated
• 5:32
  to just that, which was really awesome, Yeah.
• 5:35
  Very cool festival if you can. That's that's what I would
• 5:38
  recommend. Go as anyone who can attend.
• 5:40
  Yeah, definitely worth attending because of the fact that you
• 5:44
  will have great conversations with other film makers in the
• 5:48
  bar behind the theater. Not behind the screen, but like
• 5:51
  in the back of the theater, there's a bar there.
• 5:53
  And so in between screenings, you'll definitely have great
• 5:56
  conversations with film makers. And also, you'll have
• 5:58
  conversations with people that are either just in the
• 6:02
  neighborhood there to support film or aspiring film makers.
• 6:07
  They'll come up and ask you about your film.
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  They'll ask you good questions too, not just the technical
• 6:12
  stuff like how did you come up with this idea?
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  What was the development of this character look like?
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  What did that look like? There was a lot.
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  So people that are genuinely interested in the art.
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  So if you can attend, then definitely it's worth
• 6:27
  submitting. How about you?
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  What do you think? Yeah, I would say that if you
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  are a filmmaker and you can physically be in Portland for
• 6:34
  this festival, do it. Just submit.
• 6:37
  It's absolutely worth it. It was so much fun.
• 6:39
  It was so great to talk to so many different people from a
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  surprising number of different areas, too, because when you get
• 6:47
  to the middle of the country, you can get people there a
• 6:51
  little bit easier. So the actual process of seeing
• 6:55
  more diversity and where people are from comes a little bit more
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  naturally. When you get to the West Coast,
• 7:00
  to the East Coast, you tend to limit your reach.
• 7:03
  But Portland was not the case. There were plenty of film makers
• 7:06
  from all over the place. Yes, definitely a lot from, you
• 7:09
  know, California, Washington, Oregon for sure, but a wide
• 7:12
  variety of people outside of that as well.
• 7:14
  And especially for a first year festival, I see this festival
• 7:17
  doing very well and becoming just as big, if not bigger than
• 7:20
  the LA Under the stars of the Austin Under the Stars, Yeah.
• 7:23
  They're going to have to set up more chairs next year for sure
• 7:25
  based on the attendance this year.
• 7:26
  Definitely. Baller, So check that out.
• 7:29
  And if you want to have a review of your product, whether it's a
• 7:33
  film or a Film Festival, to do so, go to indiefilmpodcast.com.
• 7:38
  Forward slash. Submit.
• 7:41
  And we can take a look at your film or your attend your Film
• 7:45
  Festival and talk about it on our podcast.
• 7:47
  And of course, if you subscribe to our newsletter, then you'll
• 7:49
  get deeper insights on exactly what these reviews are, when
• 7:52
  they're coming out, and how you can get earlier access to them.
• 7:55
  Awesome. Does that cover everything?
• 7:57
  Should we succinctly say farewell?
• 7:58
  I think so. Bye bye.