AFTER 60 years, the Edinburgh Film Festival has finally moved out from August, a home it shared with all the other festivals, to strike out on its own with a June place, like an old flatmate who has moved out to a leafy Barratt estate.
Having left the convivial cultural tumult of Festival City, it must be odd not to have to shout at the jazz festival to keep the noise down any more, or complain that the International and Fringe always get their mates round and hog all the space.
At their housewarming launch this week in Edinburgh, artistic director Hannah McGill and festival producer Ginnie Atkinson underlined all the fabulous features their new set-up has to offer as the only show in town, yet the mood was subdued. You could almost hear the mutters of "blimey, it's a bit quiet here, innit?"
As we are repeatedly reminded, the Edinburgh Film Festival is the oldest annual film festival in the world, but longevity doesn't make securing world-class films any easier. Festival directors still have to beg and plead with distributors and filmmakers who have their own ideas on the best places to secure exposure for their work. A programme has to please the critics and make sense at the box office, while superstar talent can be the most capricious of travellers. The shift to June may take the Edinburgh Film Festival out of clashes with Toronto and Venice but it also directly follows in the shadow of Cannes, which operates as the European launch pad for high-profile titles such as Kung Fu Panda and Spielberg's Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull this year. As one distributor put it: "When you've paid £100,000 for a private jet to bring a star to Cannes, you're not going to spend another £100,000 on a UK festival the following month."
Under the circumstances, securing WALL.E, the first film from animation kings Pixar since Ratatouille, is certainly a coup for the determined, charismatic McGill and her team. And since this year Cannes has largely snubbed British films, Edinburgh also has a wealth of new UK films in its showcase, including its opening premiere, The Edge Of Love, the Dylan Thomas picture which combines arthouse cred, red carpet glamour in the slimline form of Sienna Miller and Keira Knightley, and even a showbiz kilt, since The Edge Of Love was penned by Sharman Macdonald, Knightley's mother.
Other popular choices include Robert Carlyle in Stone Of Destiny, and the emotional drama Summer, with the possible appearance of Sir Ben Kingsley – although he was supposed to come to Glasgow last year for a Scottish film showcase, but didn't – for his films The Wackness, Transsiberian, and Elegy. For some films in the programme, Edinburgh may be the only platform they have; a large number of the British pictures premiered here will open nationwide within weeks of their festival screenings.
For a film festival that looks to Sundance as a model, however, other choices look a little timorous. McGill has said that one powerful reason for moving the festival was that it would be able to take advantage of June's less congested space situation when booking showcases and special events.
The festival could certainly do with a few more venues: last year's awards ceremony took place in a hotel room, a melancholy setting that conferred the air of an end-of-term school prizegiving. Yet so far the special guests for next month are respectable but not especially exciting. Doughty cinematographers Brian Tufano and Roger Deakins, stop-motion king Ray Harryhausen and even actor Brian Cox are highly regarded industry names, but they are hardly rare sightings on the festival circuit, while This Is England director Shane Meadows has practically become an EFF mascot with appearances dating back to his early feature Short Time. Similarly the revival of Cinema Under The Stars, an event that projects cinema across the city, carries just a whiff of coming-next-on-ITV2, with much-loved, but also much-seen, films such as ET, Back To The Future and even Local Hero.
As a film festival keenly reliant on its box-office revenue, Edinburgh will now be at the mercy of the enthusiasm and deep pockets of local movie lovers, as opposed to the culture-bingers of August, as well as the competing allure of football and external blockbusters such as The Incredible Hulk.
To be fair, 10 months is barely any time to turn around a behemoth like Edinburgh, and moving house is one of the most demanding things one can do. But after a muted launch, one hopes that Edinburgh's quest for surprise and discovery will extend to the event itself. v
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Edinburgh International Film Festival, (0131-623 8030), June 18-29 •
www.edfilmfest.org.ukFESTIVAL HOT TICKETSWALL.ELast year it was Ratatouille and this time we're treated to Pixar's follow-up, Wall.E, the story of the last robot on Earth.
• June 28, Cineworld
DUMMYBritish debut about two brothers dealing with family tragedy. Score by Phil Hartnoll of Orbital.
• June 25 and 26, Cineworld
STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDUREThe peerless documentary maker Errol Morris takes on the Abu Ghraib scandal.
• June 21 and 22, Cineworld
DEATH DEFYING ACTSEdinburgh-set Houdini drama with Guy Pearce, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Timothy Spall.
• June 24 and 26, Cineworld
FAINTHEARTBritish comedy starring Ewen Bremner, Jessica 'Spaced' Hynes and Eddie Marsan.
• June 28, Cineworld
