Little Rock Film Festival Starts Today

Today (Wed., May 15) is the official start of the 7th Annual Little Rock Film Festival. Growing dramatically over the past seven years, the LRFF is now ranked as one of the top 25 film festivals out of the roughly 5,000 film festivals in the country.

From Wednesday until the festival’s close on Sunday night, festival-goers have over 80 films to choose from, from full-length feature films, documentaries and a large collection of short films.

There are too many wonderful films to list, so click here for the LRFF website to get a complete rundown.  I would note there are a significant number of Arkansas filmmakers listed in this year’s festival.

And, there are exciting changes to the screening venues this year making it a pedestrian-friendly festival. In years past festival films were screened at the Riverdale Movie Theater, but this year festival organizers moved the screening venues to downtown Little Rock and North Little Rock.

The Rep, Historic Arkansas Museum, 610 Main Street (across the street from The Rep), Argenta Community Theater and Cornerstone Pub are the five main film screening venues, thus making the festival a larger part of the community and putting it more in-line with major festivals such as Sundance.

Have you ever watched a film and wanted to know more about the movie? At the LRFF you’ll have the opportunity to ask the filmmakers questions since roughly 90% of the filmmakers whose films are being screened at the LRFF will be in attendance, answering questions after their films are screened.

LRFF has an app you can download to your smartphone, listing all films, their times and venue locations, plus the app allows you to set up reminders for the films you want to see. Type in “Little Rock Film Festival” into your smartphone’s app store to get the free download.

Let’s not forget the parties. Every casino online night of the festival there are exclusive parties featuring the filmmakers at various hotspots in downtown Little Rock and North Little Rock. I specifically used the word “exclusive” to describe these parties since festival-goers must purchase either a Silver or Gold Pass to gain entry to these events. The Bronze Pass gets you into all movies, except the opening night film, but not into any of the festival parties.

I personally recommend the Gold Pass since it gets you first in line for all film screenings, access to every festival party, and the closing gala at the Clinton Library, plus exclusive access to the Filmmakers Lounge where you can mingle with the filmmakers in between screenings and enjoy free food and drink. If you want to experience everything the festival has to offer, it’s money well-spent. Click here for more information on the passes and the prices.

“Short Term 12” is the festival’s opening film on Wednesday night with staggered screenings at the Argenta Community Theater in North Little Rock and The Rep in downtown Little Rock.

The Little Rock Film Festival is a not-to-be-missed experience for movie buffs and with over 80 films to view over the next five days, festival-goers can gorge themselves on numerous scrumptious and delightful films. I hope to see you there.