Locarno’s Heritage Monday Panelists Argue for Marketing Old Classics Like Current Films: ‘There Is a New Generation Coming to Cinema Now’
variety.comMarta Balaga You can approach old classics just like new films, argued participants during Locarno’s Heritage Monday panel. “I talked to an exhibitor in Paris and they don’t consider repertory cinema to be different from contemporary cinema.
They are collapsing both models into one and it’s very interesting,” said K.J. Relth-Miller of the Academy Museum. Swiss Film Archive director Frédéric Maire noted that they also mix “fresh” films with older titles. “This idea of separating them can be useful for communication, but we try to avoid it.
Yesterday, I was watching [Daniel Schmid’s 1974 film] ‘La Paloma’ [at the festival] and it felt modern and new. I don’t want to make these distinctions in terms of cultural perspective,” he said.
Such an approach can be beneficial also when it comes to raising audience’s awareness, argued Film Movement’s Erin Farrell. “When we talk about ‘heritage films’ in the same breath as our new releases, we tend to get more engagement.” During the panel, which was dedicated to theatrical distribution, exhibition and streaming of classics and moderated by Jay Weissberg, artistic director of Italy’s Pordenone Silent Film Festival, the experts shared tips that help them reach new – and often much younger – viewers. “Let’s call a cat a cat: ‘heritage film’ is not a bad word.
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