Forest City Film Festival launch party at Museum London
Kicking off its 10th anniversary, the Forest City Film Festival held a launch party at Museum London which welcomed guests with light snacks, a cash bar, and a fun atmosphere where the community gathered to celebrate a decade of cinematic impact as well as this year’s newest lineup of films and emerging talent.
Dorothy Downs, the founder and executive director of the festival says that she had started Forest City Film Festival because she noticed that London lacked a long-standing, successful, and thriving film festival to showcase local talent.
The crowd at the FCFF launch party
“I had a teenager who was a precocious filmmaker; he loved making films. He made one at one point that was good enough to get into the Rain Dance Film Festival in London, England which is one of the largest independent film festivals in the world. So we flew over,” recalls Downs as she remembers how she had been inspired to start the festival.
“I fell in love with how they supported filmmakers and how they supported the industry. On the way back home, I realized there was nowhere in London for our friends and family to see his films. So I started looking, and all around North America, this was the only city I could find that didn’t have a long-standing and successful film festival. So I thought, we gotta change that.” she says.
With 100 films including 14 that have been screened at the Toronto International Film Festival (otherwise known as TIFF), the festival is set to have one of its most impressive seasons yet.
“We’re competing with a lot of really great film festivals in Ontario. We’re coming at people with a lot of TIFF movies this year, we’ve got 14 movies that played at TIFF this year, other regional film festivals just don’t have that.” says Ethan Hickey, the managing director of the festival.
FCFF launch party at Museum London
“On top of that, every year that this film festival goes on, the local and regional films get better and better and better and that’s proof that the film industry in London, Ontario and Southwestern Ontario is just growing and it’s just gonna get better and better.” he added.
From October 24 to November 2, the Forest City Film Festival offers ten days packed of film screenings, panels, and workshops; all of which foster celebration of art and community through storytelling.
Watch the full interview with Dorothy Downs and Ethan Hickey here:
