In its first year in 2005 the Glasgow Film Festival sold just over 6,000 tickets, a figure which last year rose to over 34,000, with the festival this February offering a rich selection of 239 films.
So what is on store this year? Co-director Allison Gardner told STV’s Grant Lauchlan: “We have a whole month of movies.
“We have the Glasgow Youth Film Festival, from the 5th to the 15th, the Glasgow Short Film Festival, from the 9th to the 12th, and the main Glasgow Film Festival from the 16th to the 26 February.”
She added that there are films around the world, red carpet galas, a retrospective of Gene Kelly movies, Werner Herzog documentaries – “there literally is something for everyone in this programme”.
Allison also discussed the global appeal of the festival. She said: “Glasgow Film Festival is becoming international.
“We have a lot of people who travel over – not just the guests and the filmmakers, but people who travel regularly for the festival itself.
“This is for everybody, across the whole of Scotland, the whole of the UK. We have lots of people who come from Dublin, for example, people who come from Paris, because they’re getting to see films that they don’t really have access to normally in a friendly, fantastic city that has other things to offer.”
Why does Allison think the festival has grown so much? She explained: “We don’t really change the ethos. The ethos is it’s cinema for all.
“There’s no snobbery or pretention about what we put on. I’m not saying that happens in other film festivals – other film festivals for example have access to world premieres everywhere, for example Cannes.
“But as a normal film-lover you can’t go to Cannes – but you can go to Glasgow. So we offer something for everyone, we have no prejudice against films – it doesn’t have to be a world premiere or a UK premiere, the film’s are there on their merits.
“We try to give people roots into the festival through the strands. We definitely give them a root in through price; it’s really competitively priced. We don’t charge extra for any of the guests, for example. That’s the added value you get with Glasgow Film Festival, and people really appreciate that, they’re very kind about the festival.
“They love the warmth they get from the people of Glasgow themselves, they love the warmth of the festival staff – we do our very best to look after people and make sure they get what they want.”
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