The 37th annual Santa Barbara International Film Festival unveils this year’s poster, announces line up
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SANTA BARBARA, Calif. -- The Santa Barbara International Film Festival held an in-person press conference on Thursday morning to unveil the full festival line-up and poster reveal.
Director Rodger Durling announced that to open 37th annual SBIFF, the first screening will be "Phantom of the Open", starring Mark Rylance and Sally Hawkins.
"This film will be a very big crowd pleaser, we need to smile and we need to feel warm," said Durling. "And this film will do the trick."
And to close the festival this year, Durling said they will screen the documentary "Dionne Warwick: Don't Make Me Over", with a special in-person attendance of the Grammy Hall of Famer Dionne Warwick herself.
Another exciting feature Durling announced this morning was that in honor of the 10th anniversary of "Silver Linings Playbook", SBIFF will hold a free screening of the Academy Award winning film at the Arlington Theater will the attendance of director David O. Russel and other special guests.
Also coming to SBIFF this year, Durling announced that director Gregory Nava will come to town to do a retrospective of his work, including movies such as "El Norte" and "Selena".
Overall, Durling said the 37th annual SBIFF will feature 48 world premieres, 95 U.S. premieres from 54 countries, a new record for the film festival.
This year's festival will feature an exceptional amount of Academy Award nominees.
When discussing how SBIFF has featured Oscar nominated actors in the past, Durling said "I always miss one person, but this year, I'm batting a thousand."
More than half of the awarded actors and actresses coming to SBIFF this year received Oscar nominations on Tuesday, and four of the six SBIFF feature films each received multiple Academy Award nominations.
Durling also said that he will announce the winner of the Montecito Award next week, "who is also an Academy Award nominee."
More announcements Durling said are yet to come within the next few weeks include the revealing of the writers, producers and women's panel, as well as the Outstanding Directors of the Year Award.
To close the press conference Thursday morning, Durling introduced the painter of SBIFF's poster this year, Hank Pitcher, and together they unveiled the poster for the 37th annual Santa Barbara International Film Festival.
"I grew up in Santa Barbara, in the theaters and on the beach here," said Pitcher. "There's something about waiting for the lights to go down and the film to go on, and something about standing on the shore that's all about dreams and desire, they fit each other."
The festival will take place in-person this year from March 2 to March 12. Click here for specific dates and times of each event, as well as how to purchase passes.
