Few things conjure up an image quite like film festivals do. The big three in particular—Cannes, Berlin and Venice—carry visions of satin gowns and shimmering suits, oodles of gleaming critique paved with carpets of red and champagne streams. Yet at the heart of all the grandeur and prestige inflating film festivals is the reputation of excellently curated films. Last year, at Cannes alone, ‘Parasite,’ ‘Once Upon A Time in Hollywood…’, and ‘Portrait of a Lady on Fire’ premiered for the first time. The cultural significance of these festivals lies in their ability to select the films that will end up in the pantheon of cinematic marvels.
Of course, like the Oscars and the Grammys and everybody’s birthday party, the pandemic has made such mass gatherings impossible—the ripples of these cancellations shall be felt for both this year and the next. Award season buzz starts circling winning films at these festivals. Several streaming platforms depend on film festivals to decide what content they showcase. So, what next? Tribeca Enterprises and YouTube turned to the obvious option: an online film festival. While Cannes did not want to adulterate the physical experience of their flagship event by going virtual (“its soul, its history, its efficiency, it’s a model that wouldn’t work,” the festival’s director told Variety), it was one of the 21 bigwigs that elected to participate in ‘We Are One’—a ten-day film festival held entirely online. Other renowned festivals like BFI, Sundance, Tokyo and Venice screened select pickings for free between March 29th and June 7th.
13 films premiered for the first time, there were panel discussions with the likes of Ang Lee and Jackie Chan, and fresh filmmaker perspectives infused the mostly already-released films with new excitement. ‘We Are One’ positioned itself as a global event with selections from Sarajevo, Jerusalem and Mumbai in addition to the usual suspects of Europe and the US. Arun Karthick’s Tamil film ‘Nasir’ looked at communalism in Coimbatore. From Macau’s film festival, ‘Sisterhood’ unpacked buried feelings of regret and loss in a lesbian relationship that never fully materialised. Mati Diop, the first black woman to contend for the Palme D’or, showcased her 2009 short-film ‘Atlantique’ which evinced the promising scaffolding for what would later become the acclaimed ‘Atlantics.’
India, Japan, Mexico and Brazil featured in the festival’s top-10 viewing countries. It is unlikely that Tribeca’s scheduled annual festival in New York would ever have been this diverse in its audience and composition. Most of the festivals who contributed to its content restrict their in-person events to A-listers and auteurs, to elite critics and eclectic celebrities. It is quite remarkable to see the stuffy gatekeepers of art, with their billowing yacht parties and million-dollar-buy-ins, being compelled to share their content with us uncultured masses of the interwebs. Because ‘We Are One’ took place on YouTube—a platform that revolutionised content creation by democratising filmmaking and creating a space for anyone with a DSLR and a dream to make the home film of every critic’s nightmare.
And so the ultimate significance of ‘We Are One’ is not in its effective navigation of the technological legwork that goes into a streaming event of this stature, or its choice of panellists. Its significance lies in its accessibility. In the past five months, ‘Hamilton’ released as a film on Disney+. (A ticket to the Broadway show could set you back 1,000$. A subscription to Disney+ costs 6.99$ a month.) The Bolshoi Ballet streamed ‘The Nutcracker’ for 24 hours, free of cost. The Royal Shakespeare Company is offering its plays for unrestricted viewing for a month. You get the idea.
As recreational thespians and amateur ballerinas clamour to catch a glimpse of “great art,” it should not have taken a lifetime-defining health crisis to have made this happen. ‘We Are One’ successfully proves that there are ways to open up the tight folds of the upper echelons of art without compromising any of their rigour and delight. In doing so, there are some inevitable questions thrust upon the aforementioned insular gatekeepers. What is the value of art when it is consumed and circulated only amongst the carpeted echo chamber of the rich? Why must meaningful or “important” art be paraded about with glitzy self-aggrandisement and upturned noses? Is there no sense of irony when ‘Parasite’—a film about the ravages of systemic inequality—is dotingly adjudged best film in an imperiously exclusive festival on the French Riviera? ‘We Are One’ might have been a forced play from a corporation left with no other hands. If popularised, its model could transform the concept of film festivals altogether.
