Festival Proves a Real Draw for Documentaries

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ArcLight Cinemas Documentary Film Festival has filmmakers flocking.

The festival brought in a record 400 submissions this year, up from 250 last year and 110 in its first year. The festival will run Wednesday through Sunday.

Gretchen McCourt, executive vice president of cinema programming at ArcLight, said the growing applicant pool shows a rising profile.

“This year it just exploded,” she said. “I think the word’s spreading for our festival.”

To handle the influx of submissions, ArcLight brought in a curator, Marjan Safinia, president of the board at the Independent Documentary Association. She previously was on the festival’s judging panel.

It’s a change from previous years, when all of the films shown at the festival were picked by the public by voting on trailers posted to ArcLight’s Facebook and YouTube pages.

This year, Safinia picked 20 films and the public picked an additional five via social media. The 25 selections mark an uptick from the 20 shown last year.

The festival will open Wednesday night with a screening of “Let the Fire Burn,” which chronicles the 1985 aerial bombing of the radical black organization Move in Philadelphia that killed 11 people and burned 60 neighboring homes.

The festival is also branching out with showings of docs at all ArcLight locations, including in Pasadena, Sherman Oaks and El Segundo. In the past, the festival’s movies were only shown at the Hollywood location.

Part of the idea behind the festival is to reinforce the ArcLight brand, which is known for arty and foreign fare along with studio movies. ArcLight is a unit of Los Angeles holding company Decurion Corp.

The next challenge will be to beat last year’s attendance of about 3,000 people, McCourt said. Tickets are sold in batches of 10 for $100 dollars or packs of 5 for $60. Individual tickets are also on sale.

To get the word out, ArcLight has taken out ads in the Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles magazine and other media.

“We’ve already (cleared) one hurdle, which is to get more submissions and quality submissions,” she said. “The second would be to outdo the attendance.”


Headphone Hi-Fi

Watching movies on mobile devices is already hugely popular, but DTS Inc. of Calabasas thinks the experience could be improved quite a bit with surround sound.

That was the thinking behind the audio technology firm’s new product, Headphone:X software, which provides surround sound-quality audio with any headphones.

It’s still the early days for the technology, but it has won an endorsement from soundtrack composer Hans Zimmer, who encoded two of his recent movie scores, for “Man of Steel” and “Rush,” with Headphone:X technology.

Listeners can hear the new format on the “Rush” soundtrack by downloading a free app, called Z+ Rush, and then downloading the songs for $1.99 each. Normal MP3 formatting is also available.

Geir Skaaden, senior vice president of products and services at DTS, said composers and filmmakers are eager to improve the quality of mobile entertainment.

“(Artists) need to find a way to extract value from the portable market more than they are today,” Skaaden said. “You need to elevate the experience.”

DTS is hoping the support of Zimmer and other artists will help get the word out on the new format.

Sound engineers and composers can use Headphone:X technology to encode their audio tracks. The encoding simulates the acoustic characteristics of a mixing room, giving listeners a surround-sound experience as if they were in the studio.

It works on any kind of headphones, but for the technology to expand, DTS will need to license Headphone:X to mobile device makers who will imbed technology that is compatible with the format.

In limited scenarios, the technology can work in mobile apps, as with the “Rush” soundtrack.

DTS’ business is licensing audio technology to consumer electronics companies and collecting a fee for each device manufactured. The Headphone:X technology will be sold in similar licensing deals. Skaaden expects device makers to begin imbedding the technology in new products next year.

Comings and Goings

Jaime Jimenez has been elected chairman of the Southern California Broadcasters Association. … MSG Entertainment has named Paola Palazzo vice president of bookings at the Forum in Inglewood … Gabrielle Carteris has been elected as executive vice president of performers’ union Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists.

Staff reporter Jonathan Polakoff can be reached at [email protected] or (323) 549-5225, ext. 226.

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