Beginning in 2025, the Sun Valley Film Festival will shift from March to December. The move seeks to place the festival as a prominent “must-stop” on the awards circuit.
To mark the shift in dates, the festival will produce a special two-day SVFF Winter Screening Series on Dec. 6-7.
Executive director Teddy Grennan said, “When we started in 2012, we scheduled the Festival in the spring to help drive tourism in an otherwise quieter time of the year. With the success of our Winter Screening Series and an increasingly crowded festival landscape in the spring, we saw an opportunity to fulfill the desire of the film industry and showcase high-caliber films to thoughtful and influential audiences including Sun Valley-based guild and AMPAS members in advance of voting for award season.”
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Sean Baker’s “The Florida Project” screened as part of their early-December Winter Screening Series. Baker said the screening helped spotlight the film during a busy screening series. “I know a lot of independent filmmakers will appreciate the same opportunity,” he said. “The Sun Valley Film Festival will always hold a special place for me. They honored me with their Vision Award in 2013. Since then, it’s been great to see the festival grow and I think their move to December will be beneficial for the film community.”
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Festival director Candice Pate added, “Sun Valley has long been a destination known for its deep Hollywood roots while celebrating our unique location and mountain life, creating a relaxed and fun-loving vibe that has distinguished the Sun Valley Film Festival. By shifting the Festival to the beautiful Holiday season in this ski paradise which is attracting other top events like World Cup, we can grow the prominence of the Festival and highlight the best of awards season contenders to our sophisticated audience of movie lovers.”
The Sun Valley Film Festival’s Winter Screening Series will take place Dec. 6-7 this year, just before Academy Award shortlist voting starts on Dec. 9.
Last year, the series showcased “The Color Purple” and Ridley Scott’s “Napoleon.” Previous winter screenings have included such films as National Geographic Documentary Film’s “Free Solo,” which went on to win the 2019 Academy Award for best documentary feature.
Chris Albert, former head of marketing and communications for National Geographic, said, “The Sun Valley Film Festival has been a true partner for more than a decade. Their audience is the perfect mix of press, influencers and AMPAS voters, in a setting that puts film and film lovers first. Each of the four Nat Geo-nominated Oscar documentary campaigns I oversaw screened at Sun Valley, and honestly, I consider them a good luck charm! With this change in date, I would add Sun Valley as a must-stop for awards contenders.”
The organization will continue its Monthly Movies series for local audiences, as well as other year-round programs and workshops such as SVJr Film, Shop Talks and the Screenwriter Lab Residency.
Passes and tickets to 2024 Winter Screening Series will go on sale later this year.
