#1 ·
I was scrolling through some industry news earlier today, and it got me thinking about the whole ecosystem of film festivals and how we, as viewers, perceive "quality." We’ve become so accustomed to these annual cycles where a specific group of directors is anointed by a handful of prestigious juries, and suddenly, everyone is talking about them as if they’ve just reinvented the wheel.
There’s a certain ritual to it, isn't there? You see these names pop up in the headlines, you see the "official selection" banners, and there’s this immediate, almost Pavlovian response from the critics and the cinephiles. It creates this intense bubble of hype that feels almost disconnected from the actual experience of watching a movie. I find myself wondering: at what point does a festival stop being a celebration of art and start becoming a high-stakes marketing machine for the awards season?
I remember a few years back, I went out of my way to see a film that had been the darling of the festival circuit. I went in with these massive, inflated expectations because the "prestige" was so thick you could cut it with a knife. I sat there in the dark, waiting for this profound, life-altering cinematic experience, and honestly? I was bored. It felt like it was performing "importance" rather than actually being important. It was technically perfect, sure, but it lacked that raw, unpolished soul that usually makes a movie stick with you. It felt like it was designed specifically to win trophies, not to move people.
It makes me skeptical of the "curated" experience. We live in an era of algorithmic recommendations where everything is served to us based on what we've already liked, but film festivals are supposed to be the opposite of that—they are supposed to be the gatekeepers of what is "significant." But when the same handful of names keep circulating through these prestigious lineups, it starts to feel less like discovery and more like a closed loop. It feels like a private club where the members decide who gets to be "relevant" this year, and the rest of us just react to the ripple effects.
What really bothers me is how this affects the way we talk about movies. We start using this specific vocabulary—words like "visceral," "nuanced," or "subversive"—to describe these festival favorites, almost as if we’re following a script. It’s like we’re being coached on how to appreciate them before we’ve even seen them. I miss the days when a film’s reputation was built on word-of-mouth from regular people actually watching it, rather than being manufactured in a velvet-lined theater in Europe or a cocktail lounge in California.
Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of a festival. I love the idea of seeing something cutting-edge and being part of a global conversation. But I can't shake the feeling that the "prestige" label has become a bit of a crutch. It’s a way to signal value without having to prove it through the actual substance of the work. It’s a way to say, "This is good because we say it is," rather than "This is good because it actually works."
I’m curious to hear what you all think. Do you find that following the festival circuit helps you discover genuine gems, or do you find the hype surrounding these "main competition" lineups to be a distraction from finding real, independent voices? Does a "prestigious" label actually change how you approach a movie, or have you learned to ignore it entirely?
There’s a certain ritual to it, isn't there? You see these names pop up in the headlines, you see the "official selection" banners, and there’s this immediate, almost Pavlovian response from the critics and the cinephiles. It creates this intense bubble of hype that feels almost disconnected from the actual experience of watching a movie. I find myself wondering: at what point does a festival stop being a celebration of art and start becoming a high-stakes marketing machine for the awards season?
I remember a few years back, I went out of my way to see a film that had been the darling of the festival circuit. I went in with these massive, inflated expectations because the "prestige" was so thick you could cut it with a knife. I sat there in the dark, waiting for this profound, life-altering cinematic experience, and honestly? I was bored. It felt like it was performing "importance" rather than actually being important. It was technically perfect, sure, but it lacked that raw, unpolished soul that usually makes a movie stick with you. It felt like it was designed specifically to win trophies, not to move people.
It makes me skeptical of the "curated" experience. We live in an era of algorithmic recommendations where everything is served to us based on what we've already liked, but film festivals are supposed to be the opposite of that—they are supposed to be the gatekeepers of what is "significant." But when the same handful of names keep circulating through these prestigious lineups, it starts to feel less like discovery and more like a closed loop. It feels like a private club where the members decide who gets to be "relevant" this year, and the rest of us just react to the ripple effects.
What really bothers me is how this affects the way we talk about movies. We start using this specific vocabulary—words like "visceral," "nuanced," or "subversive"—to describe these festival favorites, almost as if we’re following a script. It’s like we’re being coached on how to appreciate them before we’ve even seen them. I miss the days when a film’s reputation was built on word-of-mouth from regular people actually watching it, rather than being manufactured in a velvet-lined theater in Europe or a cocktail lounge in California.
Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of a festival. I love the idea of seeing something cutting-edge and being part of a global conversation. But I can't shake the feeling that the "prestige" label has become a bit of a crutch. It’s a way to signal value without having to prove it through the actual substance of the work. It’s a way to say, "This is good because we say it is," rather than "This is good because it actually works."
I’m curious to hear what you all think. Do you find that following the festival circuit helps you discover genuine gems, or do you find the hype surrounding these "main competition" lineups to be a distraction from finding real, independent voices? Does a "prestigious" label actually change how you approach a movie, or have you learned to ignore it entirely?