Dan Kearns, founder and CEO of Friendly Neighbourhood Cinema, visited Encounters Film Festival, in Bristol with the support of our bursaries, which are available to Film Hub Members to help them learn from and be a part of the wider community of film programmers.
In a new blog post, Dan reflects on their experience of the festival.
" Festivals right now are an even more important lifeblood of cinema - the industry relies on this kind of curation and celebration of film to get art in front of the audiences it deserves.
Thank you, Filmhub Midlands, for allowing me to experience Encounters' 30th year! A very inspirational visit that will positively inform my work with Friendly Neighbourhood Cinema going forward "
Blog Written by Daniel Kearns
With thanks to Film Hub Midlands, I was able to attend 2025's Encounters Film Festival. A short film animation and VR festival that screens a variety of work from emerging and high-profile filmmakers from around the world. Held annually in Bristol, a city that embraces the arts in a way that is certainly special.
One of the biggest events on the programme this year was a 20th Anniversary screening of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind with filmmakers Michael Gondry and Charlie Kaufman in attendance for a Q&A. Both filmmakers also had new work premiering elsewhere in the festival. It was wonderful to watch the film cast its spell across the sold-out crowd of the Bristol Beacon Theatre. It is still one of the most unique, heartbreaking framings for a love story told beautifully through Gondry's surrealist visual poetry. Further validation that a film lives far beyond its opening box office, and is in fact only born then.
Encounters is a qualifying festival for major awards like BAFTA; the competition breeds a quality programme, with many filmmakers choosing to premiere their work to UK audiences. Bristol is an animation city with Aardman a proud presence, and so the Animated Encounters showcases had some particularly stellar work. A standout being Laura Tofaridies' UK premiere of her stop-motion short Brain Space (or Gofod Ymennydd to use its Welsh titleing). The film is a five-year-long passion project telling a very vulnerable story and demonstrating tactile stop motion artistry at its finest. Late Lounge programmes mature and experimental shorts playing to a dizzy late-night crowd as one of the last shows. Having myself screened for music festivals before, late-night programming (especially for an intoxicated crowd) is a great, fun space to show weirder work.
We also attended Filmmaker Masterclasses from Wes Anderson's storyboard artist Jay Clarke, and Havana Marking, a seasoned documentarian and activist behind work such as Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer and the current Channel 4 documentary Undercover: Exposing the Far Right. A great variety of speakers talking on both the industry and the artistry of filmmaking.
Our final viewing of the festival was the brilliant and charming Lesbian Space Princess. An Australian animated sci-fi comedy adventure from directors Emma Hough Hobbs and Leela Varghese. A space princess is thrust out of her sheltered life and into a galactic quest to save her bounty hunter ex-girlfriend from the Straight White Maliens (hilariously voiced by Melbourne comedy trio, Aunty Donna). Comedy with a large audience is a rare treat and something that should be mourned more in the decline of cinema attendance, and it's a shame that a film like this will see the majority of its viewership from solo streaming over its lifetime.
Festivals right now are an even more important lifeblood of cinema - the industry relies on this kind of curation and celebration of film to get art in front of the audiences it deserves. Thank you, Film Hub Midlands, for allowing me to experience Encounters' 30th year! A very inspirational visit that will positively inform my work with Friendly Neighbourhood Cinema going forward.
Inspired to attend a film festival? You can find all you need to know about applying for a bursary to attend vital events for industry progression here.