A long-time celebration of movies is back in town this weekend.
The East Lansing Film Festival launches its 29th season tonight with the film “Ernie & Emma” from actor and filmmaker Bruce Campbell.
Founder Susan Woods has decided that the festival will end after this year.
For Inside The Arts this week, WKAR’s Scott Pohl talks with Woods about the creation of the festival, and why this will be the last one.
TRANSCRIPT
Sophia Saliby: With Inside the Arts, I'm Sophia Saliby. A long-time celebration of movies is back in mid-Michigan this weekend.
The East Lansing Film Festival launches its 29th season tonight with the film “Ernie & Emma” from actor and filmmaker Bruce Campbell.
Founder Susan Woods has decided that the festival will end after this year.
For Inside The Arts this week, WKAR’s Scott Pohl talked with Woods about the creation of the festival, and why this will be the last one.
Scott Pohl: Susan Woods, welcome back.
Susan Woods: Thank you. Scott, it's good to see you.
Pohl: And you! The last East Lansing Film Festival, I thought I'd start by asking you about founding it back in the late '90s. What was your intention? Do you feel like whatever goals you had back then were met over these years?
Woods: Well, the first thing was that I felt that a college town really needed a film festival, and I had six years of experience with the San Francisco Film Festival and the Women in Film Film Festival. So, I thought, hey, let's do it. Well, little did I know that the city of East Lansing also wanted to do a film festival. We met and they gave us a Kickstarter grant, and the rest is history.
Scott Pohl: So, over the years, you've brought a lot of really interesting, independent films to East Lansing that people would not have otherwise gotten a chance to see.
Susan Woods: Exactly. That was the goal. The mission of it was to enhance our community through the art of cinema. And it is a valid, valid art form that most people say, "Oh, really? That's art?" But yes, it is art.
You know, I really focused on documentaries, which aren’t ever showed anymore, which is such a shame, in commercial theaters, but also foreign films, you know, make people read, and short films, which are just so creative and so wonderful.
And there is a whole sort of machinery to show short films from all these fledgling filmmakers. And that also is part of my mission was to allow these filmmakers to have a platform.
Scott Pohl: You also brought in some interesting personalities and filmmakers over the years.
Woods: I sure did. I mean, we had Michael Moore, Bruce Campbell, Gigi Gaston and Adrian Grenier, and a lot of other filmmakers; Michael Miner, who wrote “RoboCop." I mean, it was just a full array of people.
Pohl: So, why end it?
Woods: (laughs) Isn't that a question? Really, basically, is because everything has changed. I've outlived the whole place. For ten years we were at Studio C, professional projection, audio, wonderful ticket taking, everything was all in place, and they closed. And so now, we're back, it’s going to be at the Hannah Community Center, which has a gorgeous theater, and it'll be fine, but it's not, you know, it's not a commercial movie theater.
Fundraising is just the most agonizing thing to do, and I just don't want to do it anymore. I feel like I'm begging, and I don't like to beg.
Pohl: If we're going to talk about one of the films this year, is there one you'd like me to highlight?
Susan Woods: Yes.
Scott Pohl: Which one?
Susan Woods: “Wild Inside."
(Soundbite from "Wild Inside")
Male speaker: It became clear that this was potentially a Eurasian eagle owl, which there are no Eurasian eagle owls in North America. You have to understand, an escaped zoo animal is, it's like a plot from a movie.
Woods: I mean, I fought hard to get this film, and it's a documentary. Flaco, the Eurasian eagle owl that escaped from Central Park Zoo and charmed and fascinated the entire world, but especially New York City.
Pohl: And this is Friday night?
Woods: Friday at 6 o’clock.
Pohl: Always good to see you. Thanks. Susan Woods is the founder of the East Lansing Film Festival, launching its 29th and final session this week. Thank you again Susan.
Woods: Thank you, Scott.
UPCOMING ARTS EVENTS
“Humanity (1984/2026)," a short experimental documentary film about camera data collection and AI is showing Thursday, October 22 at the MSU Museum. The program starts at 6 p.m.
The MSU Wind Symphony plays Thursday with guest conductor Alfred Watkins. The program includes Bernstein’s “Candide Suite" at 7:30 in the Cobb Great Hall of the Wharton Center.
On Saturday, October 24, the Potter Center in Jackson hosts the legendary rock band Grand Funk Railroad. The show will start at 7 p.m.
