Tacoma Film Festival Kicks Off This Week

The Tacoma Film Festival begins today (Thursday, October 7) and will offer an array of films selected from a greater number of entries than ever before.

The festival received more than 350 submissions this year, up from last year’s approximately 250, said Grand Cinema Director of Community Development Rachel Marecle.

One of the rabblerousers responsible for getting the festival going was Erik Hanberg, who said talk of a festival had been around for years before the Grand Cinema began hosting it in 2006. He used to serve as Tacoma Film Commissioner and said a goal was to get filmmakers to take notice of Tacoma.

Marecle said TFF has grown in submissions each year. She said the focus is to keep the festival local and regional, but as with any festival you want a sampling of national and international films to give it a “good mix.”

Marecle noted that the ratio of local to non-local films has shrunk in the past two years, as national and international submissions have increased dramatically. A solid selection of local submissions will still be screened, including Quiet Shoes, a film-noir comedy that features members of local rock legends Girl Trouble from Tacoma filmmaker Isaac Olsen in conjunction with Kurt Kendall.

Click here for the complete list of 99 films.

What: 2010 Tacoma Film Festival
When: Oct. 7 – 14
Where: Seven locations throughout Tacoma
Cost: Regular Grand Cinema ticket prices apply.