Introducing the Gig City Film Festival

Authored By Maggie Behringer For its first film festival, Chattanooga will play host to a Golden Globe nominee. And a Sundance Film Festival-featured selection. And an American Film Institute Fest winner for Best International Feature Film. Next weekend, the Heritage House Arts and Civic Center will serve as the main tent for Gig City Film Festival, a one-day, five-film event that finally puts the Scenic City on the film festival map. The venue’s door will open at 8 a.m., with the first film beginning at 9 a.m. on Saturday morning and the last film ending at approximately 10 p.m. “Chattanooga has every other arts festival under the sun, but we don’t have a film festival,” said Kris Jones, art department and locations assistant at the Heritage House. “Every major city in the U.S. that has any kind of arts community has a film festival. We are hoping this will be our breakthrough moment.” “> Film No. 1

North to south

Though Jones and his colleague Chris Holley, director of the Heritage House, had long kicked around the dream of a film festival in Chattanooga, it wasn’t until a conference call last October that the idea moved past the concept phase.

Representatives from the Nashville Film Festival approached the two, along with members of the Department of Education, Arts and Culture, hoping to explore the possibility of a two-city collaboration.

NFF had recently received a grant from the Tennessee Film, Entertainment and Music Commission to expand its footprint across the state. For Chattanooga, this translated into an effort to leverage the older festival’s considerable expertise and organization to launch its own event.

“The commission and the NFF are interested in elevating the role of the film industry throughout the state for economic and social purposes,” said Ted Crockett, executive director of the NFF. “Chattanooga is the first city of our new program, Tennessee Film Tour. We plan to expand to Johnson City, Murfreesboro, Goodlettsville and others during the next year.”

The only catch was the time frame: The Gig City Film Festival would have to take place before the Music City’s event in April.

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Film No. 2