Buddhist Film Festival in 2009

Hi Guys,

Some updates on one of the stuff I've been involved in these few months.

A group of us have organised a Youth Conference this year to try and get together the various Buddhist youth groups to discuss on how to move ahead. The conference was pretty good, and we're moving on to our next project. See the conference details here: http://www.dharmainaction.net/

Our next project is to organise a Buddhist Film Festival in Singapore for 2009. Some of you may know of the previous International Buddhist Film Festival that was held in 2007. That particular event was quite a success and all 5000 seats were sold out very quickly.

What? Films that showcase Buddhist values and culture that have been released recently. The slant would be towards Asia and other traditions of Buddhism, and slightly away from Western-made films and less about Tibet, cf. with the 2007 one.

When? Targetted either the long weekend in Sep 2009 or Nov 2009.

Who? Target audience is whoever interested in this genre of films: artsy people, film buffs, practising buddhists, nominal buddhists, non-buddhists but interested in buddhism, tourists and foreigners, general public looking for some uplifting recreation for that weekend.

Why? We are a network of engaged Buddhists from various professions (not me, I'm the only student here) and various Buddhist groups who will do projects for the community that other groups dare not do or have stopped doing. In the future we plan to branch out into other services for the community and so we need some working funds, e.g. for our next conference in 2010. In short, the net profit from the ticketing and sponsors will go into Dharma work to benefit the community. A new way of fund raising compared to organising 法会s and fun fairs.

How? There are four work groups currently in this project, comprising of over 20 people.

Fund-raising: to solicit sponsors and funding. Headed by a former manager of fund raising from Man Fut Tong nursing home, other members include a member of the Rotary club, a manager from the NVPC and a team leader for Buddhist overseas expedition project group Firefly Mission.

Marketing: to work out a publicity campaign and create adverts for this event. Headed by a volunteer from the performing arts scene, joined by a creative designer, a lady from the National Library Board, and yours truly.

Film Selection: explains it all. Headed by Shen Shi'an, founder and editor of The Daily Enlightenment e-newsletter, who often writes Buddhist film reviews, contributor for BuddhistChannel.tv and reflection blog MoonPointer. Joined by a volunteer from the National Youth Council and some other self-proclaimed Buddhist film buffs.

Ticketing and Merchandise: somewhat laggard group being formed right now.

We have engaged a consultant from the Singapore Film Festival. Our target is to sell 10,000 tickets for 14 films over a weekend of 3-4 days. Films selected will be the uplifting, inspirational, warm-and-fuzzy, light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel kind, and not the Cheh-Cham depressing dire straits kind, so that everyone can feel a bit of hope in these dreary times of economic slowdown.

We are actually still fully open to volunteers joining our committees, especially in publicity and marketing. In particular we need a secretary to help with the overall meetings and co-ordination. If anyone is interested, please let me or Puay Kim know!

In the meanwhile, I'd be away from 12-20 December for a Zen meditation retreat in Johor. See ya at the next gathering!