Fantastic Fest Early Submission Deadline: March 4

Date: Sunday, March 1, 2009

Subject: Early Deadline for Fantastic Fest submission: March 4

Fantastic Fest, the largest genre film festival in the United States has announced it’s 2009 deadlines for film submissions. Fantastic Fest programs approximately 75 features and 50 short films, many of which are accepted out of the submission process. Last year, Fantastic Fest was named by Moviemaker Magazine as one of the 25 festivals worth the entry fee, and was also named by Variety president Charlie Koones as “one of the 10 festivals we love” alongside Cannes, Toronto and Telluride.

Important dates for Fantastic Fest 2009
Discount Earlybird Deadline: March 4, 2009
Regular Deadline: May 6, 2009
Late Deadline: June 3, 2009
Without A Box Extended Deadline: July 17, 2009
Schedule Announced: September 3, 2009
Festival Begins: September 24, 2009

The “discount earlybird” deadline for submitting a feature or short film to this year’s Fantastic Fest is coming up fast, this Wednesday, March 4. To submit your film or for additional information about Fantastic Fest, please visit the official website, www.fantasticfest.com.

"Fantastic Fest has made my whole career. Everything related to the future of Timecrimes and mine as an American director comes through your festival. I know that some directors have a particular festival attached to their whole biography. Now I know mine." - Nacho Vigalondo, director, TIMECRIMES (worldwide rights to TIMECRIMES were purchased by Magnolia Releasing following the world premiere of the film at Fantastic Fest 2007)

"The folks at Austin's Fantastic Fest set the tone when they describe it as a place for "all around badass cinema." With kudos from Charlie Koones, former publisher of Variety, who calls it "one of the 10 Film Festivals We Love," moviemakers are definitely getting into that tender sprit, too, especially when it comes to the amount of publicity their Fantastic Fest screenings are generating. "For the size of our event, we have an incredibly high number of journalists from key publications: Variety, Twitchfilm, The Hollywood Reporter, Cinematical, Ain't It Cool News, Fangoria, Rue Morgue, indieWIRE and Film Threat just to name a few. We guarantee that your film will get a review and possibly as many as eight to ten," promises festival director Tim League. If you're hoping those good reviews will turn into a great distribution deal, this genre-focused fest has got you covered on that front, too. "We have a high volume of acquisition representatives and buyers from major and indie studios at the fest and have a media room equipped with screeners of all films for those agents who can only be on hand for part of the fest." - MOVIEMAKER MAGAZINE