These avant-garde Swedes have done it again. Festival organizers in Karlskrona, southeastern Sweden, have shown ingenuity to keep their annual film festival going, despite COVID-19 restrictions. By moving the movie theater occasion to a local fishing port, festival-goers can now enjoy the program safely from the comfort of their own boats.
The fourth edition of the Carl International Film Festival is recently underway in Karlskrona, Sweden. The occasion has already taken place in the city’s cinemas and screening rooms, but this year’s global pandemic has forced organizers to be creative.
“We were about to cancel the festival, but we changed it,” says festival director Henrik JP ‘Kesson Ruben.
The result is the world’s first water film festival, and it’s not that it takes place here in Karlskrona.
The southernmost archipelago of Sweden is opposite Karlskrona, in the Blekinge region. This incredibly picturesque coastline, made up of some 1,650 islands, islets and rocky ridges, has many small ports and fishing ports that perfectly fit a sunny summer day up and down the water.
As Melinda Martino explains of VisitSweden, Sweden’s national board, Swedes are no strangers to boats or sailing.
“Recreational sailing is very popular in Sweden: a third of Sweden’s adult population travels by boat at least once a season and the density of excitement boat owners is high,” he says, adding that the number of adults matching the number of excitement is thirteen in Sweden, to 25 in the US. , for example, according to Sweboat statistics. Organize the pro-organization representing the Swedish maritime industry.
After discussions with local authorities, law enforcement and the coast guard, the Carl 2020 International Film Festival, however, landed at Salta Fish Harbor, on the small island of Leap (or Salt Island), connected to the mainland via a bridge.
An 870-square-foot LED display was installed for port-wide allocation films, which can accommodate up to a hundred boats. However, the number had to be limited to 25 ships, or 50 people, according to government rules on social estrangement and meetings.
Henrik JP ‘Kesson Ruben’ explains that the safety body of workers and divers has been deployed in the festival domain with the highest degrees of protection and safety.
“This is the world’s first water movie festival, where audiences help keep their distance from each other by staying in their boats and watching movies,” he says, adding that there have been some surprises along the way, adding an unforeseen scale. through a Swedish army send the opening ceremony.
“The shipment remained close to our event,” he continues. “Overall, we were surprised that everything was so good: other people stayed on their boats, food deliveries from local restaurants worked perfectly, and the audience entertained itself, not only with the magic of cinema, but also with live music and interviews. The evenings were really beautiful with the screen reflected in the water: a fishing port is a magical place for a cultural event.
This year’s festival theme is ‘From Hope to Action’, and the poster includes old films by Swedish directors such as Ingmar Bergman, Marie-Louise Ekman, Lasse Hallstrom, Lasse Oberg, Jan Troell and Suzanne Osten, as well as a variety of films from the Baltic Sea region, as a component of the Baltic Sea contest, which aims to publicize the Baltic Sea. The festival program also includes music, interactive seminars and conversations with filmmakers.
The fourth edition of the Carl International Film Festival began on August 21 and will end on August 26, 2020.
Growing up in Sweden and reading in the UK, I moved to Barcelona in 2010 and never looked back. I write about travel, with a specific about everything
Growing up in Sweden and reading in the UK, I moved to Barcelona in 2010 and never looked back. I write about travel, with a specific theme about everything that is sustainable and local, and about pop culture. My ideal day would be to get lost in a new city, meet a little place to eat and try a dish I’ve never eaten before. If served with red wine or gin (or any other type of alcohol in the area, I’m not picky), it’s even better. My paintings are in Condé Nast Traveler, National Geographic Traveller, American Way, Departures International, The Guardian, Buzzfeed, etc. Follow me on Instagram @ikliger.