In March, the Little Rock Film Festival (LRFF) completed its second year of downtown screenings, a move hallmarked by the early 2014 completion of CALS' (Central Arkansas Library System) Ron Robinson Theater. In recent years, the festival had showcased a host of buzz-worthy films such as Academy Award contenders Beasts of the Southern Wild and Winter's Bone, as well being featured in Paste and MovieMaker Magazine.
But in October 2015, festival founders Brent and Craig Renaud announced that 2016's 10th-anniversary festival wasn't happening.
In May, the Internal Revenue Service had revoked the festival's 501(c) (3) nonprofit status due to three years of missed Form 990 filings. The Renauds said the IRS sent paperwork to the wrong address. They were unaware of the revocation, they said, and it played no role in their decision to end the festival.
But what did play a role, the Arkansas film community wanted to know? To many, the announcement seemed unexpected and abrupt.
"The festival just seemed to get bigger and better every year. That's why the ending shocked and surprised all of us," said Tony Taylor, former production manager for the festival and founder of the Film Society of Little Rock.
A few days before the announcement, CALS booted the festival from its rent-free office in the Arcade building, which also houses the Ron Robinson Theater. Internal communications revealed that the relationship between the library and festival had been strained since at least July.
Craig and Brent Renaud, who often travel overseas on assignments for HBO and Vice, among other outlets, wrote in an October statement to the Democrat-Gazette that, "From the moment the LRFF moved into the Arcade building, it was clear that Bobby [Roberts'] staff resented that arrangement, for reasons never communicated to us directly."
Library Director Roberts describes an uneven partnership.
"What we wanted them to do was to help us bring in film ... and they just really didn't have time to do it .... It wasn't a money issue as much as it was scheduling the theater and our need to have some help from them in exchange for letting them use our space," Roberts says.
The Renauds were unavailable for comment, but in 2015 they said their professional commitments made it impossible to keep the festival going without a full-time executive director, and the organization didn't have the money to hire one.
But Arkansas Film Commissioner Chris Crane thinks the film festival could return in 2017 without its founders.
"I've been in constant contact with the Renauds, and their involvement now is going to be to pass the torch to an entity that they're comfortable with," Crane says. "We are trying to make sure we have the proper funding and a strategic plan in place to have it succeed. I'm guardedly optimistic that the whole thing will come back. For me to give you a hard yes or no [on the festival's return], we're probably a couple of weeks off, but I don't think we're much further than that."
In the past the festival cobbled together a budget based on state, municipal and private support. Crane says all these sources remain important, but for permanent infrastructure, "There has to be more private support."
A source close to Crane said it would cost at least $100,000 annually to keep the festival going.
Private funding has not been announced, but according to Jimmy Moses, Moses Tucker Real Estate has been a festival contributor every year and the company will continue this support "as long as there is a festival."
"I think a model of tying the festival to some public entity for permanent staffing, office space and a small sum of operating dollars all matched by private gifts is a good one," he says.
Most of the players -- municipal officials, theater programmers, CALS representatives and former festival staff -- say thus far there is nothing to report. But Crane says the Film Society's Fantastic Film Festival and the Czech embassy's Czech Film Festival are scheduled to play at Riverdale 10 Cinema this year.
Prior to moving downtown, the festival was held at Riverdale 10, which, according to former staff, donated the space. In 2014 Riverdale 10 was bought by Matt Smith, who transferred his independent screenings from Market Street Cinema to Riverdale.
Smith isn't sure if he will donate the venue to the festival, but, "If they figure out who's going to run the thing, I'll probably come up with a plan for them," he says.
Crane says a rent-free space will be important until the festival is "back in the black, so to say, and then we're able to spread that growth to participating spaces and everybody's happy. Everybody's making money, and we have a high-art festival."
Crane is not discounting the Ron Robinson as a venue, either. "I think there's room for that bridge to be patched, and there have been conversations to that effect. I think there were things that happened that all parties involved weren't particularly happy with, but it's a new day."
Roberts says he hasn't spoken with anyone about the festival in months, but that the library would be open to an arrangement similar to the previous one, where use of the theater was donated during the 9-5 workday and the film festival was billed for overhead incurred after hours.
"We don't want to make it a financial burden on us, nor do we want it to be a financial burden on them," he says.
MovieStyle on 01/29/2016