Each year, film festivals and award shows across the nation honor the past year’s best films. In Champaign, a certain celebration of film separates itself from all others: Ebertfest.
Festival passes for the five-day film festival go on sale Friday at 10 a.m. at The Virginia Theatre in Champaign. There will be 1,000 five-day passes available, valid between April 23-27, 2014. Tickets can be purchased through the Virginia Theater website or at The Virginia Theatre box office. The festival pass price remains at $145, with additional fees for online purchases. If passes sell out, participants can sign up for the wait list.
Ebertfest 2014 will be the first festival planned without its creator, Roger Ebert, who died in April from thyroid and salivary gland cancer. This year’s festival coordinators hope to maintain the atmosphere and message that Ebert and festival director, Nate Kohn, strived for when they created Ebertfest 15 years ago. Ebert’s wife, Chaz Ebert, will host the festival this year, a position her late husband held in previous years.
“We feel every festival will celebrate Roger and be a tribute to Roger,” said Mary Susan Britt, associate director for Ebertfest and director of advancement for the College of Media. “I look back at Roger’s welcome in the 1999 festival, and it is just so interesting that everything has stayed the same. Roger’s mission and vision have never changed. We will continue to stay true to Roger’s vision — to draw attention to worthy films and filmmakers around the world.”
As it has been for the past 15 years, the festival will take place at the Virginia Theatre in Champaign. The theater holds specific importance to the festival, Britt said. The theater is where Ebert viewed films as a child in his hometown of Urbana.
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Michael Kozuchowski, president of the Illini Film and Video and senior in LAS, said he has participated in Ebertfest the past two years and plans to volunteer this spring as well.
He said the festival is like a “big movie marathon slumber party” and that he is looking forward to this year’s festival.
“There is also an intimate relationship with the directors because often times directors will stay for the day after their screening, and will sit in the audience,” he said. “You get a very up close and personal relationship with those people involved in making the films.”
Declan can be reached at [email protected].
