At Media That Matters, the extraordinary gathering of media activists and documentary filmmakers in Hollyhock on the remote British Columbia isle of Cortes Island last month, I spent some time with Anita Adams, founder and executive director of the First Weekend Club and one of the coolest people I’ve met this year.
Watch, download or embed the video on Vimeo
The Vancouver-based nonprofit (no relation to US-based First Weekend Club) is a “cross-Canada movie club dedicated to promoting and raising awareness for great Canadian films. Through grassroots efforts such as Q&A’s with talent, contests, premiere parties, advance screenings, film alerts, and much more, First Weekend Club builds audiences for Canada cinema and creates a “buzz” for the crucial First Weekend of a film’s release,” as the site explains.
It’s one of several organizations I got to discover during the four-day business retreat that combined networking, ad hoc sessions and personal discovery.
In this short video interview, Anita talks about her passion for great filmmaking and some of the important storytelling taking place under the radar. She also discusses her experience at Media That Matters. (Check out my Flickr photo gallery.)
A production note: This was the first video I’ve ever shot on a digital SLR camera — a Canon 5D. My prime lens broke during the conference so I was forced to use a 70-200mm lens, which make focusing difficult. The white balance was also tricky. I’ll need to try this several more times before I get it right.
JD Lasica, founder of Inside Social Media, is also a fiction author and the co-founder of the cruise discovery engine Cruiseable. See his About page, contact JD or follow him on Twitter.
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