OZARK FOOTHILLS FILMFEST
All weekend, various locations in Batesville. Mostly $3-$5 per screening. See the schedule.

Improbably, as it has for the last nine years, Batesville, a town of 10,000 that’s never exactly screamed “tourist hotspot,” will become a destination for cinephiles across the South this weekend as the Ozark Foothills FilmFest presents easily its most impressive program to date.

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The formula for success and longevity has never been about big names, according to founder Bob Pest, who runs the festival out of his house with his wife Judy.

“As a film festival, we’re not always looking for big glamorous features and stars as much as we’re looking to build the film culture and film economy.”

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This year, in addition to longstanding local partners Lyon College and the University of Arkansas Community College at Batesville (UACCB), which serve as the festival’s venues, he’s got a national partner to help with his mission. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has provided the funding for “Finding Your Audience” (Friday, 1-4 p.m., Room 103, UACCB), an indie film marketing workshop led by filmmaker Heidi Van Lier, the author of “The Indie Film Rule Book” and a past winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Slamdance.

Better yet, Pest has a number of new partners. The National Endowment for the Arts helped him secure a showcase of Cajun music that includes three artists who might not enjoy name recognition within the mainstream, but who, within documentary film and Cajun music circles, respectively, are giants.

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