Giannis, this is a great moment for Film Olympiad. The festival has launched a new Interviews section on its official website. What motivated this initiative?
Believe it or not, it has been in our plans since day one! There are so many amazing ideas, but Film Olympiad is an international film festival and at the same time an awards competition, so it is quite challenging to implement all these ideas at once. Thus, we go step by step.
The interviews section has been motivated by one main factor:
"We want the artists' voices heard!"
Film Olympiad has received participations by top industry names. Zoe Saldaña, Kevin Bacon, Coleman Domingo, Bjork, Karla Sofia Gascon... to name a few. Is this who we should expect in the interviews?
Yes, and no. Although we would love to gradually have this absolutely amazing and inspiring artists sharing their thoughts with us, Film Olympiad is all about equal chances. I respect and admire immensely the success of all creators. But this means that I respect and admire the everlasting struggles of creators who fight with blood in order to have their voices and vision heard.
Our goal is to have interviews from everyone, even - and especially - from those who don't have the possibility for visibility.
Why do you consider such a "dialogue" between creators & audience, so important?
Without this dialogue - qualitative, emotional and profound - we are doomed. History works like a spiral, and our generation faces an unprecedented challenge. Everyone is spending huge amounts of time consuming tons of "content". A job is a job, but even the word itself, used by each own creators (aka influencers), shows the real value of this "content".
So yes, in today's era, the worst of many horrible wars is this one. Images and words are not just "socials' content". Images and words are mirrors of our soul. We have to prove that this soul is not empty. I am sure that many of our interviewees, will inspire both their peers and our audience.
Any tips for our future guests/filmmakers?
I don't believe that I have the position to give such "tips". But I would love to encourage to... "Speak the speech, I pray you" like Shakespeare says. Be themselves, we appreciate simplicity and forwardness. What I love about our Film Olympiad "family" is that I have not noticed pretentiousness in our festival's participants and our growing community.
This is the exact reason why we are moving forward with this initiative. I hope it will be embraced and perhaps it will provide to our social media mayhem, some really valuable "content".
"Images and words are not just "socials' content". Images and words are mirrors of our soul. We have to prove that this soul is not empty."
What's the next step? The next initiative?
We are already planning to organize online roundtables with participants of the festival. Those will be published on our new YouTube channel and our official website. Our goal is to promote both the online roundtables and the interviews so that these exceptional voices may reach larger audiences.
I feel confident that our filmmakers will also actively share with their communities these discussions. We are allies in this adventure. Together, we can make an unbeatable team.
