I won an award so thus that means this festival must be great! Wrong! Something about this seemed off after I was contacted by Edna Frenchwood, the event director. They initally contacted me to tell me that my film had won an award and that they wished to do a live interview with me. They were initally cagey about when my film would be shown for some reason. Also I asked if I would get complimentary/reduced priced tickets to the event since it is my film, something I never got a response to. Furthermore, Despite me asking them several times for a time and link to the upcoming interview, they never did and instead gave me a link to the festival website which didn't have the information I desired. The interview was eventually delayed much to my dismay but I moved on. Some time after the event had passed, I was asked to attend a meet and greet for all the award winners. I found it a bit odd that it was happening after the event's dates but I still went. Much to my surprise, this meet and greet was in reality a ploy to get me to subscribe/become a member to their exclusive filmmaking programs. Edna was trying to sell the award winners her overpriced filmmaking program, claiming that it has had a bunch of success. I'll put it to you straight, I have never been a part of any film festival, online or in-person, where the festival director was so desperately trying to sell their own filmmaking program that would supposedly help other filmmakers. I understand wanting to keep in contact with the filmmakers and helping them along the way if you're able to. But what Edna is doing is gatekeeping, only helping those who pay for her overpriced program, which upon further research into it isn't even all the successful in the first place. And before I forgot, after all this, Edna still had the audacity to contact me about doing an interview. I told her to give me a time and link so that the interview can be done. And after supposedly not responding on time, even though I responded nearly 2 days before the interview was supposed to be, I was blamed for it not happening. To be honest, I didn't care about the interview at that point, but I didn't appreciate being blamed for it not happening when it was Edna's lack of communication that was at fault for this interview, as well as the previous interview, for not happening. I know Edna or someone else from the festival will respond with their claims of how they may have helped me out or I misuderstood something or whatever. Frankly my dear, I don't give a d***. Thank you for the award and have fun scamming people!
