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Desert Heats Up With Stars In Winter at Palm Springs International Film Festival
The Sea Inside and Watermarks Named Audience Favorites

A beautiful starry warm evening greeted filmgoers at the Closing Night event for the Palm Springs International Film Festival. While the rest of the world was braving rain and snow, the Festival was hot with success as they celebrated the Festivals 16th year. This was a record-breaking Festival for Executive Director Darryl MacDonald and dedicated staff and the buzz from attendees for closing night was electric. The Festival closed with the U.S. Premiere of LADIES IN LAVENDER and stars Dame Judy Dench and Maggie Smith, which was attended by director Charles Dance. The audience was very appreciative of this film and at the conclusion Bravos were called out to the Director.

With record rainfall the Opening Weekend, record-breaking attendance, outstanding programming and a sterling presentation for Closing Night, the Festival is truly in the Top Ten Festivals in the United States. Top Winners of films were announced and IN THE BATTLEFIELD Receives New Voices/New Visions Award: EVERYTHING BLUE received the John Schlesinger Award, for a first-time feature director and the coveted Audience awards went to the Golden Globe winner THE SEA INSIDE and the Documentary WATERMARKS. The lovely Closing Night Party event was held around the poolside of the Spa Hotel with a sumptuous delight of shrimp cocktail, prime rib, grilled vegetables and a sinful array of desserts to temp the Festival guests.

The Festival, which took place from January 6-17, 2005, screened 194 films from 65 countries, including 80 premieres and 44 of the 50 foreign entries at this years Academy Awards. This dynamic growing US Festival has become increasingly popular and continues to expand its diverse programming of the most desired after independent and foreign films, setting the stage for the up-coming film festival circuit. While many prepare for the snow of Sundance and the chilly weather of Rotterdam and Berlin festivals Palm Springs make an enticing presentation and has the depth and quality to solidify its presents with the older more renowned festivals.

Board of Directors Chairman Earl Greenburg stated that, “This Festival has exceeded all of our expectations making us the largest ticket generating revenue film festival in the country with a box office of more than $750,000. This overwhelming response is due to the strong quality and
array of films selected for this years program. Thousands of filmgoers braved the inclement weather of the first few days and continued to fill the theaters to capacity during the sunny last week. This event is one of the Coachella Valley’s and Palm Springs proudest moments.”

Festival Director Darryl Macdonald said, “This year's Festival was a spectacular success on all fronts: record attendance, more filmmakers and industry attending than ever before, and an enormously positive response from festival-goers to the films and special programs on offer. In addition, a number
of films, both foreign and domestic, generated strong distributor interest and potential sales deals. We'll have our work cut out for us trying to top this one in coming years.”

The Festival began on Thursday, January 6th with the Opening Night screening of Paramount Pictures Coach Carter, which stars Samuel L. Jackson, which opened number one at the box office over the weekend. Coach Ken Carter, executive producer.

Keiko Beatie