Over 50 film directors are in Hot Springs for the 20th annual film festival bringing an economical boost to the city.
The city of Hot Springs is bursting with tourists. The festival is celebrating a landmark anniversary, films have been shown for 20 years at Malco Theatre. Now the theatre isn't the only one drawing in extra money from movie goers, many other local businesses have seen profits as well.
Dan Anderson says, "It's a celebration of non narrative documentaries we have film makers in from all over the world and we have attendees from all over the country."
Dan Anderson is the festival director and pleased with this year's event. Thousands of people from all around the world are buying tickets for this 10 day documentary movie event.
Almost 30,000 tickets were sold last year and this year proves to be successful with over 40,000 tickets already sold. With the festival bringing in this amount of visitors Hot Springs economy is boosting
Kevin Rogers says, "The crowd has definitely doubled this week if not tripled on week nights."
Rogers owns Maxine's, a local bar, and says this is one of the last weeks they are busy before fall sets in.
Another restaurant just a couple of blocks down from the theatre is Brick House Grill-
Catherine Crigger works at the grill and says business has picked up. Catherine Crigger says, "Especially during the week days, when films dismiss around 12:30 or 1 we seem to have a lot of business after the film with a vast variety of people from all over the United States."
Film festival attendees are also filling up hotels. When tourists are not eating out, some are checking out local attractions like the Blue Moon Art Gallery. Dishongh Scavo says they have been in business for 14 years and local events help grow their business. Scavo says, "We've had a big increase in foot traffic, specifically film goers from around the country."
The festival plans to show 110 documentaries over the course of the event. Director Anderson says the festival budget is about a third of what it usually is, allowing $10,000 to $15,000 to put on the festival. He says the work of volunteers help make this event a smooth one. He adds, "There's a certain charm to Hot Springs, a certain charm to the people volunteering that you're just not going to find anywhere else."
The director also says the film festival will bring in around $30,000 and they have over 100 volunteers donate their time each day of the event.