AFI Fest Grows Up - Finally!

The almost overnight turnaround at AFI has largely been the achievement of one woman, Rose Kuo, now entering her second year as the festival’s artistic director. It’s Kuo who has been visible on the international festival circuit in a way that her recent predecessors (who behaved rather like strange subterranean creatures afraid of their own shadows) never were. And it’s Kuo, more than any single other force within the AFI organization, who has been willing to gamble on the intelligence and eclectic tastes of Los Angeles moviegoers, which this year extends to the festival’s themed sidebars on new films from Argentina and Kazakhstan, as well as the decision to partner with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art on a nearly complete retrospective of French filmmaker Arnaud Desplechin — all of which would have been unthinkable under the former AFI Fest regime.

Nor have Kuo’s efforts gone unnoticed where it really counts: Attendance is stronger than ever, as is the festival’s overseas reputation. (One source close to AFI Fest confides to me that certain international sales companies that, only a few years ago, wouldn’t answer the festival’s requests for films are now the ones picking up the phone and placing the calls.) Indeed, the only trick that seems beyond Kuo’s considerable talents is programming any festival attraction for the evening of Tuesday, November 4 that can rival the electrifying picture show sure to be taking shape on America’s television screens. But there’s no doubt (or Doubt) about it: After a decade in the doldrums — and several years in the shadow of the summer’s similarly rejuvenated Los Angeles Film Festival — AFI Fest is, at last, the other world-class film festival our city deserves.