Heartland Film Festival Summer Rewind – June 26-28, 2014
Heartland Film Festival Summer Rewind showcases some of the best Heartland Film Festival movies of the past in an abbreviated, three-day mini-festival format, giving moviegoers an opportunity to see an enlightening slate of independent films and to meet the filmmakers who crafted them. Today we interview one of the attending filmmakers, Producer Ben Fuqua. His film, This Is Where We Live, was a Festival Award Winner at the 2013 Heartland Film Festival.
Filmmaker Bio
Benjamin Fuqua is a New York City based filmmaker where he has spent the last five plus years working in the film/TV industry in various capacities of production. Ben has worked in production and development at both Tribeca Productions and Scott Rudin Productions, working on projects such as; Little Fockers, It’s Complicated and Fantastic Mr. Fox. He also spent time as an assistant to several above-the-line individuals on a variety of productions including; Philip Seymour Hoffman’s directorial debut, Jack Goes Boating, and Woody Allen’s Blue Jasemine.
Most recently, Ben produced the award-winning feature film, This Is Where We Live, which had its world premiere at the 2013 South By Southwest film festival. Along with screening at SXSW, the film was also selected to screen at numerous other festivals winning awards such as; “Special Jury Award for Outstanding Ensemble Cast” (Nashville Film Festival & Florida Film Festival), “Best Narrative Feature” (Santa Fe Independent Film Festival) and “Emerging Directors Award” (St. Louis Int’l Film Festival), and a top five finalist “Festival Award Winner” (Heartland Film Festival).
Ben is currently in development on several projects under his company, Bluff City Productions, and is a producer on the up-coming Austin, TX based feature film, The Big Spoon, starring; Mallory Culbert, Alex Karpovsky and Agustin Silva.
Heartland Film Interview
Heartland Film: Can you tell us a little about your overall Heartland Film Festival experience and what you’re looking forward to most about returning to Indy?
Ben Fuqua: As a first-time filmmaker, and being new to the festival circuit, I didn’t know much about festivals, but of the 10 festivals we attended, Heartland Film Festivals ranks extremely high. The staff and volunteers were great, the community was fantastic, and the programming of films was top-notch. Honored to have been selected to be apart of the line-up of films. I’m excited to get back and connect with the community surrounding the Heartland Film Festival and fellow filmmakers.
Heartland Film: Give us an update on This Is Where We Live since it was shown at Heartland last October. Any big news?
Ben Fuqua: Since This Is Where We Live was shown at Heartland in October, we’ve had a lot of movement, both on the tail end of our festival run and distribution end. We had three more festivals after Heartland in various parts of the country. We screened in Santa Fe, Napa Valley, and St. Louis where we took awards for “Best Narrative Feature” (Santa Fe Independent Film Fest) and “Emerging Directors Award” (St. Louis Int’l Film Fest). On the distribution end, we did a one-week theatrical run in New York City last November, and recently partnered with a company, IndieVisible, where we’re planning a “road show” in 8 – 10 markets around the country beginning with The Angelika Film Center in Dallas.
Heartland Film: Heartland Film Festival moviegoers love filmmaker Q&As. Let’s say a Summer Rewind attendee wants to earn some brownie points—what is a question that you’d love to answer, but haven’t yet been asked?
Ben Fuqua: I always love hearing peoples questions and thoughts, so Q&As are definitely one of favorite parts of a festival screening. As far as a question that I would love to answer, I mean, we’ve heard a lot so it’s hard, but I always love to hear Marc (writer / director / actor) talk about what’s the inspiration behind the story and how much his friend, Thomas, the person that inspired the August character, means to him.
Meet Ben at Summer Rewind
See This Is Where We Live and meet Ben at the Heartland Film Festival Summer Rewind, June 26-28 in the Fountain Square district of Indianapolis.
