Hoboken Film Festival coming to Greenwood Lake

BY ERIKA NORTON
GREENWOOD LAKE — The Hoboken International Film Festival will bring its annual week-long event to the waterfront backdrop of Greenwood Lake next May, after four years of holding the event in Middletown.
Screenings and festival events will be held at the scenic lakeside beach at Thomas P. Morahan Waterfront Park from May 19-25, 2017.
“Greenwood Lake is the most picturesque, beautiful setting, that you could hold an event like this, and it's not the usual venue for a film festival,” Festival Founder and Chairman Kenneth Del Vecchio said. “I picture for my film festival-goers who come from all across the world, that if the filmmakers are shown that their film is going to be shown right on this beautiful lake right on the beach, it's so appealing, and that same appeal goes for the festival-goers and the fans. To be able to come to this type of location, to be able to be watching a movie and swimming at the beach at the same time, go boating, jet skiing, it's just really exciting. It's really different and in a word, it's cool.”
Greenwood Lake Mayor Jesse Dwyer said he thought that not only will the tourism to the village for the festival be beneficial, especially during the slower month of May, but the media attention from a festival of this caliber coming to the community will be favorable.
Since the location is waterfront, festival-goers will also have access to different lakefront restaurants, hotels and bed and breakfasts, which Dwyer said will appeal significantly to a broader region and encourage greater growth in tourism.

Decision to move

For the past four years, the festival had been held at the Historic Paramount Theater, built in Middletown in 1930. According to Del Vecchio, the reason the film festival is no longer at this venue anymore is because, “I didn’t want to continue being there.”
“I had a good four years there,” Del Vecchio said. “I am very fond of my time there. I love the people in Middletown. I actually love the Paramount Theater, which I personally resurrected from death. Before I came there, the theater had not shown movies seven days a week for over 20 years. It hadn’t had comedy acts or famous music acts in 20 years. And I brought all that back in.”
Del Vecchio said that ultimately, he gave the city, who owns the theater, a minimum figure and the city wanted to negotiate lower, so while he has very fond memories and is very proud of what he did there, he decided to move on.
“I wish Middletown the best,” he said, “without a doubt.”
On the other hand, City of Middletown Mayor Joseph DeStefano said one of the major reasons the city did not renew their contract with the festival is due to lower attendance than anticipated.
According to DeStefano, the first year attendance was 6,000-8,000, with a significant decrease each subsequent year, leveling out at less than 2,400 people in attendance at the last two festivals. In comparison, DeStefano said the city’s free weekly summer concerts draw 300 people and the Charlie Daniels Band, which recently played at the Paramount Theater, drew 800 people.
“The sponsorship plus additional costs, tech crews, loss of theater revenue for two weeks, police and DPW over time did not in any way justify a week long attendance of 2,200,” DeStefano said.
Del Vecchio called this claim of decreasing attendance a “complete fabrication and nonsense,” and that attendance was around 15,000 people in each of the past several years, which he said is backed up by numerous media reports of those that were at the festival.

Looking ahead

Greenwood Lake has signed a three-year contract with the film festival, according to Dwyer and at this time, they don’t know how much the village will end up having to contribute. The fee is $40,000 for the first year, but that fee can be offset by sponsorships, which according to Dwyer, he has already been able to raise more than $25,000 to go toward those sponsorship fees.
The festival will be in partnership with Greenwood Lake’s local businesses and chamber of commerce, as well as residents, who according to Dwyer are enthusiastically supporting the film festival’s presence in the village. Del Vecchio said he intends to get as many local businesses involved with the film festival as possible, and is currently shooting his latest movie in Greenwood Lake as well.
“Warwick/Greenwood Lake,” Del Vecchio said, “is definitively the artistic capital of Orange County.”
For more information, go to http://www.hobokeninternationalfilmfestival.com