CARBONDALE, Ill. (KFVS) - The Big Muddy Film Festival will return to Southern Illinois University Carbondale and features 72 films.
In its 48th year, the film festival runs Thursday through Saturday, March 19-21 at The Varsity.
According to SIUC, the free, public event is one of the nation’s oldest film festivals affiliated with a university.
They say it did not run one year due to the lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to the university, this year’s celebration features 72 films: 19 experimental, 15 documentaries, 14 narratives, 13 Saluki Shorts, 10 animation and one feature film.
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They say the entries include films from local to international. The Saluki Shorts are student films.
You can click here for the film schedule and more events, including workshops and panel discussions.
An Illinois filmmaker Q&A panel discussion will start at 7:45 p.m. on March 19.
Following the panel discussion, “American Dendrite,” a 2025 documentary by Adam Marshall Present, will screen at 8:30 p.m. as part of the festival’s “Home Sweet Home” program.
According to SIUC, the festival will feature workshops from three jurors: post-producer Andrea Balek and screenwriter Carl Ellsworth, along with animation filmmaker and poet Jonni Peppers-GoLions.
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The award ceremony will be streamed live from The Varsity on the festival’s Instagram and YouTube pages at 8:30 p.m. on March 21.
Awards will be presented in the best narrative, documentary, animation and experimental categories, in addition to:
- Mike Covell Award - given to an alumni filmmaker in honor of festival founder and retired faculty member
- John Michaels Social Justice Award - given in honor of a cinema student in the 1980s who earned his master of fine arts degree at SIUC and who was involved in community organizing and activism before he died of brain cancer
- Cade Bursell River Award in honor of Bursell, a retired SIU cinema professor
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