Bentonville Film Festival

BFF champions women and diverse voices! In 2021, we had over 150K+ viewers watching films and panels on our watch.bentonvillefilm.org virtual platform and over 10,000 attendees at safe in-person screenings of competition and spotlight films, outdoor family films, and BFF community events around Bentonville and the Northwest Arkansas region. In addition, we had the most diverse and inclusive film program to date! In the BFF 2021 juried competition program, 73% of films were directed by women, 75% by people that are BIPOC or API, and 35% by people of the LGBTQIA+ community. 87% feature a female lead, 81% a BIPOC or API lead, and 30% an LGBTQIA+ lead. Overall, 98% of these films had a cast and crew that was made up of more than half of people from these same communities. We want to continue this important work, so filmmakers, if you have a project that fits our mission to champion inclusion on and off screen and accurately reflect the gender balance and diversity of our world, please submit your shorts, episodics, and feature films to the 2022 Bentonville Film Festival, produced by the BFFoundation (501c3). Entering its 8th year, the Bentonville Film Festival is an annual event chaired by Academy Award® winner Geena Davis in partnership with founding sponsor Walmart and presenting sponsor Coca-Cola. The 2022 festival, much like 2021’s, will take place as a hybrid version of virtual showings and on-the-ground events due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We will celebrate this year’s featured films and panels globally from our homes, as well as with local in-person screenings and events for those in the Northwest Arkansas region. This year our in-person festival dates will be June 22 to June 26, with virtual streaming beginning the same day until July 3, 2022. Every year, BFF convenes entertainment and media leaders, and corporate brands along with a vast array of intersectional content creators and storytellers to demonstrate the power and success of diverse voices in filmmaking. We hope to accurately represent the world we live in by cultivating an ecosystem in support of film that authentically reflects the intersectionality of our society. Our primary objective is to influence mainstream media to immediately increase diversity of content because if they can see it, they can be it. By supporting the achievements of diverse storytellers, and connecting them with industry leaders and major corporate change-makers, it can create a seismic change in accelerating the production and distribution of inclusive film and media. THE BFFOUNDATION BFFoundation is a non-profit organization focused on promoting underrepresented voices of diverse storytellers. We want to amplify female, LGBTQIA+, BIPOC, API, and people with disabilities in entertainment and media. We do this through research, education, and supporting the production and distribution of inclusive content. The foundation believes that by taking real action with content creators, talent, influencers, advertisers, and content distributors, we can reflect the gender balance and diversity of our country in front of and behind the camera. Our primary research partner is the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media. Together, we seek to support research that proves these systemic changes are not only the right thing to do—they are also commercially beneficial. The Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media has also clearly shown that the media children consume has an overwhelming influence in shaping their view of the world and their place in it. The foundation also partners with schools and community institutions, working with children to educate on the challenging effects of stereotyping, unconscious bias, and gender imbalance. We also utilize media-based tools and content to build positive association and equality-based learning models. Working in partnership with the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, the foundation seeks to use research to reinforce initiatives which are successfully driving improvement in the way gender and intersectionality are represented in the media and entertainment. BFF Foundation engages schools, community institutions, corporations, non-profit partners, content creators and media and entertainment industry leaders to actively support and create content that showcases positive gender and intersectional on screen portrayals. The Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media has proven that the media and entertainment our children consume has a dramatic influence in shaping their view of the world and their place in it: If They Can See It, They Can Be It. BFFoundation is focused on working with its partners to foster inclusivity in media and entertainment to produce a positive influence in the community at large.