The Roxbury Film Festival (also known as RFF) is an annual event held in the historic Roxbury

Roxbury, Massachusetts

Roxbury is a dissolved municipality and current neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It was one of the first towns founded in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630, and became a city in 1846 until annexed to Boston on January 5, 1868...

 neighborhood of Boston

Boston

Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

. RFF is co-produced by the non-profits ACT Roxbury and The Color of Film Collaborative. Candelaria Silva, former Director of ACT Roxbury along with Lisa Simmons, president of The Color of Film Collaborative shared a passion for supporting artists, especially artists of color. Their passion led to the first Roxbury Film Festival, then called the Dudley Film Festival, in 1998.

History

The first RFF started with a small grant and focused on the work of Boston area African-American filmmakers. RFF has since expanded its focus to include all filmmakers of color in order to reflect the changing face of Roxbury and greater Boston. Currently, the RFF planning committee receives submissions from filmmakers all over the world. The 8th annual festival held in 2006 was especially notable for the range of award-winning international films screened throughout the five-day festival. Films from Brazil, Cuba, Haiti and France were featured and several international films won recognition and cash prizes in RFF’s competitive awards. Past special guests at the festival include; Billy Dee Williams, Victoria Rowell, Russ Parr, Michael Beach and CCH Pounder.

Current Festival

RFF, now the largest festival in New England

New England

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

 to showcase films that celebrate people of color, features a variety of work, from documentary to animation to feature films. The 12th annual Roxbury Film Festival was held July 29-August 1, 2010. The festival takes place over 4 days, with workshops and film screenings happening at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts, is one of the largest museums in the United States, attracting over one million visitors a year. It contains over 450,000 works of art, making it one of the most comprehensive collections in the Americas...

 Massachusetts College of Art

Massachusetts College of Art

Massachusetts College of Art and Design is a publicly-funded college of visual and applied art, founded in 1873. It is one of the oldest art schools, the only publicly-funded free-standing art school in the United States, and was the first art college in the United States to grant an artistic degree...

, Wentworth Institute of Technology

Wentworth Institute of Technology

The Wentworth Institute of Technology is an independent, co-educational, technical design and engineering college located in Boston, Massachusetts...

, Roxbury Center for the Arts at Hibernian Hall, The Haley House and other locations throughout Boston.

Producers

The Roxbury Film Festival is co-produced by Madison Park Development and The Color of Film Collaborative.

The Color of Film Collaborative (TCOF) provides support to theater, multi-media professionals, filmmakers of color, and Greater Boston-area individuals that are striving to create diverse images of people of color within their disciplines. Through support, exhibition, and funding, TCOF aims to provide an environment for filmmakers, actors, performing artists, and others with an interest in media to share and develop their ideas, visions, and works with their peers. Click to visit coloroffilm.com.