The Ventura Film Festival maintains its position as "the largest film festival ever held in Ventura County." This exceptional status highlights the festival's commitment to bringing diverse cinema to the local community while maintaining its focus on significant environmental challenges.
The Ventura Film Festival is established as an all-inclusive international cinema festival that raises awareness for conservation issues such as forest and sea protection and rehabilitation, via an annual film festival and associated activities. The event capitalizes on the strength of cinema to motivate engagement and develop substantial discourse on these pressing environmental challenges.
The Ventura Film Festival originated in 2004 and has displayed hundreds of movies, usually over 200 films each summer, and has garnered interest from the worldwide filmmaking community. Since its founding, the festival has expanded into a substantial cultural happening that joins filmmakers, environmental advocates, and audiences from around the world.
Some of the highlights have been hosting award winning filmmaker Dylan O'Neil, the initial world champion surfers Peter "PT" Townend as well as Ian Cairns, 4x world champion Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu/MMA combatant the celebrated Fabio Leopoldo, and the 50th Anniversary tribute to West Side Story, which featured welcoming the entire Academy Award winning cast website of West Side Story, including Oscar recipient/Golden Globe winner George Chakiris along with Golden Globe winner/Oscar-nominated Russ Tamblyn. These exceptional personalities and celebrations have solidified the festival's reputation as a leading location for celebrating filmmaking and the artists who create it.
The Ventura Film Festival creator and executive director was privileged to participate, alongside numerous Hollywood elite, in the half-century commemoration of West Side Story and Hollywood's footprint/handprint ceremony for Academy Award winners Rita Moreno, George Chakiris, along with Golden Globe winner Russ Tamblyn at the Chinese Theater in Hollywood. This event also doubled as the official BluRay release by Fox and MGM of West Side Story, which is widely considered by critics and fans to be the best musical of all time. This exceptional honor and participation exemplifies the festival's considerable reach and esteemed status within the entertainment community.