This weekend, a massive Anime Film Festival was hosted over at the Gateway Megaplex as a part of Salt Lake City’s “FanX!”
The first thing that stood out to me was that almost all of the events’ staff appeared in full, Anime-themed cosplay, and they were happy to be there talking with attendees and sharing their passion with the rest of the fan community.
As soon as I got to the theater, I noticed that everything was presented in glorious subs – meaning everything shown was in its original, subtitled from. As I explained in a previous article, Anime fans have kind of a mixed history with Dubbed Anime from companies changing and sometimes outright removing large parts because they thought American audiences wouldn’t like or understand it… (Looking at you “4Kids”.)
I also noticed the films had a bit of grain to them. Talking with event organizer Hraefn Wulfson later that night revealed that he had decided to bring in 38mm film projectors to show the movies in the same way they were originally shown in the theaters. This amazed me! I got to see Studio Ghibli films the way they here originally meant to be seen off of the same prints that went through the theaters. Nothing “FanX” had to offer compared to this experience for me!
There were only a couple minor flaws at this event. One: I had wanted to see a little more variety in the movies – most of what I got to see were Studio Ghibli, or Ghibli-like. Two: and I didn’t know about this until the last day… The advertisement for this event was negligible at best. If I had been sent a press release ahead of time, I would have arrived completely prepared to toss my press pass into the rafters because I would have had no reason to leave!
Overall, the Anime Film Festival was a fantastic experience that I deeply hope I will get to repeat at the next “FanX!”