Tropfest cancelled due to lack of funding

Less than a month before it was due to be held, Tropfest has been cancelled, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.

A dispute with the company that manages the event has reportedly forced founder John Polson to call off what is described as the world’s largest short film festival, which attracts hundreds of entries and is watched by hundreds of thousands of viewers every year.

In its 24th year, Tropfest was due to hold a night of screenings at Sydney’s Centennial Park on December 6, beamed to venues around the country and broadcast live on SBS2.

Polson has told the SMH it had emerged in the past week that there was a financial discrepancy “well into six figures” that would not allow the festival to proceed.

He has started legal action against a company he declined to name which has been managing the event for Tropfest, saying it was hard to avoid concluding there had been “a terrible and irresponsible mismanagement” of the festival’s funds.

“Suddenly, wham, we’ve got this huge hole,” Polson told the SMH from New York, where he is executive producer of the television series Elementary.

“I’m not suggesting there’s any impropriety here,” he said. “I honestly don’t know. The best I can say now is mismanagement.

“It’s hard to avoid ‘mismanagement’ if you’re not even getting straight answers about what the situation is.”

Polson said he was unsure what the festival’s future was now.

“Can it come back? I honestly don’t know,” he said.

“It’s like being in a bad dream,” he said. “This is 23 years of work. It’s a stunning, shocking blow, with really no hint of what was to come.”

More than 450 filmmakers entered shorts this year and the finalists had been called ahead of an announcement next week.

Hollywood star Susan Sarandon had agreed to head the festival jury.

“I feel terrible for the filmmakers,” Polson said. “I feel terrible for the audiences.

“It’s terrible for the sponsors. And I think it’s terrible for anybody who cares about Australian film and certainly the grassroots, emerging end of Australian film because, right now, our future is up in the air. I really don’t know what’s going to happen.”

The hugely successful festival began when Polson organised short film screenings at Sydney’s Tropicana cafe in 1993.

It expanded quickly to free events attended by vast crowds in the Domain then Centennial Park, with shorts entered by such then rising filmmakers as Joel and Nash Edgerton, Paul Fenech, Clayton Jacobson and Rowan Woods.

Judges at Tropfest have included Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett, Russell Crowe, Geoffrey Rush, Baz Luhrmann, George Miller, Keanu Reeves, Samuel L. Jackson, John Woo and Ewan McGregor.