As the summer heats up and the world proceeds to reopen, the Newport Beach Film Festival (NBFF) is moving away from virtual screenings and returning to theaters. Postponed due to the COVID – 19 Pandemic. This year only, all screenings will take place at THE LOT – Fashion Island. The Festival will run for a 2-week span, August 6 – August 20, 2020, in order to accommodate all of its planned screenings. The festival opens with the world premiere of A Life of Endless Summers: The Bruce Brown Story on Thursday, August 6, 2020 at 7:30pm in all seven cinemas at THE LOT – Fashion Island (401 Newport Center Drive).
Life of Endless Summers: The Bruce Brown Story is the highly anticipated film from acclaimed second-generation documentarian in partnership with Irvine-based SCS. Brown lends his storytelling prowess to a truly memorable and personal piece-of-work in the form of a penned love letter to his father. A road trip turns into a rare, intimate look at the amazing life of his legendary father, Bruce Brown (The Endless Summer and On Any Sunday). Dana started the project with his father as a long-overdue “road trip” they took together traveling up the west coast and Hawaii.
“The Film is a tribute to my father. Dad started the whole action sports film genre. He broke the mold; he broke the rules; he broke open the film category. There will never be another one like him,” said Dana Brown. “We could not think of a better fit for our world premiere then The Newport Beach Film Festival which places such a strong focus on Action Sports programing and continually acknowledges Dads legacy in the Southern California Community.”
“The Newport Beach Film Festival is exceptionally proud to open its 21st edition with the world premiere of Dana Brown’s moving documentary. We are thrilled to bring the community together to celebrate and honor the legacy of Bruce Brown and his impact on documentary filmmaking and surf culture,” said Gregg Schwenk, CEO and Co-Founder of the Newport Beach Film Festival. “With the Festival’s long-standing commitment to action sports cinema and deep relationship with the Brown family, it is the ideal film to kick off two weeks of global film screenings and events here in coastal Southern California.”
“It’s a fabulous story that has rarely been told: the freewheeling adventurous days when lifestyle sport programming was born,” says James Schiefer, Schiefer Chopshop Founder.
Due to the COVID – 19 outbreak, The Festival, along with THE LOT and health partner, UCI Health, are taking extra pre-cautions to ensure the health and safety of filmmakers and patrons. In addition to abiding by California’s current social distancing guidelines, every Festival attendee will receive no contact temperature checks, sanitizing stations will be placed throughout THE LOT, theaters will be thoroughly sanitized after every screenings and food will be served in single-use containers.
The Newport Beach Film Festival is sponsored by The City of Newport Beach, Visit Newport Beach, UCI Health, Fashion Island, THE LOT, and Morgan Stanley.
Passes and tickets for film screenings and special events go on sale July 7th . To purchase tickets and for information about the Newport Beach Film Festival visit www.NewportBeachFilmFest.com.
