Mark your calendar: It’s time to say goodbye to the beloved Flatirons Food Film Festival, which has held its signature, multi-day event of food films, culinary events, discussions and more in Boulder for the last eight years. The festival is ending its run so that its organizers can move on to other projects.
“The Flatirons Food Film Festival has been an amazing and magical ride,” says Julia Joun, the Flatirons Food Film Festival’s founder and director. “The generosity of local restaurants and other food-related businesses, as well as the volunteers, sponsors and grant funders, has made it so special for so many. We couldn’t have done it without them. However, we’re an all-volunteer nonprofit and it takes a lot of effort and fundraising throughout the year to sustain it. It’s time to relax and enjoy life outside of the festival.”
Though there won’t be a festival this year, the organizers are hosting one last hoorah on Oct. 20 to say goodbye and thank you to the community.
After eight years of festivals, the organizers have decided to move on to other projects. It’s called “The Feast on Reel Food: The Final Meal” and includes a showing of “The Truffle Hunters,” a documentary about the men who search for rare and expensive white Alba truffles in the forests of Piedmont, Italy. The event will also include bites from Basta, Big Red Restaurant Group, Capello’s and Farow, plus sweet treats from Bread and Baklava.
The event is scheduled for Oct. 20. Tickets are $25 and available for purchase online. It’s being held at the Boulder Public Library in the Canyon Theater and kicks off at 7 p.m. with a reception and screening, followed by a discussion with Eduardo Valle Lobo, Frasca Food and Wine’s culinary director, and Antonio Laudisio, a beloved Boulder chef.
Though the festival won’t be hosting its signature, multi-day event moving forward, the organization is not going away completely. Organizers hope to host smaller-scale community events in the future that align with the festival’s mission of using films and events to entertain, educate and inspire.
Over the years, the festival has held more than 127 individual events, shown more than 55 feature-length and 119 short films about food, and held important discussions with speaks like Jeremiah Tower, Jonathan Gold, Sandor Katz, Adrian Miller, Claudette Zepeda and Bobby Stuckey.
The festival has also organized many intriguing events, including a children’s class on filmmaking, a marijuana edible speakeasy, fermented food and pollinator fairs, opera performances paired with food and films and a presentation on molecular gastronomy, just to name a few. Through the years, it’s explored diverse and important topics such as regenerative agriculture, sustainability, local food organic farming, lab-grown meat, world cuisines and fermentation.
Joun founded the organization in 2012 with a goal of bringing together her two loves: food and film.
“Food and beverages are amazing topics that have something to do with so many aspects of life,” she writes. “As such, there is an amazing diversity of films that cover these topics. I make a conscious effort to reflect this variety in the films that I select. So, I make sure to select a mix of documentaries and features, international and domestic subject matter, and always select at least one film that has an overtly political dimension. The enjoyment that we experience while making and eating food or beverages is significant to me, too.”
