Hamptons International Film Festival’s Silver Anniversary

Hamptons International Film Festival's Silver Anniversary.

- Mary Ellen Walsh

LIGHTS! Camera! Action! It’s hard to believe the Hamptons International Film Festival (HIFF) is celebrating a quarter century of showcasing great works in film.

The eight-month celebration 25 Years: 25 Films poignantly kicked HIFF winter with a screening of “The Piano,” for which Jane Campion won a 1994 Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. “The Piano” originally screened at Guild Hall in Easthampton in 1993, the year the festival began. Other screenings from the Hamptons to Montauk Point, Palm Beach, Los Angeles and Manhattan included: Oscar-winning documentary “Searching for Sugarman,” “Pollock,” “Diving Bell and Butterfly,” and two Oscar-winning documentaries: “Twenty feet from Stardom” and “Open Water,” that debuted at HIFF. In April, at Sag Harbor’s Bay Street Theatre, Edie Falco was a guest for a Q&A following the 25 Years: 25 Films screening of “Judy Berlin” (HIFF 1999). Other films screened throughout the year were: “The Artist,” “SlumDog Millionaire,” “Still Alice,” “The Cove,” “Heavenly Creatures,” and “I Am Not Your Negro.”