Santa Barbara International Film Festival – Opening Night

What an amazing 10 day festival this Santa Barbara International Film Festival has become!!! It’s hard to miss the opening event, as the two trucks with spotlights help create instant excitement:

This is what the red carpet entrance looks like on a ‘slow’ night!  The line of people in the back have ‘general admission’ tickets.  Then comes two lines of folks with various sponsor, filmmaker and VIP passes.  The next row near the gold box office is all press, including photographers, videographers and writers.  Finally, next to the black wall with the logos is the red carpet….quite the scene!This is Giles Paquet-Brenner, director of the movie, Sarah’s Key walking the red carpet, and then on stage welcoming the crowd:Of course the films and celebrities are only half of the excitement…the other half is the after parties!  There were what seemed like THOUSANDS of people crowded in the Paseo Nuevo mall for the opening night after party.  Here’s a picture of the entrance of the party taken through a wall from the second level: I didn’t get to see the movie, but friends that did really enjoyed it!!  I’m just glad this was only the first day of the festival…many more to come!