Austin Film Festival Returns In-Person this October

March 31, 2021

Austin Film Festival & Writers Conference (AFF) will return to an in-person Festival and Conference for its 28th year. The eight-day Festival will take place from October 21 – 28 in Austin, Texas.

AFF will once again feature four full days of panel conversations and discussions on the art, craft, and business of screenwriting with some of the industry’s biggest names and eight days of film screenings highlighting emerging talent, as well as premieres of studio films as part of its marquee programming. In addition, AFF will also offer a virtual badge which will include a selection of panels and films recorded at the festival for those who cannot attend the in-person event.

The Festival also released today its 2021 Bill Wittliff Award for Screenwriting recipient, Scott Frank. Past AFF honorees include Tony Gilroy, Lawrence Kasdan, Callie Khouri, and Nancy Meyers. Frank is an Oscar- and Emmy nominated writer and director whose screenplay credits include Little Man Tate, Dead Again, Malice, Heaven’s Prisoners, Get Shorty, Out of Sight, Minority Report, The Interpreter, The Lookout (writer/director), Marley & Me, The Wolverine, Walk Among the Tombstones (writer/director), Logan, the Netflix limited series, Godless (writer/director) and The Queen’s Gambit (writer/director).

His most recent project, The Queen’s Gambit, is Netflix’s most watched scripted miniseries and won a Golden Globe for Best Television Limited Series. The series was also named one of the AFI’s Top Ten Shows for 2020.

Frank will be recognized at the 2021 Awards Luncheon on Saturday, October 23 at the Austin Club, and will participate in festival and conference programming. The Festival also announced conference guests Peter Craig (The Batman), Javier Grillo-Marxuach (Lost), Meg LeFauve (Inside Out), Nicole Perlman (Guardians of the Galaxy), with more panelist announcements to come.