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Long Beach International Film Festival returns

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The Long Beach International Film Festival is returning to Long Beach for its third year, and will take place from Wednesday, July 30, through Monday, Aug. 4, at locations around Long Beach and in Rockville Centre.

Approximately 3,000 people turned out to last year’s two-day event, which celebrated the art of storytelling through shorts, fiction and documentary films on the boardwalk and beach outside of the Allegria Hotel.

This year, however, in addition to the free short movies at the beach, the festival has been expanded to six days, beginning with an opening night, a drive in movie event at Nickerson Beach, two days of feature films, a concert on the beach and a closing night awards ceremony at the Madison Theater at Molloy College. Tickets are on sale at www.longbeachfilm.com.

“Having the Madison Theater involved this year is a wonderful addition to the festival, and especially exciting due to the fact the Long Beach [movie] theater is still closed due to Hurricane Sandy”, said Ingrid Dodd, the festival’s co-founder.

The LBIFF has received 342 submissions for this year’s festival from all over the world. Dodd said that this is the first year that tickets are being sold for the event and has grown tremendously since its inception.

“This is really our founding year,” Dodd said. “You’re not really a festival until you’ve sold tickets. We’ve graduated!”

Last year’s Festival had a great outpouring of support from local celebrities in film, music and sports including Scott Franklin, Billy Crystal, Joan Jett, Dee Snider, Burt Young and UFC Champion Chris Weidman, and more celebrity guests are expected to attend this year as well.

The Long Beach International Film Festival will also be honoring State Assemblyman Harvey Weisenberg with the Elovich Weisenberg Community Award for his exemplary community service.

At the award ceremony on Monday, Aug. 4, 20 awards will be presented for categories ranging from best actor to best feature film. The winner of best feature film will receive free studio time at Grumman Movie Studio in Bethpage, where “The Amazing Spiderman” was filmed.

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