Hannah shows 'em how it's done

THE sceptics who worried about the move to June are mostly silent now. They're impressed by record box office figures reported by the Edinburgh International Film Festival, and the healthy film industry buzz around the event. The question is, should other festivals now follow its lead, as some commentators – such as former Film Festival director Mark Cousins – have suggested?

Not according to Hannah McGill, who led the surprising shift in only her second year as the EIFF's artistic director. "There's something lovely about a city that is continually having things going on," she concedes, but she cautions: "I do think that breaking up that part of August any more would be risky, because people do want to experience more than one thing while they are in Edinburgh in August."

The Film Festival is one of more than a dozen Edinburgh festivals. The Science Festival runs from late March; Imaginate, the children's theatre festival, from late May. But although the Jazz & Blues Festival starts its summer residency in late July, the rest are firmly centred on August alone, from the giant Fringe to the brief Edinburgh Mela.

EventScotland, the Scottish Government agency with the task of boosting Scotland's profile, visitor numbers and tourism trade via events of all kinds, has backed the Film Festival's move with a three-year, £240,000 funding package. Paul Bush, its chief executive, says the organisation would welcome a "dialogue" with other festivals about similar moves. "If we can spread the load across the year, it would be more beneficial to Scotland and have real potential for them to grow as events," he says.

EventScotland is keenly aware of what airlines call the "shoulder" periods – quieter times around the busy summer, in early May or September and October, for example. But where the Film Festival is bidding for a higher profile and more media attention, other events, such as the Tattoo, the Fringe, or the Edinburgh International Festival, seem happy with keeping their August slots.

However, Bush says he would encourage any new festivals to go elsewhere in the calendar. Celtic Connections, Glasgow's regular January event, has proved the possibilities of independent success outside the summer season, he says.

The Film Festival answers to an international industry beyond Edinburgh, but was often overshadowed by its local rivals. "We were the one that got the most out of moving," McGill says. Mike Gubbins, editor of trade magazine Screen International, says he had worried about it moving to a risky slot just after Cannes, when the film industry has traditionally gone to sleep. But he was impressed: "I think it's put its marker down, it's as good as they could hope for."

A spokeswoman for the Edinburgh International Book Festival dismissed any idea of a move: "August works on a whole range of different levels. Audiences love the fact they can go off and see different things." There are now more than 300 literary festivals in the UK, she added. "It's pretty crowded. We like our niche. We have no intention of moving."

The message is even more emphatic from the Fringe. Its director, Jon Morgan, points out that for non-professional acts the summer holidays are ideal to come to Edinburgh. And other Fringes, in the UK and internationally, have built their calendars around Edinburgh. "We wouldn't move because August is the perfect month."

Joanne Brown, the director of the five-year-old Edinburgh Art Festival, which embraces the summer shows of many independent galleries, says it is well known that tourism agencies suggest moving to "almost everybody that knocks on their door. 'Move out of August and move somewhere else.' It's an infrastructure thing."

But she rules out the possibility of her own festial moving just now. "A lot of people say, if you wanted to make more of a splash, if you wanted a higher profile, why don't you go to March, or November, visual arts isn't weather-dependent, blah-blah-blah. Actually I think there's a real buzz, a real open-mindedness that comes from being an audience member, or resident, in Edinburgh in August. We are a vulnerable organisation still, so actually it makes sense for us to be part of that August offer, at the moment."