PEEBLES is set to host a festival which aims to highlight emerging talent in independent filmmaking.

The Scotland International Festival of Cinema (SIFC) is the brainchild of American director Stephen Savage and Trinity Houston, the founders of Idyllwild Cinema Festival in southern California, with the help of Scottish actress Mhairi Calvey (Braveheart).

Peebles is home to festival producer and actor Vivien Reid, who suggested her hometown to Savage when she took her film The Box to Idyllwild in 2020.

“He [Stephen] said, ‘I really want to do this [a Scottish film festival] but I’d like it to be in a place like Idyllwild, I don’t want it to be in a city I want it to be in a town,” said Vivien. “I just smiled and said I live in the Scottish version of Idyllwild and told him all about Peebles.”

She added: “I felt the Scottish Borders has a really passionate community of people that love the arts, and not just cinema but all different types of arts, so I said I could see it [festival] working really well here.

“I just thought it would be an amazing thing to do for Peebles.

“As soon as I told him [Stephen] about it he was sold quite quickly, because it really is similar to Idyllwild.

“When I arrived there [Idyllwild] I felt so at home because it was so similar to Peebles, it was very picturesque. It means a lot to me that it will happen here.”

The SIFC will take place at the Eastgate Theatre in April and will see nearly 80 films, including shorts and features on multiple topics screened in the town.

“That was one of the scariest things,” explained Vivien, “with a first year film festival, what kind of films are going to be submitted?

“You go through that panic of will anybody submit, will anyone submit to a first year film festival?

“But my goodness they did, and I’m so thrilled with the standard of the filmmaking, it’s exciting, we’ve got some real gems.”

And the festival also hopes to run question and answer sessions with creators, as well as a forum for women in film. The week of film will then conclude with an awards ceremony. The Borders is already home to the Alchemy Film Festival in Hawick and Peebles’ Outdoor Film Festival, however Vivien says that SIFC won’t ‘tread on any toes’.

She said: “As far as I’m concerned there’s so much going on in the Scottish Borders, you’ve got Alchemy as well and all these other film festivals, that I kind of felt we won’t be treading on anyone’s toes because this is going to be very different.”

Vivien and the team behind the SIFC are hoping that, although film submissions to the festival have come from all over the world, the local community will come along to the event in April.

She said: “We’d like to attract people from further afield but if we can get the locals behind it [festival] we’re winning really. Especially after the last two years that everybody’s had you want the escapism of storytelling. I really hope that when I walk down to the Eastgate on April 19 that the theatre is buzzing. I want the theatre and the town of Peebles to feel alive. I just want people to come along and enjoy being part of it.

“It’s a film festival for everybody.”

The Scotland International Festival of Cinema will take place from April 19-24 at the Eastgate Theatre.

For more information, visit scotlandifc.com