Southern Oasis Film Festival Returns To Sevierville

The Southern Oasis Film Festival will take place at Governor’s Crossing Stadium 14 in Sevierville and bring three fun-filled and movie-packed days to East Tennessee from April 4-6. Now in its sixth year, the festival began in Knoxville before moving to Governor’s Crossing in 2024. Presented by Anakeesta, Southern Oasis also receives substantial support from the Tennessee Entertainment Commission and Middle Tennessee State University.

“This year’s festival has seen us grow while remaining aligned with the independent vision and focus on our region that inspired us in the first place,” Southern Oasis founder and artistic director Thomas Moore said. “The team has worked tirelessly to elevate the festival with each season, and we can’t wait to share it with the audience!”

In addition to screening over ninety films playing as part of the festival’s competition, the event will dedicate its opening night to movies about Tennessee, including the Sevierville premiere of the documentary An Unforgettable Ride about the history of Dollywood by Janine Winfree of the Knox County Library’s Tennessee Archive of Moving Image and Sound. Friday’s programming will conclude with a 55th-anniversary screening of the Gregory Peck classic I Walk the Line, which was filmed in Gainsboro and set in East Tennessee. These opening-day events will be free for veterans/active duty military, first responders, and residents of East Tennessee senior-living centers.

New this year is a special block of programming about agriculture issues that will feature the film, Knee High and a Q&A with director Marissa Vonn; Cody Hopkins, CEO of the regenerative farming organization Grassroots Farmers’ Coop; and Zack Oxford of PickTN. In conjunction with the screening, PickTN will offer a unique pop-up shop with curated local products from East Tennessee farmers and small businesses.

Southern Oasis will continue showcasing films devoted to disability advocacy with a screening of the feature documentary The Ride Ahead in collaboration with SparkTN–a Knoxville disability nonprofit whose staff will speak about the issues the film presents and the organization’s work in the region.

The festival also features a series of workshops and presentations from special guests, including Gala Avary, producer and co-host of The Video Archives Podcast with Quentin Tarantino and Roger Avary and The Gala Show. Avary will host a workshop on film podcasting and introduce a screening of her father’s 2002 cult film, The Rules of Attraction, featuring Jessica Biel and James Van Der Beek.

Hallmark/Great American Family screenwriter Bob Saenz will give a workshop on crafting a Hollywood screenwriting career in Tennessee while entertainment lawyer Bill Whitacre will lead a legal clinic and share his experience brokering distribution deals on hit indie movies like The Blair Witch Project. Workshops kick off on Saturday morning with a session led by Gisela Moore of the Tennessee Entertainment Commission and a sound design session with Allie Sultan, a media professor and award-winning filmmaker who has worked on a range of Hollywood movies from Marie Antoinette to The Spiderwick Chronicles.

Southern Oasis is the only film festival in the region with a statewide high-school film showcase and a block of work from Tennessee community college students. These screenings will take place Saturday afternoon before the unveiling of the films made for Southern Oasis’s signature Two-Week Twister competition in which local filmmakers premiere shorts they wrote, shot, and finished within the allotted 14-day window.

“We’re building a festival where industry professionals and first-time attendees feel equally at home — a space that celebrates great storytelling while welcoming everyone into the experience, including those who aren’t filmmakers,” Jerod Ra’Del Hollyfield, Executive Director of Southern Oasis, said.

Other highlights include a block of vintage Saturday Morning Cartoons with an organic cereal bar sponsored by Lovebird Cereal and Kalona SuperNatural Milk as well as the East Tennessee Premiere of Universal Language–winner of the Audience Award at the Cannes Film Festival and Canada’s official entry for the 2025 Academy Awards. A full schedule can be found on the festival’s Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/SouthernOasisFF).

Weekend passes, day passes, and individual tickets can be purchased online at https://filmfreeway.com/SouthernOasisFilmFestival/tickets.

The Southern Oasis Film Festival is a fiscally sponsored project of the Arts & Business Council of Greater Nashville, a nonprofit organization. Additional sponsors include The Clayton Family Foundation, Grassroots Farmers’ Coop, The Golden Roast, Annie’s Pure and Simple, TN Spice Co., CBD Plus USA, Bardstown Bourbon Company, Fright-Rags, Little Arrow Resort, MCPainting, Linear Bar 100% Organic Protein Bar, Crystal Griffith–Realty Executives, and Calloway’s Lamp & Shade.