Inside the Line: Behind the Scenes of Film Fest Ticket Queue
Written by: Laura Sands. Graphics by: Laura Sands.
Thursday night, Savannah locals wondered why kids were sleeping on the street. As the night wore on, SCAD students grew tired of answering the same question and put up a sign.
Photo by Laura Sands in October 2025.
They were here for film fest tickets.
The SCAD Savannah Film Festival is one of the longest-running film festivals in the world, spanning eight days, drawing major celebrities and screening movies before their release. It is the marquee SCAD event, and it keeps getting bigger every year.
In recent years, though, the festivities have started weeks earlier, when tickets go on sale. Students have begun lining up the day before and sleeping on the sidewalk, making memories and pulling all-nighters. This year’s line was jaw-dropping.
At 9 p.m. Thursday, more than 12 hours before the box office opened, the line stretched between 650 and 700 people. It wrapped around Trustees Theater, past Jen Library and finally ended on East State Street.
The tradition has grown into a spectacle and seems here to stay. But is it worth it, and what really happens inside the line?
Photo by Jacob Weston in October 2025.
I began my search for answers at the very front of the line with freshman Cameron Crawford, who arrived at 5:30 a.m. Thursday and only left for class, when a roommate held their spot.
Because the tickets were so competitive, I wondered if there were any arguments about saving spots for friends or letting people cut in with their group. Earlier that morning, Crawford was actually second in line, but when the group ahead asked to have their place saved and didn’t return for more than an hour, Crawford seized the opportunity to move into first.
“I said, ‘Hey guys, sorry I did that.’ They were like, ‘Honestly, respect, I would have done the same thing,’” Crawford said. “It’s the name of the game.”
Although tickets are coveted, by the end of the day most students were understanding. After all, everyone wanted the same thing — a seat at the festival.
If Crawford had been there at 5:30 a.m., how early had the students in front arrived? The five freshmen boys had started the line at 9 p.m. Wednesday. By the time they gave up their spot, they had spent two nights on the streets of Savannah and still made it to all their Thursday classes. They got little sleep Wednesday night and planned to pull an all-nighter Thursday, playing spikeball and, at my suggestion, listening to The Life of a Showgirl when it dropped at midnight.
After interviewing the front of the line, I wanted to see the difference in attitude three blocks and more than 650 people later. At 9 p.m., when I reached the end of the line, people were still joining. A group of sophomores said it felt “sad and scary” to be that far back.
One student, who had camped out the year before, said, “I came at like 8 p.m. and I was so close to the entrance. This year was different … because the actors who were coming are more famous.”
Photo by Jacob Weston in October 2025.
The most unusual part of the evening was the life-size Shaq cutout running a blackjack card booth, with betting on trinkets. Three people actually played cards with the students in line, in exchange for random trinkets they had gotten at Goodwill or traded for earlier. The oddest things that had been exchanged were a copy of The Picture of Dorian Gray, a lock of hair and a wooden desk hutch. It was an entertaining way to bring positive interactions and make new friends in the long hours of the night.
When commenting on the essentials to camp out, caffeine, food, speakers, chargers and something for the blackjack table, one person in line, Kaylin DeMore, advised on safety, a concern for many spending the night. “Stay safe too, you know, it gets very late,” she said. “I know there are tons of people around, but still, it never hurts to just make sure that at least one person in your group is aware of the surroundings.”
But the big question is: Is it worth it? I went to buy my own tickets at 2 p.m. Friday, where I then interviewed Sydney Perry, who arrived at the same time. “I am watching people who have spent the night on the street getting tickets,” Perry said. “They have been here for over 24 hours, and they still don’t have tickets and everything’s sold out.”
Not everything was sold out, but all of the movies with the more famous actors were.
While Perry’s statement makes it sound like camping out isn’t worth it, the short answer is, it depends. There is also a slight possibility that more tickets will become available later that day or even the following week. The line has become an event in its own right, providing students with fun experiences, a tighter community and a night full of stories for a lifetime, and that makes it all worth it.
Yet as SCAD continues to garner attention in the film world, gathering bigger films and celebrities each year, tickets will be harder to come by. So find me camping outside Trustees starting in September.
