The Ann Arbor Film Festival is an annual film festival held in Ann Arbor in the U.S. state of Michigan. Established in 1963, it is the third-oldest film festival in North America (after the Columbus International Film & Video Festival, 1953; and the San Francisco International Film Festival, 1957); and the oldest experimental film festival. It has become one of the premier film festivals for independent and, especially, experimental filmmakers to showcase their work. Now in its 49th year, the Ann Arbor Film Festival attracts over 2,500 entries from filmmakers in more than 60 countries, and distributes over $18,000 in cash awards. As a pioneer of the traveling festival concept in 1964, each year the Ann Arbor Film Festival Tour continues to present a collection of short films at more than 30 art house theaters, universities, galleries and cinematheques throughout the world.

Created as an alternative to commercial cinema, the annual week-long festival remains true to its original mission of promoting film as an art form. The Ann Arbor Film Festival also fosters the growth of emerging and established film and video makers. The festival is open to film and video of all lengths and genres, including experimental, narrative, animation, documentary, and genre hybrids. The festival’s mission is to supporting bold, visionary filmmakers, promote the art of film & new media, and provide communities with remarkable cinematic experiences.

A film festival is an organised, extended presentation of films in one or more movie theaters or screening venues, usually in a single locality. Increasingly film festivals show part of their films to the public by adding outdoor movie screenings. The films may be of recent date and, depending upon the focus of the individual festival, can include international releases as well as films produced by the organisers' domestic film industry. Sometimes there is a focus on a specific film-maker or genre (e.g., film noir) or subject matter (e.g., horror film festivals). A number of film festivals specialise in short films, each with its defined maximum length. Film festivals are typically annual events.

The first major film festival was held in Venice in 1932; the other major and oldest film festivals of the world are: Cannes Film Festival (1939), Festival del film Locarno (1946), Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (1946), Edinburgh International Film Festival (1947), Melbourne International Film Festival (1951), Berlin International Film Festival (1951) and Toronto International Film Festival (1976).

Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of Washtenaw County. The 2010 census places the population at 113,934, making it the sixth largest city in Michigan. The Ann Arbor Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) had a population of 344,791 as of 2010. The city is also part of the larger Detroit – Ann Arbor – Flint, MI CSA.

Ann Arbor was founded in 1824, with one theory stating that it is named after the spouses of the city's founders and for the stands of trees in the area. The University of Michigan moved from Detroit to Ann Arbor in 1837, and the city showed steady growth throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, with a decline during the Depression of 1873. During the 1960s and 1970s, the city gained a reputation as an important center for liberal politics. Ann Arbor also became a focal-point for left-wing activism and served as a hub for the civil-rights movement and anti-Vietnam War movement, as well as the student movement.

Ann Arbor is home to the University of Michigan, a world renowned institution of higher education. The university shapes Ann Arbor's economy significantly as it employs about 30,000 workers, including about 12,000 in the medical center. The city's economy is also centered on high technology, with several companies drawn to the area by the university's research and development money, and by its graduates. In the year 2010, Forbes listed Ann Arbor as one of the most liveable cities in the United States of America.

Flying Lotus (born Steven Ellison) is an experimental multi-genre music producer from Winnetka, California. His debut album, 1983, was released on Plug Research Records in 2006. He produced much of the bumper music on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim programming block, for which he is uncredited, and he also contributed remixes for fellow Plug Research artists including Mia Doi Todd. He is often referred to as FlyLo by fans and critics. His grandmother was songwriter Marilyn McLeod. He is the great-nephew of the late Alice Coltrane, whose husband was John Coltrane. He is also the cousin of musician Ravi Coltrane.

In 2007, he announced that he signed with Warp Records. Following his Warp debut, the six-track Reset EP, he quickly became one of the label’s cornerstone artists and released his second album, titled Los Angeles, on June 10, 2008. In 2008, Flying Lotus also remixed "Reckoner" from Radiohead's album In Rainbows. His third album, Cosmogramma, was released on May 3, 2010, in the UK and May 4, 2010, in the US. In January 2011, Cosmogramma won in the Dance/Electronica Album category in the 10th Annual Independent Music Awards.

Kenneth Anger (born Kenneth Wilbur Anglemeyer; February 3, 1927) is an American underground experimental filmmaker, actor and author of two controversial Hollywood Babylon books. Working exclusively in short films, he has produced almost forty works since 1937, nine of which have been grouped together as the "Magick Lantern Cycle", and form the basis of Anger's reputation as one of the most influential independent filmmakers in cinema history. His films variously merge surrealism with homoeroticism and the occult, and have been described as containing "elements of erotica, documentary, psychodrama, and spectacle." Anger himself has been described as "one of America's first openly gay filmmakers, and certainly the first whose work addressed homosexuality in an undisguised, self-implicating manner", and his "role in rendering gay culture visible within American cinema, commercial or otherwise, is impossible to overestimate", with several being released prior to the legalisation of homosexuality in the United States. He has also focused upon occult themes in many of his films, being fascinated by the notorious English occultist Aleister Crowley, and is a follower of Crowley's religion, Thelema.