Promoting Local Culture | The Case of Purbalingga Film Festival

Purbalingga is a small town located in the territory of Banyumas cultural region, in Central Java, Indonesia. The majority of the people are farmer and laborers in the manufacturing industry. Purbalingga is often regarded as a city that does not have a prominent historical record related to arts and cultural activities like other cultural cities in Java. However, from 2007 until now, Purbalingga has transformed into one of the important references for organizing Film Festivals in Indonesia through the Purbalingga Film Festival.

The Purbalingga Film Festival is managed by a community called Cinema Lovers Community (CLC) independently. This independence is shown in the financial aspects of the organization, provision, and curation of films, including in the development of themes and film production (You can read my earlier post about this festival: here). The films that were screened at this festival raised social issues in the region. The issue and locality of Banyumas culture become a strong identity in the film content. The praxis aspect of community empowerment is the strength of CLC along with the Purbalingga Film Festival which is held through education for students in producing film content to be screened in the festival.

Established on March 4, 2006, CLC Purbalingga started its activities from film production, which later transformed into film screening and education for the people of Purbalingga and Banyumas, Central Java. Their activities focus on community education through cinema, especially for young people. Their program includes film screenings, festivals, and production workshops. They collaborate with all lines of arts and cultural groups, including traditional arts groups. Through these activities, CLC Purbalingga presents cinema activities as a whole; from production to film screenings.

Purbalingga Film Festival is the annual program of CLC in addition to dissemination, library, and cultural dialogue, which is applied in the form of workshops (writing, filmmaking), discussions, regular film screenings, and many others, aimed at building a new culture of watching films for the people of Purbalingga and Banyumas in general, and as an educational laboratory room with films as a medium for delivery. It is a space for dialogue through film media both in the context of employment, and other aspects; the transformation of values and education, local identity, and everyday narratives of the community. This festival becomes a seed development space (teenagers - beginners) to express their opinions through film media.

CLC interest in the film medium is a response to technological change. Technological developments have made amateur film production equipment easier and cheaper. Likewise, with the distribution channel. It is now easier for communities in small cities to work in complex mediums like films. But it should be noted that the CLC method of producing films requires a strong commitment. This kind of commitment is rarely found in communities in other cities. CLC shows that their local identity is very strong. From film production, to film distribution, CLC Purbalingga does it in their own ways, which may not be taught by standard modules about managing professional festivals. This makes CLC a unique film community, but it is also difficult to develop as a professional unit.

Film productions are complex works. It combines audio and video, packed with interesting effects based on various types of art, such as sound art, music art, body art, decorative art, and so on. Apart from being an art, it is also one of the mass communication media that effective in conveying messages to the audience. However, from several functions of mass communication, films are often only seen as a function of entertainment.

As complex as the productions itself, films are not only interpreted as works of art but rather as "social practices" too. Film is not only an artistic expression from the maker. Film also involve complex and dynamic interactions between the supporting elements of the production process, distribution, and the exhibition. Even more, this perspective assumes there is an interaction between film and cultural ideology in which the film is produced and consumed. Likewise, film is a reflection of society.

The existence of the Purbalingga CLC confirms opinions about film as a social practice. CLC main activity is facilitating community-based film activities in Purbalingga. One of the typical identities of CLC Purbalingga is to bring the film closer to its people by holding an open-air cinema screening in the villages.

Promoting Local Culture

The Purbalingga Film Festival is known by many Indonesian film public as the only Festival that successfully moves students to consistently make films about all the things that happen in their daily lives. This achievement is deliberately designed.

Film Festival cannot be separated from identity cases. The Purbalingga Film Festival becomes so prominent and different in the national film scene because they dare to show themselves as they are through their work. This is the way Banyumas people see movies.

The issue of Banyumas identity as the "other" Java underlies the programs contained in the Purbalingga Film Festival. How the Banyumas dialect (The ngapak dialect) often considered funny by people from other regions, they are intentionally producing their films in the ngapak dialect. I once went to a film screening in Jakarta, I saw the audience laughed loudly when watching one of the film produced by Purbalingga student, even though what was played was not a comedy, but a horror film.

Related to the identity of the city of Purbalingga, the Purbalingga Film Festival always attempts to highlight the unique things of Purbalingga as its visual identity. Every year, the Purbalingga Film Festival always tries to choose one icon that is considered to represent Purbalingga as a theme for publication. In 2018, for example, they chose Muffler as the main icon for posters and other publications. Likewise, in 2017, they use eyelash icons. In 2016, they use a wig as the visual key. Muffler, Eyelash, and Wig are the manufacturing industry Purbalingga known for. This kind of uniqueness is interesting to be explored and presented to the public. Apart from the visual identity, the local context of Purbalingga is always raised by CLC Purbalingga through the films they produce.

According to Kotler, promotion is the process of communicating a company with parties who have present and future interests and the community. Promotion is one of the variables in the marketing mix that is very important to be carried out by the company in marketing products and services. Promotional activities not only serve as a communication tool between companies and consumers but also as a tool to influence consumers in purchasing activities or use of services in accordance with their wants and needs.

We can conclude that promotion is an effort made to influence consumers to buy products that are produced or to deliver news about the product by communicating with the persuading audience. Promotion is any activity that is intended to inform, persuade or influence consumers to continue using the marketed product.

Tourism destinations can be seen as a product too, so it will be interesting if, in the promotion mix, we use the brand strategy to enhance the image. Brands must be the main consideration when we talk about a modern product. The brand must construct a social image of a product. To achieve brand identity, brand awareness is needed.

City branding is similar to corporate brands. In this case, cities and companies both want to attract the attention of various stakeholders and customer groups. City branding can form an identity that is useful for promoting cultural activities. City branding also related to urban planning that can be used as a strategy of a city to make a strong positioning within the marketing target, as well as the positioning of a product or service. Marketing is inseparable from competition, as well as for a city.

The support of CLC in tourism promotion can be seen from the film works they produce. They upload these films to the CLC Purbalingga youtube channel, it's open for public so that anyone can see the film. The Youtube channel owned by CLC is filled with various content about the richness of Banyumas cultural arts, especially Purbalingga. One video upload on the CLC youtube channel about Banyumas culture and art got thousands of viewers. The video content is about Bonokeling custom rituals. This documentary film directed by Bowo Leksono besides describing how boisterous and strong the tradition of Unggah-unggahan, but also telling the background of Bonokeling believers. Through the caretaker, Kyai Sumitro, the film explained many things related to all activities of tradition and daily life of Bonokeling community.

CLC's efforts to record and documenting Purbalingga's cultural wealth can be seen as an effort to preserve culture. This effort is in line with the framework of Community-Based Tourism (CBT), that tourism must take into account aspects of environmental and cultural sustainability.

Community-Based Tourism (CBT) is a form of tourism that provides opportunities for local communities to control and be involved in tourism management and development. In CBT, people who are not directly involved in tourism businesses also get the benefit. Ideally, CBT is developing tourism which takes into account aspects of environmental and cultural sustainability.

CBT is closely related to the participation of local communities. Community participation in tourism consists of two perspectives, namely the participation of local communities in the decision-making process and the participation of local communities in relation to the benefits that society receives from tourism development. Thus CBT is a tourism development approach that emphasizes on local communities in the form of providing opportunities in tourism management and development which leads to the empowerment of the community.

In addition, there is also one activity program from CLC Purbalingga which is held grandly, complete with the sparkling big stage, VIP guests, red carpet, and various performances that attract local people. The program is "The Night of the Purbalingga Film Festival Awards". Like a major film festival, Purbalingga Film festival closed its series of events with a lively celebration. In collaboration with the local youth and sports service, they used the town square of Purbalingga as the location of the event.

In the square located in the center of the city, they set up a magnificent stage with a loud sound system as well. As an official event, they also invited officials from the capital city, represented by Indonesian film stakeholders. This event always accompanied by a lot of performances by the local artists to entertain the guests. As a cultural arts event, the Awarding Night can be a unique tourist attraction.

On that awarding night, there was a special award named "Lintang Kemukus". The Lintang Kemukus Award is an award given to individuals and groups that significantly contribute to the arts and traditional culture in Banyumas in its various activities. The name Lintang Kemukus was taken from one of the titles of a novel by Ahmad Tohari, a great writer from Banyumas. The "Lintang Kemukus" award was first given at Purbalingga Film Festival in 2012.

At 2017 festivals, the Lintang Kemukus Tradition Award was given to Mr. Maryoto, the leader of the Lengger Lanang Association. Lengger is an acronym for the words Leng and Jengger which means "women who turn out to be men". Lengger Lanang art is a typical Banyumasan art. In this dance, the dancer is a man but dressed up as a woman and performed the dance movements that are generally performed by female dancers.

While the Contemporary Lintang Kemukus Award was given to Syaikhul Irfan, founder of the Kie Bae Community. Shaykhul Irfan has been in touch with the stage of modern theater since 2001. Dozens of theater scripts have been successfully presented to various cities in Indonesia.

I couldn't argue that the big effort to hold this festival should have a significant impact on the promotion of local culture and also, tourism. But sadly, I found that the promotion of the local culture that emerged in the holding of the Purbalingga Film Festival looked so random and sporadic. The promotion agenda has not become a mature decision. The management is still not professional, lack support from other stakeholders. The tourism promotion and culture of Purbalingga looks like running without clear strategies and goals. The promotion of cultural tourism from this activity has only been seen in the stage of good product packaging while regarding the main purpose of promotion is to make tourists visit Purbalingga, the distribution of promotional material that has been produced to the maximum is still not well explored.

More on this issue, later....

CONCLUSION

CLC through its program, the Purbalingga Film Festival, has shown that the existence of film festivals has a relationship, both directly and indirectly, with the opportunity to promote the city or region. The promotion of the city in question is related to the interests of regional imaging as well as a means of branding tourism and culture. Film festivals, like the film itself, are not just about the text or the content of communication in it, but also relate to matters relating to the institution and the people involved in the festival.

CLC through its film works has wrapped various tourism potentials of Purbalingga culture in a good audio-visual package, but the obstacles they face in the promotion framework are the absence of promotional strategies to make these products more visible to a wider audience.

CBT is a form of tourism that provides opportunities for local communities to control and be involved in tourism management and development. In CBT, people who are not directly involved in tourism businesses also benefit. CBT is closely related to the participation of local communities. Of the various dimensions contained in Community Based Tourism (CBT) guidelines, CLC Purbalingga meets most criteria, namely in the dimensions of Social, Culture, Environment, and Politics. As for the economic dimension, CLC has not been able to meet these criteria.

In the practical matters, the concept of regional tourism development with the CBT approach can be applied by active communities such as CLC. However, it should be noted that CLC must also improve its structure to be more professional. There are much evidence too that a good cooperation between tourism stakeholders has not been well established, while tourism development with the CBT model requires a close link between stakeholders.

P.S
For future research, primary data collection requires field observation and in-depth interviews with resource persons in a longer research period so that the results of the analysis are comprehensive. Future research should also examine the role of other stakeholders such as the government and the private sector in supporting initiatives carried out by the community in the context of regional tourism development.

Refferences
Bungin, Burhan. 2015. Komunikasi Pariwisata. Pemasaran dan Brand Destinasi. Kencana: Jakarta.

Fiske, John. 2006. Cultural and Communication Studies: Sebuah Pengantar Komprehensif. Yogyakarta: Jalasutra.

Irawanto, Budi. 2017. Film, Ideologi, dan Militer: Hegemoni Militer dalam Sinema Indonesia. Yogyakarta: Media Pressindo