SANTA BARBARA INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

PHOTOS BY SCOTT LONDON

It's not Cannes or Sundance. But over the past two decades the Santa Barbara International Film Festival has established itself as one of America's leading movie fests, an eleven-day affair replete with world-class premieres, panels, award shows, interviews, and late-night parties. The 2008 festival, which ran from January 24 to February 3, drew some 70,000 people and featured over 200 screenings — including sessions devoted to nature, extreme sports, and Asian, Latino and Eastern European cinema — along with an impressive line-up of tributes, award shows, and panels with industry insiders. But the big story, as always, revolved around the celebrities, the beautiful people who came to town and, for a few days, transformed the place into the epicenter of the entertainment world.