What were they thinking: The cost of consolidating the CIFF Bob Abelman Cleveland Jewish News Thirty years ago, the Cleveland International Film Festival (CIFF) experienced a major turning point when its board voted to move its screenings from the east side’s Cedar Lee Theatre in Cleveland Heights – where it had resided for the festival’s first 14 years – to downtown as part of the Cleveland/Tower City renaissance. “Being more centrally located, having larger venues at our disposal, and meeting the demand for more morning and late-night screenings helped change our fortunes,” recalls CIFF associate director Patrick Shepherd. Last year’s festival at the Cleveland Cinemas multiplex in The Avenue at Tower City offered 600 screenings of 211 feature films and 237 shorts from 71 countries, which attracted 105,839 attendees. Change is once again on the horizon, for CIFF movers-and-shakers have announced that for next year and for the foreseeable future the festival will travel 14 blocks east to Playhouse Square. For more of this article, go to: www.clevelandjewishnews.com/columnists/bob_abelman/