Cinequest — the Silicon Valley film festival that opened Tuesday in downtown San Jose — has had a devoted following for 35 years. But its not just the thousands of movie lovers who come back year after year, it’s the people who actually make the festival run smoothly: the volunteers.
They serve as ushers and work the box office at the California Theatre and Hammer Theatre Center, introduce screenings and conduct question-and-answer sessions with filmmakers afterward and escort Maverick Spirit Award winners during the festival. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
“Cinequest was founded and built on volunteerism,” said Halfdan Hussey, Cinequest’s co-founder and CEO. The festival, he said, empowers people through elevated storytelling, innovation and a caring community — and the core of the caring community are the volunteers.
“My favorite Cinequest events each year are not opening night or the big name experiences, they are the volunteer kickoff and appreciation events, for they remind me that Cinequest was built and continues its human impact via the wonderous giving and caring of the brilliant minds and beautiful hearts of the Cinequest volunteers,” he said.
The volunteers were out in force Tuesday, getting the festival ready for opening night film, “Her Song,” at the California Theatre in downtown San Jose. More than 250 features and shorts — including 143 world or U.S. premieres — will be screened over the following 12 days. The full lineup, as well as tickets and passes, are available at www.cinequest.org.
All that adds up to hundreds, if not collectively thousands, of hours of work for the festival’s volunteers like Janet Hebert.
Like many Cinequest volunteers, Hebert started as an audience member, attending for the first time in 2007. The next year, the San Jose resident thought it would be fun to be part of the team and volunteered for a speaking role. “Being in front of an audience never intimidated me,” the former teacher said.
Lou Bash, left, works with Cinequest volunteers Vivek Dhavan, back, and Elizabeth Machaen in the California Theatre box office in downtown San Jose on Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (Sal Pizarro/Bay Area News Group)
She later helped train other speakers, who conduct those Q&A sessions and introduce movies, and this year has been part of the operations team, which includes 30 speakers, 30 theater managers and 65 ushers.
“I enjoy working with the other volunteers and I enjoy seeing the patrons who attend year after year. It feels like a family reunion,” she said. “Another thing that keeps me coming back is the opportunity to meet the young, enthusiastic filmmakers.”
Gabby Solleder, who lives in San Jose’s Naglee Park neighborhood, started volunteering at Cinequest in 2020 — the year the festival was cut short because of COVID-19. She has returned every year since.
“It’s really a ton of fun,” she said. “I’ve enjoyed seeing how it comes together.” She’ll also be part of the volunteer team in Mountain View, where Cinequest will hold the second half of the festival — March 15-22 — at the Alamo Drafthouse.
But when it comes to passion for Cinequest, it’s hard to top Nick Givechi. He first came to Cinequest in 2020 as a first-time filmmaker who was left with such an impression he wanted to come back as a volunteer when the in-person festival returned in 2024.
“Over the course of the two weeks of the 2024 season, I put in 108 hours and I fell in love with it,” said Givechi, who now serves as chief concierge in the VIP lounge at the Continental. Here’s the thing: Givechi lives in California and uses his vacation time from his day job to volunteer at Cinequest.
But he thinks it’s more than worth it.
“So many people break the bank to come to Cinequest. I feel like I’m getting paid double. It doesn’t feel like a minute of work to me,” he said. “This is my Tahiti. This is my Disneyland.”
WARDROBE MALFUNCTION: Carl Guardino and his wife, Leslee Guardino, flew back to the Bay Area from Copenhagen, Denmark, on Sunday night and went through customs at SFO, with him heading directly on a red-eye flight to Washington, D.C. and she returning home to Monte Sereno.
When Guardino arrived in D.C. on Monday, the vice president of government affairs and policy for Tarana Wireless made a startling discovery: The couple has matching luggage, but not matching wardrobes.
“I’m now trying to decide which of Leslee’s outfits to wear to Capitol Hill,” he posted on Facebook. “Forty years of business travel, and this is a first!”
CAMPBELL SCRAMBLE: My item last week on the grand re-opening of the Campbell Library on May 9 spread some misinformation. While switching to an all-electric library thanks to a grant from Silicon Valley Clean Energy did require some plans to be re-done, that happened early in the process and wasn’t the cause for the delay in the library’s opening.
Campbell spokesperson Letysia Moresco said the Silicon Valley Clean Energy grant made it possible to include significant electrification improvements in the project and had no impact on the anticipated grand opening date.
“As with any major public construction project, timelines can be affected by many moving parts, including required regulatory agencies permitting, material availability, supply chain fluctuations, specialized equipment delivery (elevators, mechanical systems, etc.), and contractor scheduling,” Moresco said.
In other words, as anyone who has done a home improvement project knows, sometimes things take longer than you think they will.