Adam Rocha Delivers Major Screen Time with San Antonio Film Festival
June 22, 2026
With his wiry frame, long hair, tinted glasses, and bushy moustache, Adam Rocha would not look out of place in a movie western. Maybe one directed by Clint Eastwood or Sam Peckinpah, which is appropriate for someone who is passionate about movies.
The San Antonio College alum is the founder and executive director of the San Antonio Film Festival, which is celebrating its 32nd year promoting movies and moviemakers in the city.
Since he started the film festival while still a student at SAC, Rocha has given filmmakers their first shot at fame, built relationships with major players in Hollywood, and created a space for individuals to learn and collaborate.
And it started with a disappointing showing of one of his student films.
Rocha first came to SAC to study in the radio, television, and film program.
“I took Fred Weiss as my video instructor, my film instructor, and it was a Super 8 film class that he had and I just loved it,” he said.
Rocha created a student film and entered it in the CineFestival Latino film festival, sponsored by the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center. When it was accepted, he had grand dreams of the film playing to a packed house inside the center’s auditorium.
The reality was that the film was screened in a cramped office with no air conditioning. The only people attending were Rocha and the projectionist.
Fortunately, his second experience with a film festival as better.
His film was accepted at the San Diego Latino Student Fim Festival and he went to California for the screening. After participating in the festival, he decided that he could start a similar one back home.
“I just thought the film scene in San Diego is just like the music scene in San Antonio,” he said, “I could start my own festival, just like what they do here in San Diego. To me, San Diego was just like San Antonio, except they had burritos.”
A golden opportunity – launching the San Antonio Film Festival
Rocha started the festival in 1994. In those pre-internet days, he relied on his extended family to help him promote the new undertaking. An aunt made copies of fliers announcing the event and an uncle who had access to a stamp machine let him mail off invitations across the country.
That first year, the films and videos were screened at the Cameo Theater in St. Paul’s Square in downtown San Antonio. He asked Weiss to be the emcee because Rocha was too nervous to do it himself.
From this beginning the festival started to take root and making connections in the film community.
During the second year, the festival screened a documentary called GG Allin & the Murder Junkies, about a controversial punk rocker. The filmmaker, a New York University student, came down for the showing.
“He was in his Ramone’s jacket, and we smoked cigarettes at the bar,” remembers Rocha.
The student was Todd Phillips, who went on to produce and direct several Hollywood movies including Old School, The Hangover, A Star is Born, and Joker.
The festival continued to grow and change – spurred on by his enthusiasm, which is so infectious that it has led to many friends, family, and fellow film lovers to volunteer their time and resources.
The one person who has been with him throughout the run of the film festival was his wife, whom he met around the same time he started the endeavor. He credits her help in expanding the festival, including setting it up as a nonprofit organization.
Getting help from Hollywood
In 2014, the festival screened a documentary on Marcia Nasatir, a Hollywood film producer and the first female vice-president of a major movie studio. As a film executive, she developed several successful movies, including Carrie, Rocky, and The Black Stallion.
Nasatir grew up in San Antonio and, for the festival, she was the guest of a Q&A session held at Jefferson High School, which she attended as a student. She had such a good time that she invited Rocha to her Brentwood, California apartment and held a soirée in his honor. At the party, she introduced him to several important film people including a producer on The Godfather and actor Bud Cort, who starred in one of Rocha’s favorite movies, Harold and Maude.
A year later, he met Harry Ufland, a producer and legendary talent agent who represented director Martin Scorsese, and several A-list actors, including Robert Di Niro, Martin Sheen, Ray Liotta, and Jodie Foster. Ufland offered advice and support to Rocha and the film festival until he passed away.
The festival is more than just a showcase for movies. Rocha has also made sure there are opportunities for up-and-coming filmmakers to network with each other and with veterans in the industry. It also offers film related events that families can attend.
Teaching the next generation of filmmakers
And while the film festival has been a part of most of his adult life, Rocha has a day job that has also been very rewarding. After SAC, he transferred to the University of Texas at Austin, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in film. A year later he became a school teacher, where he has taught video production since 2003.
He has been a teacher long enough to see some of his students establish successful careers in the film industry both locally and in Los Angeles.
Looking back, Rocha said that all of this would not have been possible without coming to SAC.
“Honestly, that's the best choice I ever made – going to San Antonio College as an 18-year-old. It changed my life,” he said. “It just helped me get so much self-esteem, and it gave me a direction, and I just thought, man, I can do anything.”
The San Antonio Film Festival will take place from Tuesday, July 21, through Sunday, July 26, at venues across the city. For more information, visit safilm.com or follow them on Instagram @safilm.
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