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Iowa · Nonprofit

FILMSCENE

FILMSCENE (Iowa) receives grants from 34 organizations whose IRS filings report $844,502 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($133,400). 14 of them have funded it in more than one year.

Revenue FY2024
$1.9M
Funders on record
34
Grants received
$845k
Net assets
$1.3M
14/34 repeat funderspeak grant-dependency 16%
01What it does

What Filmscene does

Mission

Filmscene's mission is to challenge, inspire, educate, and entertain our communities through the shared discovery of film. Filmscene is iowa city's nonprofit cinema, working in partnership with the bijou film board, a university of iowa student organization, to present films at two locations on five permanent screens and a seasonal outdoor cinema. From our home in downtown iowa city, we enrich the cultural vitality of the surrounding area through community-supported programming that showcases exceptional american and international filmmaking in a vibrant, accessible, and welcoming space.

As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.

Program

  1. Filmscene serves the eastern iowa region through full-time, community- supported cinema in downtown iowa city. Filmscene annually presents over 450 unique new release and repertory films, with broad representation of genres, filmmakers, and distributors within the international film ecosystem. In addition, Filmscene serves as a community hub for film education,community dialogues, and filmmaker support often in partnership with other nonprofits and community groups. Filmscene is committed to enriching the cultural vitality of the area through community-supported programming that showcases exceptional american and international filmmaking in a vibrant, accessible, and welcoming space.

    $1,810,440 spent$802,587 earned by the program
    100% of program spending

The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $1,810,440.

02The organization over time

The organization over time

Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.

100 = 20172017 Revenue 100 ($748k) Expenses 100 ($729k) Net assets 100 ($93k)2018 Revenue 163 ($1.2M) Expenses 129 ($942k) Net assets 400 ($371k)2019 Revenue 326 ($2.4M) Expenses 213 ($1.5M) Net assets 1357 ($1.3M)2020 Revenue 247 ($1.8M) Expenses 193 ($1.4M) Net assets 1827 ($1.7M)2021 Revenue 200 ($1.5M) Expenses 176 ($1.3M) Net assets 2058 ($1.9M)2022 Revenue 186 ($1.4M) Expenses 242 ($1.8M) Net assets 1755 ($1.6M)2023 Revenue 257 ($1.9M) Expenses 287 ($2.1M) Net assets 1576 ($1.5M)2024 Revenue 250 ($1.9M) Expenses 285 ($2.1M) Net assets 1356 ($1.3M)
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24
Revenue (250)Expenses (285)Net assets (1356)Peer revenue range

Balance sheet

Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2020 to 2021, from $2.4M to $4.2M (+75%).

$139k
$449k
$1.7M
$2.4M
$4.2M
$4.2M
$3.8M
$3.5M
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24
Total assetsTotal liabilities

How it's funded, over time

Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.

2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

Government-grant reliance: 2017 3% · 2018 3% · 2019 1% · 2020 10% · 2021 36% · 2022 12% · 2023 6% · 2024 4%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.

37% of FILMSCENE’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (63% for the typical peer).

This organization
Typical peer · 5,395 orgs

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 of the last 8 reported years ran a deficit.

$20k
’17
$279k
’18
$888k
’19
$437k
’20
$215k
’21
−$370k
’22
−$167k
’23
−$204k
’24
1.9
months of
reserve

Leadership and staff

The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.

Board chair

Monique Galpin

Chair of boa

As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.

'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24
Listed2026302324241720
Joined·+8+6+5+1+9+5+6
No longer listed·221209123
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 3 funders to 9 funders, grant income rose $44k → $55k.

12 of 34 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 50% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.

From the IRS filings of FILMSCENE’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 34 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

How concentrated its funding is

FILMSCENE has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 16% of grant income, and it takes 5 funders to reach half.

the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 5 funders to its left

78% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund FILMSCENE.

16%
largest funder
37%
top three
~13
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 71% · 2018 42% · 2019 18% · 2020 26% · 2021 32% · 2022 24% · 2023 36% — diversifying over time.

“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

How long its funders stay

20% of FILMSCENE's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 41% give in more than one year at all.

first grant+1y+2y+3y+4y+5y

Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.

Where its funders are

FILMSCENE draws 57% of its grant income from funders outside Iowa, across 9 states in all.

MN
IL
MI
NY
MA
IA
PA
NJ
CA

In-state vs out-of-state, by year

’17
’18
’19
’20
’21
’22
’23
Iowa out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $422k arriving through sponsors registered in 9 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

04Its place in the field

Against its field

FILMSCENE has grown faster than half of the 5,136 arts & culture nonprofits its size.

Operating margin−11% · bottom quartile
Months of reserve1.9mo · below the median
Revenue growth (annualized)14% · above the median

this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 5,136 arts & culture nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2024

Government funding FILMSCENE receives

Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $230k on record.

Federal$230k
grants $230kcontracts $0
22
23
24
25
26
Top agencies
  • National Endowment for the Arts$230k

Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.

Organizations like FILMSCENE

Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.

In Iowa

Nationally

05Profile & governance

Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.

Where the money goes

87% of spending goes to programs.

Program 87%Management 10%Fundraising 3%

Governance

15
board members
100%
independent
✓Conflict-of-interest policy–Whistleblower policy–Document retention–Board reviewed the 990✓Audited financials

Public support

98%

Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.

Screen this organization

A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for FILMSCENE: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.

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Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf

Questions and answers

Who funds FILMSCENE?
FILMSCENE (Iowa) receives grants from 34 organizations whose IRS filings report $844,502 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($133,400). 14 of them have funded it in more than one year.
How many funders does FILMSCENE have?
IRS filings report 34 organizations giving $844,502 in grants to FILMSCENE, 14 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of FILMSCENE?
FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND is the largest funder on record, with $133,400 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like FILMSCENE find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Iowa. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.

Play a game about who funds Filmscene →

These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2017–2024), and the filings of 34 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing