Jury Nominees 2024

Aidan Lesser - 22

A desperate woman takes her elderly mother with dementia on one last drive through the snow-covered countryside.

Closing Night

Joey Schweitzer - 24

A Holocaust survivor navigates the pressures of assimilation with the trauma of her past in 1950s Brooklyn.

Centerpiece

Lucas Manuel-Scheibe - 20

A literary translator moves from Sao Paulo to New York to work on the novel of a dying author. Adrift in the unfamiliar city, she seeks solace by consuming soil from her homeland.

Closing Night

Nathan Ginter - 23

After seeing a botched depiction of himself, Sammy, a nude drawing model, sprouts an ear from the back of his head, spiraling his sense of self-image and life out of control.

Centerpiece

JT Trinidad

Along a river that undergoes a major change, Baby, a middle-aged transwoman, shuttles between her job as a companion-for-hire for strangers and her duty to her father. As the people around Baby start to disappear, she realizes that she has been left behind in a stagnating city.

Centerpiece

Jaina Galves - 23

A phone conversation with my father in which we discuss our identity as Native Hawaiians.

Opening Night

Hannah Hunter - 22

Inspired by the youth of the Scottish highlands- whose collective voice often goes unnoticed and unheard- this documentary captures the opinions of young people living in Ardnamurchan, through interviews inspired by traditional oral storytelling.

Reel Impact

Freddie Gluck - 23

In this short documentary, we journey into the enigmatic world of Rex, a self-made sculptor who engages in philosophical musings about mortality — verbalizing his abandonment of fear to his headstones.

Centerpiece

Ian Kim - 17

An award-winning short animated documentary about the life of Lee Yong-soo, known in Korea as Grandma Lee, an activist and survivor of the Japanese World War II-era “Comfort Women” system of human trafficking and sexual slavery.

Reel Impact

Matteo Moretti - 22

After losing his wife, Papou reconciles with a changed sense of belonging as he returns to his home village without her.

Coping for the Best

Andrés Lira - 23

An insightful look into the working lives of undocumented farmworkers in America and their experiences with migration, exploitation, and poverty.

Centerpiece

Agustina Aranda - 21

A young filmmaker explores her fraught relationship with her father—a Paraguayan immigrant, workaholic, and amateur videographer— using his VHS tapes spanning over forty years of his life.

Closing Night

Giovanna Trujillo - 22

A group of queer Latinx skaters struggle with crippling mental health and societal expectations in Southern California. In their local skate community, they find cathartic release, chosen family and mastery of empowerment.

Happy Hour Shorts

Vivienne Ayres - 19, Nidhi Kumar - 20, Audrey Shuppert - 19

Three Alaska Native artists define the intrinsic value of their work while a booming downtown tourism industry extracts and appropriates their culture into souvenirs.

Reel Impact

Owen Markham - 23

Frank, an aging Irishman, lives a simple yet busy life surrounds by his friends and his dogs.

Passionate Pursuits

Phoenix Park - 18

The air conditioner standardizes the most extreme of temperatures, cooling passion in service of unchanging comfort.

Breaking the Mold

Tiffany Lin - 24

This 100% happened to me.

Happy Hour Shorts

SEO Pyoungwon - 24

A big hole gets made in Sung-joon’s heart after he becomes alone. An unfilled emptiness dominates his daily life, and one day, Min-seok, a senior at the company, takes Sung-joon to the badminton court.

Friday Night Spotlight

Max Hendrickson - 18

A stop motion re-telling of the classic Edgar Allen Poe short story, in which a man is driven to insanity by the presence of his older companion's pale blue eye.

Uneasy Street

Lindsey Shaw - 24

"Wait" is a short, 1 minute animation exploring themes of loss, childhood, and time.

Breaking the Mold

Dani Sadun - 22

Frida, an 8-year-old engineering prodigy, builds an airplane behind her mother’s back to follow in her Abuela’s legacy.

Eclectic Endeavors

Alex Vicatos - 21

Follow along as a group of animated flour-based sweets and loaves come together to make a new friend for their clique - a mischievous, weird and cute film in the kitchen.

Happy Hour Shorts

Johanna Xue - 24

A 6-year-old girl starts attending kindergarten where she meets a strict teacher who uses a bamboo stick to discipline children.

Fresh Eyes

Joy Zhou - 21

When missing 8th grader Penny Liu returns to her eerie New England town as a ghost, she’s determined, along with her crime-solving BFF, to hunt down her own murderer—and the origin of all her town’s sinister secrets!

Futurescapes

Gabrielle Selnet - 25

Thrown out of her mother's apartment without even a pair of shoes, Gab tries to find a flat amidst the chaos of Paris’ streets.

Centerpiece

Philip Thompson - 23

An exploration of the emotional divide between fiction and reality in the American sitcom.

Experimental Visions

Noah Lazar Abraham - 17

Deep in the forest, a lonely wolf falls madly in love with a human woman. Rabid Love is a shadow puppet short film by the 17 year old artist Noah Lazar.

Breaking the Mold

Boluwatife Adeniran - 23

A young, pregnant and overworked woman gets a few things off her chest as she prepares to give birth in an undisclosed post colonial Pan-African country.

Experimental Visions

Kaylinn Duffy - 23

Tuesday Film is an experimental, coming-of-age drama following the life and thoughts of Kasey, who is overburdened by the beautiful scenes she sees while driving around Springfield, MO.

Pedal to the Mettle

Costa Karalis - 23

A cow recalls moments from a past life before they are gone forever.

Experimental Visions

Jesse Vela - 21

Still, quiet, and hopefully in peace: both an ideal night for our day-to-day but also in the hopes for our passing. But do we hold our sleep sacred, let alone the sleep over others; that is why I made this documentary, because the sun sometimes sleeps.

Experimental Visions

Jack Cosgriff - 19

Kino Kopf, a sentient humanoid VHS camera dreams of an electric cowboy as their memories flash through their lens.

Experimental Visions

Ankit Santra - 24

Inspired by Kafka's 'The Metamorphosis', a propaganda artist Bihaan traces his journey of becoming a vermin while trying to paint a nude portrait of his lover. As a sense of infidelity penetrates his personal relationships, he is posed with a question- what is morally corrupt- art or the artist?

Experimental Visions

Jeongmin OH - 23

A child with a dandelion head, an insect and a fish with a human face, and the Absolute.

Experimental Visions

Ana Pereira - 18

A film for my people, where I speak directly to them, use their names and mention their ways. And for those who have never heard my name, I hope they find themselves capable of feeling, that they have the desire to ride a seagull and a huge desire to learn to love.

Breaking the Mold

Justin Nguyen - 20, Ethan Frank - 21

Feeling discomfort within herself, Devon, portrayed by Hollywood star Robert Rexx, goes through the personal archives of her past relationship. Faced with the weight of unresolved emotions, she embarks on a journey through memories to figure out why she feels soo sticky.

Opening Night

Luciana Baldovino - 24

'Dropping Seeds' by Carly Gibert (Music Video)

Seismic Soundtracks

Gordy De St. Jeor

I'm on your tongue, and it's just what I want.

Friday Night Spotlight

Caitlyn Phu - 22

A band of puppets go on the run after escaping their evil puppetmaster.

Seismic Soundtracks

Eliot Lee - 24

Claire and Gavin spend a day in Los Angeles.

Closing Night

Michael Colombos - 21, Dakota Ticheli - 23

Dogpark Band is in an electrifying performance before an airplane, harnessing the propeller's wind.

Seismic Soundtracks

Ama Buzo - 22

After tossing a coin into a magical fountain, a young girl dives into it herself, swimming into realms of manifested dreams.

Seismic Soundtracks

Maya Marzuki Peters - 22

RAEGAN is reimagined as a fairytale character trapped inside of a swamp cottage. She must find a way to reckon with the barrage of frogs trying to break down her door.

Happy Hour Shorts

Zishan Sun - 22

In “TALK”, Deacon Phillippe’s music video, Deacon met someone who seemed to be perfect for him, but the universe guided him on a mysterious journey, challenging him to find the balance between self-love and the pursuit of genuine emotional connections.

Seismic Soundtracks

Anahita von Andrian-Werburg - 20

In a whimsical chase through New York's East Village on Valentine's Day, a young man follows his runaway heart, leading to encounters that reveal the interconnectedness of love and loss.

Seismic Soundtracks

Teja Mettu - 18

When a 2nd generation Indian couple discovers their new home falls under the shadow of a local Hindu temple, they’re forced to confront the beliefs of their traditional Desi community, before dealing with the dire consequences of bad Vastu.

Episodic Showcase

Sabrina Yum-Shuster - 22, Katrina Yum-Shuster -18

Jude Lavine has a secret admirer. As the Queen-Bee of Lakeview high, she never thought much of it. But after getting brutally dumped by her long-time boyfriend, and replaced with another girl, maybe a secret admirer is a good thing to have on your side.

Episodic Showcase

Ethan Hawthorne-Dallas - 22

An investigation of a murder at a gas station leads two private-military officers to a mysterious drug den. Meanwhile, a gang member dealing counterfeit drugs is given the opportunity of a lifetime.

Episodic Showcase