Jesse Padveen - 23, Solmund MacPherson - 24, Tobias Harrison - 23, Josh Willick - 23 | Canada

“Have you ever had a night that was such a bummer, such a pile up of rotten luck and inopportune life challenges, that you were left with a distinct cocktail of incomprehensibly bleak emotions? Sometimes all you can do is laugh. Or, perhaps, you can dive straight into the subconscious, dredge up the detritus of our woes and throw it all on screen. THE SPHINX is one of the most bafflingly funny films I’ve seen in a long time, where every formal decision contributes to a specific sense of comedic dread that had me completely locked in from beginning to end. I find myself quoting it to friends and forgetting it’s not (yet) a well known feature.”

Centerpiece presented by Adobe Premiere Pro

Amira Stone - 23 | USA

“Some of my favorite documentaries calibrate themselves to the pace of life as experienced by the subject; this one takes it a step further by including a Costco POV shot! The filmmaker's grandmother, fka “Angelita,” has built a home for herself that has offered great comfort in her later years, one that invites reflections on the space of the past and our memories. There's a profoundly touching moment where Angelita, resting on the beach, discusses her inability to walk comfortably after back surgery; we then cut to a group of clams burrowing into the sand as the tide comes rushing in. Through simple visual association and unobtrusive montage, we find ourselves discovering the peace in life.”

Familial Frames

Justin Kaminuma - 24 | USA

“As a lifelong lover of cinema, it might not come as a surprise that loss of vision remains one of my recurring anxieties (it doesn’t help that I end up with more floaters with each passing year). When I encountered this film, I kept asking myself what I was looking at and where its uncanny power came from. Upon learning that the filmmaker created it entirely in their bedroom through a process of animating forgotten photos of childhood hallways and haunting backrooms, subsequently printed out on copy paper and scanned back into the film itself, I couldn’t help but marvel even more. What we’re left with is a bad dream we can’t shake, a liminal nightmare that pops up in unexpected places long after the film has ended.”

Experimental Visions

Thibeaux Hirsh - 22 | Jamaica

“I try to pay extra attention to the odd moments of coincidental synchronicity in my life. Early in the morning before starting a day of NFFTY programming, I finished reading Cockfighter by the great Charles Willeford. I was immediately struck when my first short of the day was this portrait of a Jamaican alligator conservationist and fowl fighter named Evel. First I marvelled at the happenstance, and then I found myself marveling at the film (along with many of the echoes across both depictions of complicated men and the relationships that keep them going). With a perceptive approach to the material, the film characterizes the remarkable life of a caring father and his unconventional professions.”

Friday Night Spotlight presented by MUBI

Léo Gatinot - 24, Clara Nicolas - 24 | France & Italy

“What role does the landscape play in our activism? Could it even, perhaps, be a member of our collective? With a keen eye for landscape photography (exquisitely captured on 16mm), this documentary charts the repercussions of a tunnel boring machine cutting its way through a mountain on the Franco-Italian border. Eschewing talking heads, we hear voices of the community overlaid over scenes of both natural beauty and the haunting intervention of humanity. Does our anger simply echo in the valley, or is that the land speaking back at us?”

Reel Impact presented by Team Soapbox