Independent Shorts Awards

On a beautiful sunny morning in a suburb of Silicon Valley, Karen is taking her ailing daughter, Katie, to a doctor’s appointment. Katie suffers a relapse on the way and Karen rushes her to the hospital and, only blocks away, encounters a police funeral detail blocking the road. Karen pleas in vain to the officer to let her through, while she calms her daughter. After considerable delay, Katie falls into a seizure as Karen speeds by the officers, who remain oblivious to the emergency.
Directed by Teresa Langley (USA)

A macho toy arcade prize is quick to judge a young girl who wants to win him and goes on a life-changing journey in an attempt to stop her from winning and taking him home.
Directed by Aviv Mano (USA)

What can go wrong when a strange magazine from a shop can grant you anything you want?
Directed by Thomas Scott (UK)

A shop where things are enchanted and taken home to release their energy for good or evil.
Directed by Thomas Scott (UK)

Intimate footage captured during his 2018 journey to County Sligo, Ireland to trace his Irish Ancestors. Featuring Irish American international poet, writer, and philosopher, Merv Nickleman. Merv is inspired to write the poem Irish Ancestors about his experiences and shares some insights into his complex, eclectic and charismatic character and background.
This short film was entirely shot on a Google Pixel Smartphone.
Directed by Aleksandra Dimoska (Ireland)

Episode One: Even-keeled Brett, a 28-year-old financial analyst, gets more than he bargains for as a result of his newfound efforts to make his life more complete.
Directed by Brett Carmical (USA)

A young woman faces the struggle of depression amidst a parallel dimension of unseen forces, who themselves are waging an epic battle over her fate… and only one side can prevail.
Directed by Sheila Patterson (USA)

Music video featuring Ginta. The meaning of the song is based on the stereotype that we have to always choose between the concept of “yes” or “no”. But the answer is possible when two apparently opposite positions coexist together, at the same time, depending on one’s perspective. This is the principle of life.
Directed by Aleksandras Brokas and Serena Corvaglia (France)

Parents are at odds with what to do when their 6-year old son is sent home from school for wearing a dress.
Directed by Ellie Foumbi and Michael Niederman (USA)

We risk to become irrelevant to the community and danger lurks our vanity and leads to isolation. We only listen to opinions that confirm our own.
“Romanian Diary. Muslim Diary” is intended as a communication vehicle, an invitation to dialogue.
How it influences our location and how much we influence the community to which we belong?  Is Culture one of the pillars of the community? How does Romania look like less touristy and less as seen on television?
Directed by Carmen Lidia Vidu (Romania)

A schoolgirl’s splintered memories of a sexual assault reveal a reality that when revisited from an alternative perspective uncovers a very different truth.
Directed by Kate Cheeseman (UK)

They thought it was a distant future. They thought they knew disaster. But only a few of us were aware of what surely would happen…
In a time when cities grew without limits, where chaos was televised live while people played God, reality was catching up to us – until the day the red dust covered it all. Making us pay for our sins, collapsing our lungs, choking our hope…
2051. Few will survive, with almost no water or food, and barely any… Energy.
Directed by Francisco Garcia Mateos (Spain)

“Treading Yesterday”, an original series plays out through a multi-decade storytelling witnessed through the eyes of Eric, a soon to be a middle-aged gay man, who has lived what appears to be a charmed life. The pilot episode opens as a present-day drama however by midpoint the timeline resets to 1988, in a historical fiction format, during a period in time when monumental anti-gay backlash had been orchestrated.
“Treading Yesterday” juxtaposes 1988’s intolerance of Gays with present-day acceptance while at the same time revealing the inherent challenges existing in both environments.
Directed by Craig Bettendorf (USA)

Based on a holocaust survivors story. A terrorist attack raises uncomfortable questions about immigration, identity, and morality. When a group of disillusioned strangers encounters Eli, an elderly man, can the harrowing events torn from his past influence their future?
Directed by Colin Gerrard (UK)