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Nominations Winter 2023

Nominated: Best Art/Experimental

At The Fence
At The Fence

Director/Writer/Producer: Max Albrecht

Cinematographer: Anna Liepelt

Country: Germany

Project Type: Short

Overview: A journalist on the cold trail of their missing grandfather discovers a fabled house overlooking a remote town. As their investigation continues, they discover disturbing evidence of extradimensional experimentation and unearth their grandfather's fate.

Director Biography: Born in the south of England and raised in the north, while studying a physics degree at university Max identified film-making as a way to combine his various creative interests, including writing, visual composition, acting, and composing songs and soundtracks. Max is a lifelong fan of sci-fi, horror, fantasy and surreal films, and draws upon his own scientific knowledge and medical experience of surviving cancer at an early age to colour the philosophies behind the characters and worlds in his films.

Nominated: Best Long Short, Best Student Director
Cheese and Onion

Director: Shaun Stone-Riley

Writer/Producer: Mark Quinn

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Short

Overview: ‘Cheese and Onion’ is a police crime drama highlighting how a small dispute can escalate out of hand and lead to tragic consequences. Set in present day rural West Yorkshire, the narrative follows a police sergeant as she takes revenge on her husband's young mistress. Highlighting the abuse of power, injustice and the destruction of a young woman’s dream, Cheese and Onion is a story that audiences of all ages and walks of life will find thought-provoking.

Director Biography : I'm working class, mixed heritage, Gen Z with a passion for grass roots, hands on filmmaking. I seek to give a voice to narratives that deal with specific cases of austerity and Injustice and its effect on northern working-class multiculturalism. something close to my heart.

Nominated: Best Feature Documentary

CANCER/EVOLUTION Episode 1: The Dustbin of History

Director/Producer: Maggie Jones, Brad Jones

Writer: Brad Jones

Country: United States

Project Type: Science, Docuseries, Television

Overview: The newest hope for cancer is actually one of the oldest. Buried for a century, the metabolic theory of cancer is overturning entrenched dogma and reshaping the future of cancer treatment. Episode 1 of this 5-part docuseries addresses the history of the metabolic theory of cancer through the story of Nobel laureate Otto Warburg, a gay, Jewish scientist under aegis of the Nazis.

Director Statement: One month after my 40th birthday I was diagnosed with terminal, stage 4 lung cancer that had spread to my left eye, my liver, a dozen lymph nodes throughout my chest, neck and abdomen, and four tumors in my brain. My prognosis of six to eight months with conventional treatment seemed optimistic. My doctors were focused on making me comfortable. I was dying. One year later I was cancer free. Survival should not be reserved for the privileged.

Nominated: Best Short Screenplay

STOP. PLAY. FORWARD
STOP. PLAY. FORWARD

Writer: Luigi Rizzo

Country: Italy

Genre: Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller

Overview: A young girl trapped inside a dystopian government structure tries to break free from a teacher who wants to know who stole from a forbidden area




Nominated: Best Short Screenplay
Sirens of Silence
Sirens of Silence

Writers: Matt Townsend, Ellana Blacher

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Short Script

Overview: A professional couple book a relaxing break in an AirBnb Lodge in a remote place named 'Silence'. The owners are not the innocents they seem to be and have their own plans for the couple staying in their home.

Nominated: Best Fantasy/Sci-Fi Short
Exclusion Zone
Exclusion Zone

Director/Writer: Blake Ridder

Producers: Louis James, Lucas A Ferrara

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Short

Overview: Inside the Exclusion Zone habits an alien species. It is Jason's mission to report what he discovers, while looking for Dr. Watson.

Nominated: Best Feature
The Whirlpool
The Whirlpool

Director: Den Hook

Writer: Olga Loyanich

Producers: Olga Loyanich, Alexander Kalushkin

Country: Russian Federation

Genres: Thriller, Horror, Mystery, Drama

Overview: Beauty Lyuba is on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Her relationship with her husband has come to a standstill - she is tired of enduring bullying and insults, but cannot find the strength to leave. Together with her friends, Lyuba goes on a retreat in the Russian outback, where shamans perform secret rituals to help the wards face their fears. But it so happened that Lyuba's main fear is a meeting with herself. And from yourself, unlike the clergy, do not run away.

Director Statement: This project is very important for us not only as a film, but also as a massage to all young woman in the World about abuse and how it goes and also it is our manifestation against an abuse.

Nominated: Best Original Score
The Fate of Cysalion

Director/Writer/Producer: Marc Blasweiler

Country: Germany

Project Type: Musical, Feature

Overview: The Fate of Cysalion is a three-hour live-action musical that blurs the line between film and theatre. It is the centrepiece of a fantasy saga that tells an epochal story of heroes, villains and ancient powers. The story takes place in a distant place called Cysalion. In 1898, the boy Tayen Knightway is sent on a risky mission by the last living Vartori and ponders seminal events that took place some two hundred years earlier. An epic adventure unfolds before the viewer's eyes as two young girls embark on a breathtaking journey amidst kingdoms and empires.

Director Statement: This film will always be special to me because there were many triggers for it. On the one hand, there was always this dream of making my own film, which would then be shown on the big screen in the cinema. On the other hand, I often got strong feedback from my sweet wife Ariane, my family, friends and acquaintances that I should make a film of my theatre and musical productions.




Nominated: Best Feature Screenplay / TV Script
Let's Talk About Sex
Let's Talk About Sex

Writer: Marissa Zumbo

Country: United States

Genres: Drama, Comedy, Television Script

Overview: When the new editor-in-chief of a smalltown florida magazine wants employees to write about sex, it turns the city upside down and forces everyone to re-evaluate their Intimate lives.

Nominated: Best Director

The Cadaver
The Cadaver

Director/Writer: Volkan Özgümüş

Producers: Volkan Özgümüş, Erkut Altındağ

Country: Turkey

Project Type: Horror, Thriller, Short

Overview: Three medical schools students organize a spoofing ritual on the school cadaver for fun. The results of this ritual will be fatal.

Nominated: Best Student Director, Best Actor (Sam Strickland)
Going Nowhere

Director/Writer/Producer: George Walker

Key Cast "Wyatt Woodley": Sam Strickland

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Long Short

Overview: Tasked with bringing more tourism to the Yorkshire town, a local man struggles to hold the community together, as a crew documents the whole peculiar experience.

Nominated: Best Animation Short

iCare
iCare

Director/Writer: Bruno Urzi

Producer: Alex Sellen

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Animation, Short




Nominated: Best Short
A Time for Love: Something Beautiful

Director: Dennis O'Neill

Producers: Dennis O'Neill, Marcelle McDaniel, Chuck McDaniel

Writers: Dennis O'Neill, Marcelle McDaniel

Country: United States

Project Type: Drama, Short

Overview: A TIME FOR LOVE – SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL: After a desperate call from his daughter about her mom pushed to the limits of depression, a pastor rushes home to his wife's aid. He changes his podcast message to the subject of depression, balancing the topic of medicine and faith. Something Beautiful is a stand-alone short film. However, it is part of the series, A Time For Love. This film will ignite and inspire the world we are in to live passionately and with gratitude. Something Beautiful hits home on many levels concerning depression and its effects on its victim and their family members. When faced with conflict, a pastor, his wife, and his daughter bring calm, understanding, and light to a dark situation. With self-awareness and self-forgiveness, this story sheds insight and light into God's love and understanding in the lives of millions who face this debilitating battle of depression. This message is filled with hope, victory, overcoming faith, and the battle cry of help in mental health. After all, "It's all about love, isn't it?"

Director Statement: I have always believed in the power of storytelling to bring about change and awareness in people. In our latest projects, A Time for Love and Bail Out, I endeavor to work more effectively and diligently to provide work for my acting students and other actors. Through my work, I hope to give voice to those struggling with depression and help to understand the importance of seeking help and support. My close friend Marcelle McDaniel made me a Godfatheresque offer I couldn't refuse, asking me to become a collaborative filmmaking partner with her. It was one of the best decisions I have made.

Nominated: Best Documentary Short
Ink and Gold: An Artist's Journey to Olympic Glory

Director: Zakea Page

Producers: Zakea Page, K.W. Miller

Country: New Zealand

Project Type: Documentary, Short

Overview: A young New Zealand artist and athlete wins the 2020 Youth Olympic Games medal design competition and fulfills a lifelong dream to perform at the opening ceremonies.

Director Statement: As a child, it was always a dream of mine to win an Olympic medal. Designing the medals and performing at the 2020 Lausanne Youth Olympic Games was both a humbling and invaluable experience in which I realised the value of risk-taking, rising to meet a challenge, and taking part in the Games. It is my belief that sport and art require a strong drive for excellence, dedication, and detail. Having traveled around the world, I witnessed how art and sport both bring together communities and people of diverse backgrounds. Artistry and competition bridge barriers of language and foster connections, mutual understanding, and respect for one another. Drawing synergy from both art and sport, my performance at the Opening Ceremony was a statement against the stereotypical art vs sports dichotomy that New Zealand youth are very often forced into. The documentary highlights the connection between art and sport to demonstrate that investing in both is culturally beneficial for New Zealand, the world of sport, and humanity. It is an opportunity to share what I learned and experienced - a reflection on my individual Olympic journey and the fact that we are all multi-faceted beings. It is my hope that the audience develops a deeper understanding of the beliefs and values that went into my performance - values that align with the Olympic movement which I take pride in as an artist, an athlete, and a New Zealander: Innovation, creativity, and an appreciation for beauty in diversity.

Nominated: Best Long Short
NAAM BADAL DENA

Director: Arshila Salman

Writer: Tom Rida Bilal

Producer: Naveed Uddin Farooqi

Country: Canada

Project Type: Short

Overview: “What greater thing is there for two human souls, than to feel that they are joined for life--to strength each other in all labor, to rest on each other in all sorrow, to minister to each other in silent unspeakable memories at the moment of the last parting?" George Eliot

Director Statement: To be an artist means never to avert one’s eyes- Akira Kurosawa. This film that we made "Naam Badal Dela" is a game changer in terms of story telling. We have tried to present true and natural feelings of a dedicated, loving wife. And yes true love exist in modern times too. Man and wife could also be true soulmates :)

Nominated: Best Feature
GOOD GUY WITH A GUN

Director/Writer: John Mossman

Producers: Kevin Kenneth Cooper, DeAnna Marie Cooper

Country: United States

Project Type: Feature

Overview: Will Greenwood, a Chicago teenager forced to come to terms with his father's violent death, visits a small town and finds solace in a group of local kids. When the town bully threatens Will’s new friend, how far will he go to protect him...especially with a gun? It is a coming of age drama where young men and guns come crashing together…

Director Statement: With this film I hope to explore the danger and at times the appeal of going down this path, and the extraordinary difficulty of turning back - and ultimately the enduring power of family to see us through dark times.




Nominated: Best Feature Screenplay
Cold War Reboot

Writer: Joshua A Cohen

Country: United States

Genres: Spy, Action, Thriller

Overview: An FSB spy hunting an oligarch team up to stop a Russian terrorist attack on NATO Headquarters

Writer Statement: "Cold War Reboot" is a Euro-spy action thriller, in the vein of Bourne, Bond and Ronin. This is meant to film majority in Greece, and launch a new action franchise.

Nominated: Best Comedy Short
Hardwood Heroes

Directors: Austin Lauer, Colin Louis Kissel

Writers: Austin Lauer, Colin Louis Kissel

Country: United States

Project Type: Comedy,Short

Overview: Oliver Roland tries to live up to his father's bowling legacy, while navigating the chaotic world of The Beer League in Barlow, Kentucky.

Director Statement: Small towns take pride when they produce elite sports talent. They wear athletic triumphs as a badge of honor. Hardwood Heroes visits one such town, where the pinnacle of America's Professional Beer-League-Bowling talent is born.

Nominated: Best Drama Short
Steve the Stammer's Missing Painting
Steve the Stammer's Missing Painting

Director: John Henry Henry Westhead

Country: United States

Project Type: Short

Director Statement: We are submitting Steve the Stammer's Missing Painting as a short, essentially the first thirteen minutes of what will be a feature film. We have shot roughly thirty five minutes but much is out of sequence so it wasn't an option to submit a longer short. Regardless we will eventually submit the film as a feature. We hope submitting a short is a good way to market the film through the production process. Thanks, hope you enjoy the film.

Nominated: Best Drama Short
The Relented

Director: Steve James Moore

Writer: Connor Wulfric

Producers: Connor Wulfric, Steve James Moore

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Action & Adventure, Distopian, Thriller, Short

Overview: After two decades of political and economical turmoil, society has broken down. We follow Mitchell, a young man and newly declared Dissent, surviving alone as hunter gatherer in the wild for the past 18 months. As Mitchell makes his way through dangerous territories, on a slow route to the Freeland when he finds himself in an interaction he thought not possible.




Nominated: Best Comedy Short
Pak Life

Director: Mike Doxford

Writer: Zara Janjua

Producer: Zara Janjua

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Comedy, Short

Overview: A seemingly innocent chat up turns into some stereotyped ideas about race and identity.

Nominated: Best Short
Itching
Itching

Director/Writer: Catherine Marriott-Brown

Producer: Gracie Mills

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Short

Overview: ITCHING tells the story of a lonely young woman who is kept awake at night by an itch on her back that she just can’t scratch. While mudlarking on the Thames foreshore, she meets a young man (who is far more interested in her than she is in him) when they discover a back scratcher lying in the mud. She takes it home and tries to use it, but the handle is broken, she still can’t reach that spot. When she finds a glass eye peering up at her from between the pebbles, she begins to build a man out of the washed up pieces of glass, pottery, stone and cast off possessions of long dead Londoners which litter her room--but there’s something not quite right about him...

Nominated: Best Short
KAYAMAI
KAYAMAI

Director/Writer/Producer: Radhakrishnan Gopal

Country: India

Project Type: Short

Overview: A Group of so called INTELECT NAXALS, who are plotting a huge rally against the GOVERNMENT'S (LITHIUM) project to protect the soil from environmental impact. A corrupted MINISTER (POLITICIAN) setting up the team of COPS to stop the protest, because he has a personal benefit in the project, if it is signed between the GOVERNMENT and one Multinational Company. So, what is next and the end? Somehow only the mankind is responsible for all environmental impact, ultimately mother nature suffers taking the brunt of all destruction.

Nominated: Best Art/Experimental
Hopelessly Hopeful
Hopelessly Hopeful

Director: Somen Kumar, Disha k Shukla

Writer/Producer: Somen Kumar

Country: India

Project Type: Short

Overview: In today's world of instant gratification & innumerable options at our fingertips, do people give up on the first instance of difficulty or keep fighting for their love. This is a story of a couple that can't live with or without each other. The film takes you on an emotional rollercoaster of a relationship, treated in a surreal way.




Nominated: Best Feature Documentary
J'Accuse! A cry from the killing pits of Lithuania
J'Accuse! A cry from the killing pits of Lithuania

Director/Writer/Producer: Michael D Kretzmer

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Documentary

Overview: A documentary film that tears apart Lithuania's policy of holocaust denial and its official hero worship of mass murderers.

Director Statement: This is a film about honour and justice. It tells the story of a huge injustice and a modern scandal: the Lithuanian government's official policy of using lies to protect known mass murderers. Murderers Like Jonas Noreika, who murdered 14,500 Jews in conditions of unbelievable cruelty. Among his victims were a kindergarten class from the town of Plunge. These children are the symbol of my film, it's voice, and the reason I made it.

Nominated: Best Thriller/Horror Short
Enter the Room

Director/Writer: Harry Waldman

Producers: Lance Eliot Adams, Harry Waldman

Country: United States

Project Type: Short

Overview: A young adult (Brian) is visited by his brother, Jeremy, who needs a place to stay as he settles into his new city. The two polar opposite personalities begin to clash as Jeremy's presence poses a threat to Brian's way of life. Brian's uptight personality and unreasonable living standards rub off on Jeremy, creating an incredible amount of tension. Bad blood, stemming from a traumatic past event reveals the shocking truth of the brothers' current situations, as Brian struggles to differentiate between reality and his worst nightmares.

Director Statement: I try to create powerful films that make the viewer feel a wide range of emotions and convey ideas that will linger in the viewers' minds long after the credits roll.

Nominated: Best Fantasy/Sci-Fi Short
RIFT
RIFT

Director: Farhad Bakhtiarikish

Writers: Farhad Bakhtiarikish, Human Esfandiar Nia

Producer: Tilde Westrup

Country: Sweden

Overview: An unhappy married man who still believes in true love finds himself in a dilemma when meets a woman in a virtual dating app called RIFT.

Director Statement: Through this film, I hope to explore the complexities of modern relationships and the search for true love in a digital age. The main character's belief in true love, despite his current unhappiness, adds an additional layer of depth to the story and allows the audience to see the world through his eyes as he grapples with this difficult decision.

Nominated: Best Short
Stars Behind the Clouds
Stars Behind the Clouds

Director: Thomas Tulak

Writer: Kelsey Dougherty

Country: United States

Genres: Romance, Comedy, Short

Overview: Fresh on the heels of a romantic rejection, Kelsey attends a friend's party with one goal: have a casual hookup for the very first time. But fate - like she so often does - has other plans.

Director Statement: As a hopeless romantic, I was drawn to the script for “Stars Behind The Clouds” because of the story behind the story. It’s the heart warming true story of how, writer, Kelsey Dougherty met her husband. It feels like the kind of story that only happens in movies, and they are still married. They actually lived happily ever after, and I think that’s beautiful! I’m excited and honored hat Kelsey gave me the opportunity to bring her story of true love to life!




Honorable Mention
Letters for Lost Lovers

Director: Faisal Ahmad

Writers: Faisal Ahmad

Country: United Kingdom

Project Type: Long Short

Overview: An intimate portrait of two lovers suffering from dementia and their fractured existence, set across three timelines and centred on the true, tragic love story of Héloïse d'Argenteuil and Abélard in 12th century France.