It’s September at Austin Film Festival, which means we’re only a few weeks away from announcing our full 2015 slate of films! Hold on to your seats, because it’s a going to be a great one (as you might be able to tell from our First Ten Sneak Peek). And to help you through these final few weeks of waiting, we’re carrying on our tradition of announcing some of our standout short films early. That’s right, it’s time for #MovieMonday and #FilmFriday! Every Monday and Friday, we will be announcing these short films through our Twitter account (@austinfilmfest). Follow us to get the inside scoop before anyone else. And keep on checking back here for the most up-to-date list of announced shorts.
And if you’re excited about these shorts, and want to watch them in October, get yourself a Film Pass for 8 days of feature films, short films, red carpets, and Q&As.
Check out the list below!
Sinecdoque. Una Historia De Amour Fou
Harry and Judy
The love story of two religious teens, whose innocent romance takes a sharp turn when Judy begins to stray from the faith. Deeply unsettled by his newlywed’s penchant for sin, Harry descends into madness – content to carry out the judgments of God upon those he deems impure.
Humble Pie
An animated comedy short featuring a fly who learns a lesson about pride in a story of insects and violence.
The 100 Years Show
Carmen Herrera, a spunky and distinctive painter coming up on her 100th birthday, is finally achieving the recognition that eluded her for most of her career.
Red Rover
Two teenagers from a remote religious community travel to town in search of shelter after being told by their Evangelical parents that an asteroid will soon destroy the earth.
P.S. 432
P.S. 432 tells the story of a NYC public school teacher who must decide whether or not to cheat on behalf of his students on a high-stakes standardized test.
We Are Happy
Sarah and Paul’s best friends tell them the great news – they’re getting divorced. Unable to understand why their happily married friends are untying the knot, Sarah and Paul start to analyze their own marriage, with disastrous consequences.
Best Wishes from Millwood
An unhappy housewife is visited by a bicycle-riding stranger with wish-making cookies.
20 Somethings
An antisocial twenty-something must escape hipster conversations in order to meet a beautiful girl before she leaves the party without him.
SOAR
A precocious young girl makes a new friend when a tiny boy pilot drops out of the sky on a broken flying machine. Now she must race against time to return him home, before her new friend becomes stranded on Earth forever.
Standing 8
Abdul is a bitter and burned-out journeyman boxer who was raised to fight and win with little success. But when he kills an opponent in the ring, his popularity soars. In the lead up to his next fight he must confront his greatest enemy – himself. Standing8 is a journey to discover how the center of Abdul’s universe – boxing – threatens to crush his sanity and destroy his livelihood.
Safe Space
Patrick and Sara live a love story, but they are also fighting together for refugee rights in Berlin. When a harmless advance turns into a sexual assault, the group is forced to rethink their aims and their private story grows to an unwanted public dimension.
18
Ingrid visits the therapist she’s been seeing her entire adolescence on her 18th birthday to announce that she’s done with therapy before heading out for a night on the town with her girlfriends.
Skin the Cat
A dark comedy about a feline-phobic guy who hires a pet hit man to take out his girlfriend’s cat.
Father’s Day
A dramedy about trying to patch foxholes with band-aids.
Anthem
Anthem captures the unlikely and perilous meeting of two truly unique people. Two people with a common passion and a common struggle. The film follows two devoted rock climbers (Jeremy Thomley and Marie Claude Mathieu) as they discover each other, themselves, and their mutual fight for breath and physical contact on a secluded mountaintop. At its core, Anthem is a human story of determination, dangerous curiosity, and acceptance.
The Romance Class
Julia has finally found the perfect ending to her romance novel, but her writing group has some ideas of their own.
Into Memory
When a dying young man is released from the hospital for hospice, his closest friends and family surprise him with a small celebration of his life and create one last memory for him.
Blurry
A woman with an over-active imagination sees the world unlike anyone else. That’s not always a good thing. When her imagination becomes too distracting, she decides to get a chip implant that removes her imagination. After the procedure, her entire perspective on life and herself changes… but for the better?
Motherland
Jen spends one last night with his mother before she leaves for Bangkok, Thailand. With limited time and an indefinite separation ahead of them, the two are prompted to find solace within a torn family.
Lunch Break
A flirtatious encounter in a drugstore parking lot turns into a complicated game that takes Rosie and Lewis to a new level of intimacy.
Dakota
During a routine investigation of an abandoned truck, a Border Patrol Agent uncovers something that will cause him to question the very nature of his job.
Vainilla
Irene is the last one in her grief support group to share her loved one’s last words, but it’s a question she’s not quite ready to answer.
The Sister I Live With
A young girl struggles with her older sister’s impending departure for college and a deepening crush on her piano teacher.
Marta Rosa
Immediately following the death of her young child, Marta Rosa, a rural Mexican woman, must struggle to persevere through both her own internal grief and the harsh realities of the external world around her.
Night Shift
Members of the night shift custodial team in the Moody College of Communications building at UT Austin come from all over the world and have built a tight-knit work family here in the halls where we work and study. The film chronicles their life stories and situates these memories within the team’s present-day work environment.