DC SHORTS WINS! - BEST OF THE FEST
If you love short films, join DC Shorts for a special night of screenings at DC Shorts WINS, showcasing ALL of the films that won Jury Awards and Audience Awards this past September at the DC Shorts International Film Festival. DC Shorts WINS is a great opportunity for film enthusiasts in the DMV and beyond to experience the ‘Best of the Fest’ with 16 entertaining and impactful short films, from seven countries, covering the genres of comedy, drama, animation, documentary, and more. Three showcases, approximately 90 minutes each, with screen on Friday, March 25th, and Saturday, March 26th, at the Goethe Institute. Come out and join the short film loving community in person to after two long years of hiatus and enjoy some fantastic films. It's the perfect way to spend your Friday and Saturday night!
IMPORTANT NOTE:
COVID-19 Admission Policy for Goethe-Institut Washington: As of March 1, 2022, the Goethe-Institut Washington requires that all guests be fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Negative tests or exemptions in lieu of vaccine proof will not be accepted. Please present proof of vaccination and valid government-issued photo ID at the door; mask-wearing will be enforced full-time within the building.
SHOWCASE A (Jury Award Winners)
MUTHA & THE DEADTH OF HAM-MA FUKU
Outstanding Documentary Short
Director: Daniel Suberviola · 25 Min · Documentary · Spain
Mutha searches for antipersonnel mines in the Western Sahara Desert. Every day, she faces death. Every exploded landmine reminds her that she has saved a life, but also that a mine marked her destiny. She is not alone between the fire and the sand. At her side, a presence paralyzes her, but also forces her to keep searching.
WHEN THE SUN SETS
Outstanding International Narrative Short
Director: Phumi Morare · 14 Min · Drama · South Africa
A young, black nurse living in 1985 apartheid South Africa must face her worst fears when she learns that her activist, younger brother may be in danger when he doesn't return after school. Inspired by actual events.
ENTITLED
Outstanding US Narrative Short
Director: Kelsey Fordham · 10 Min · Drama · US
Lenna is thrust into the spotlight when the details of her sexual assault go viral. As her story spreads, lines blur between physical reality and the social media world when a swarm of strangers force their way into her home and frantically rifle through her belongings.
MIGRANTS
Outstanding Animated Short
Directors: Hugo Caby, Antoine Dupriez, Aubin Kubiak, Lucas Lermytte, Zoé Devise · 8 min · US
Two polar bears are driven into exile due to global warming. They will encounter brown bears along their journey, with whom they will try to cohabitate.
GOD’S DAUGHTER DANCES
Outstanding First Time Filmmaker
Director: Sungbin Byun · 25 Min · Comedy/Drama/LGBTQ · South Korea
A transgender female dancer, Shin-mi, gets a call from the Military Manpower Administration, to attend for the Military Service Examination. Shin-mi, with everything in readiness, takes her steps to the Military Manpower Administration.
MISS ALMA THOMAS: A LIFE IN COLOR
Outstanding Local Film
Director: Cheri Gaulke · 20 Min · Documentary/Biography · US
Alma W. Thomas lived a life of firsts: the first Fine Arts graduate of Howard University (1924), the first Black woman to mount a retrospective at the Whitney Museum of American Art (1972), and the first Black woman to have her paintings exhibited in the White House (2009). Yet she did not receive national attention until she was 80. “Miss Alma Thomas” is the first documentary film that explores Thomas’ incredible life through the lens of curators, art specialists, scholars, her family, and award-winning actress Alfre Woodard as the voice of Miss Thomas. Released in conjunction with a major four-city museum retrospective, thousands will have the opportunity to learn of her life, work, and continuing influence.
SHOWCASE B (Audience Award Winners)
SING ME A LULLABY
Director: Tiffany Hsiung · 29 Min · Documentary/Biography · Canada
Ru Wen was separated from her parents at the age of five. Forty years later, she is still unable to connect the fragmented pieces of her childhood. For Ru Wen, survival meant burying her own curiosity to know why she had been abandoned by her birth parents in Taiwan – a curiosity that grew into a silent longing over time. That is, until her youngest daughter Tiffany started asking questions. Captured over 14 years and across two continents ‘Sing Me a Lullaby’ unravels the complex tensions between love and sacrifice. Told through the intertwined journeys of daughters and their mothers, this is a story about recovering familial history, healing inherited pain, and understanding that love comes in many forms.
THE LOVE AND DEATH OF YOSEF AND ZILLI
Director: Dean Gold · 19 Min · Documentary/Biography · Canada
After 62 years of loving marriage, Yosef and Zilli decide to take their lives together. The memories of their love and their planned death are brought to life through the videotapes of their youngest son, Doron.
THE ROADS MOST TRAVELED
Director: Bill Wisneski · 25 Min · Documentary/Biography · US
Pulitzer prize-winning photojournalist Don Bartletti shares heart wrenching stories from his forty year career documenting history as it unfolds. Internationally recognized for his commitment to photographing the migration of Central Americans to the US, Bartletti’s images reveal the never ending saga of illegal immigration by individuals desperate to improve their lives.
TIME-OUT
Director: Bernabé Rico · 12 Min · Comedy · Spain
100 yards of no man's land, 25 bored men, 2 trenches of war and only 1 ball.
TRY TO FLY
Director: The Affolter Brothers · 8 Min · Animation/Comedy · Canada ·
When a baby owl is pushed from the nest by her mother, her anxiety and self-doubt triggers an existential crisis as her hypothetical future life flashes before her eyes -- all in the time it.
SHOWCASE C (Audience Award Winners)
ALA KACHUU - TAKE AND RUN
Director: Maria Brendle · 38 Min · Drama · Switzerland
Sezim, 19, wants to fulfil her dream of studying in the Kyrgyz capital when she gets kidnapped by a group of young men and taken to the hinterland. There she’s forced to marry a stranger. If she refuses the marriage, she is threatened with social stigmatization and exclusion. Torn between her desire for freedom and the constraints of Kyrgyz culture, Sezim desperately seeks for a way out.
DAVID
Director: Zachary Woods · 12 Min · Comedy · US
David needs help. So does David. A severely depressed man reaches out for an emergency therapy session. He’s not the only one who needs help.
DEAR FUTURE ME
Directors: Sarah Klein, Tom Mason · 13 Min · Comedy/Documentary · US
Every June at Maplewood Middle School in NJ, 6th grade students participate in a rite of passage - they write a letter to their future 18-year-old selves. After the letters are completed and sealed, they are held for six years. When a class is about to graduate, the teachers mail the letters from their past selves. For over 25 years, this extracurricular assignment has encouraged students to imagine and reflect on who they are and who they will become. The results are surprising, emotional, and heartwarming.
INTERMISSION
Director: Anthony Lemaitre · 16 Min · Comedy · France
Yacine and his two friends want to see "Fast & Furious 8" in their suburban multiplex, no matter what. Their problem - they can only afford the film-club screening. What should have been a simple trick for Yacine will turn into a surprising experience.
NOT A WORD
Director: Elodie Wallace · 17 Min · Comedy/Drama · France
Alice gets lost in the maze of a hospital, driven by the need to resolve her grievances with her former abuser, who is now dying. A race to finally put words to her pain...