Hang On, Little Tomato
Director: Shalyn Grow and Asya Hildenbrand
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: Tennessee
Synopsis: Hazel returns to her childhood home after her estranged mother has died. As she enters the repast looking for her younger sister, Hanna, it is clear that presence causes a stir amongst her family. She has an awkward run in with an uncle and a slightly hostile exchange with her mother's best friend and Hazel's aunt, Cindy. Hazel convinces Hanna to sneak away with her to the local park to get away from the repast and the two smoke cigarettes and discuss their feelings on the death of their abusive mother.
Hubbards (2022)
Director: Kevin Ralston
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: RETRO
Synopsis: An intense dive into the world of one man and his quest.
The Invisible Crown
Director: Amelia Kramer
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: Tennessee
Synopsis: The Invisible Crown follows Endometriosis warrior Hannah Lindgren as she wrestles with medical trauma and finds methods of healing mind and body. Abstract visuals painting the complexity of her inner emotions are paired with the outer reality she faces.
John Lilly and the Earth Coincidence Control Office
Director: Michael Almereyda and Courtney Stephens
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: Tennessee
Synopsis: An essay film about the mysteries of consciousness and communication channeled through neurophysiologist and “psychonaut” John C. Lilly, a daring experimenter with dolphins and psychedelics. Lilly’s motto — “My body is my laboratory” — carried him into realms of radical self-investigation, while his research also helped bring dolphins and whales into the collective dreamlife of the 20th century.
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KIA SUMMER SALES EVENT (2021)
Director: Brendan Walter
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: RETRO
Synopsis: An innocent conversation about a new car between a Juggalo boyfriend and girlfriend devolves into an existential, harrowing relationship crisis surrounding infidelity, family and their (possibly fabricated) deepest darkest secrets.
Website
kid with a pearl earring
Director: Abigail Holland
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: Tennessee
Synopsis: Obsessed with forgiveness, a filmmaker builds a self portrait through two relationships with men and the objects they left behind.
Lollygag (2024)
Director: Tij D'oyen
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: RETRO
Synopsis: A woman recounts her sensual yet macabre childhood memory about the boy next door.
Midsummer
Director: Masha Vlasova
Country of Origin: United States / Finland
Premiere: Tennessee
Synopsis: Midsummer is a cyanotype photogram film, where the sunlight, along with plants, insects, and water, are all employed in the process of filmmaking. The production of the film began in Finland, during Juhannus, the celebration of the longest day of the year in, when the sun doesn’t set. Blank 16mm film strips are coated in cyanotype emulsion and exposed to sunlight with natural materials, capturing the fleeting moments of nature's cycle. The landscape is both material and collaborator, where its physicality is literally imprinted into the filmic surface. The film explores the ephemeral nature of life, the swift passage of time, and the interplay between humans and the environment. Each frame captures not only the landscape but also the transient and dynamic processes of nature, creating an image that is at once tangible and elusive, grounded in the physical world yet imbued with a sense of mystery.
The Motherfucker's Birthday
Director: Saif Alsaegh
Country of Origin: Iraq | United States
Premiere: Tennessee
Synopsis: Through dancing, the Motherfucker's Birthday shows the evil of the dictator and the horror people endure under powerful political leaders. The film presents dancing, a universal and uniquely human activity often representing joy, with eerie footage of Saddam and his sons’ torture tools while they dance. Bush also dances with a smirk across the screen while announcing a war that would destabilize a whole region. Contrasting the dancing of these powerful men, who seem disturbingly unconcerned with the lives they impact, with the dancing of the people of Iraq amplifies the fear, control, and horror the general public lives under. Everything becomes a gesture of dance: the torture, the hesitant political humor, and the war. Everyone becomes a dancer, the dictator and the oppressed performing a distorted version of this human act. Saddam dances, Bush dances, so what's left for the Iraqi people except to join in.
Nathan Loves Ricky Martin (2017)
Director: Steven Arrigada
Country of Origin: Australia
Premiere: RETRO
Synopsis: Pauline, a full time carer for her disabled son Nathan, orchestrates a ruse to form a meaningful connection with the man next door.
The Never Ending Passion Boys Crew at Captain Daniel David's on the Coast
Director: Jeffrey Sundin
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: Tennessee
Synopsis: A body of water, a blind date, and an '84 Chevrolet in the year of a musical collective's debut release.
Night Warriors (2022)
Director: Bill E Mitchell
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: RETRO
Synopsis: Two self described independent thinkers on their search for personal truth, work themselves into a frenzy as they hasten toward a reality more shadowy than they could ever have expected.
Only One Glove
Director: Fotis Zampetakis
Country of Origin: Spain / Greece
Premiere: United States
Synopsis: "I thought of all those gloves I see here and there on the street and it's like they're waiting for someone to turn around, look for them, take them back". A tale on missing gloves, loss, absence, resilience and the journey to find our other half - or ourselves.
Panic Attack! (2017)
Director: Eileen O'Meara
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: RETRO
Synopsis: You know the nagging thoughts that start with "did I leave the coffee on?" and turn in to "am I pregnant with a devil-baby?” This hand-drawn animation explores anxiety, obsession, and one woman’s slippery hold on reality.
The Phalanx
Director: Ben Balcom
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: Tennessee
Synopsis: Letters from the Ceresco community trace the fragility of harmony, the dream of life in association, the frictions that give way to fracture. Members of the phalanx drift apart, lingering in private corners, suspended in speculative time.
SARDINE
Director: Andrea Dratch
Country of Origin: United States
Premiere: Tennessee
Synopsis: Chained to the grind of assembly-line life and crushed beneath society’s expectations, Henrietta is done playing tame. Her spirit snarls for release, and something raw begins to rise—a feral force long buried. As the cage of conformity tightens, she sheds the skin of civility and unleashes the wild within. This isn’t just a transformation—it’s a revolt. A primal reclaiming of power, identity, and the freedom to be unapologetically untamed.
