Palm Springs ShortFest Announces 2013 Winners

PALM SPRINGS, CA -- The 2013 Palm Springs International ShortFest, the largest short film festival and only short film market in North America, announced its Festival award winners. 330 short films screened throughout the Festival along with more than 3,000 filmmaker submissions available in the film market. A total of $110,000 in prizes, including $16,000 in cash awards, were awarded in 19 categories. Held from June 18-24, 2013, the Festival had another record-breaking year in attendance for ticket buyers, filmmakers and film industry delegates.

Darryl Macdonald, ShortFest Programming and Executive Director, said, “This has been a spectacularly successful year for ShortFest on all fronts. Attendance figures spiked, with more sold out screenings than ever before, the number of filmmakers attending the Festival jumped by 30% over last year and industry participation has doubled. Those numbers, coupled with the rapturous response to the films and programs by filmgoers attending the Festival means we’ll be doing some serious planning to accommodate the rapid growth of ShortFest in the off season leading into next year’s event.

Kathleen McInnis, ShortFest Film Curator and Director of Industry Programming said, “Our spectacular increase in filmmaker and industry attendance brought an extraordinary breadth of creative talent to ShortFest 2013 – encouraging our belief that visual storytelling not only thrives, but is indeed an increasingly vital part of the human condition worldwide.”

The 2013 Palm Springs International ShortFest award winners are:

JURY AWARDS

BEST OF FESTIVAL AWARD – Winner received $2,000 cash prize, camera package courtesy of Radiant Images, valued at $10,000, and Final Cut Pro X courtesy of Apple Computer. The winner of this award may be eligible to submit their film to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for Oscar consideration.

Delicate Gravity (Délicate Gravité) (France), Philippe André Yvan Attal and Anne Parillaud are wonderful as two lonely spirits who come together by chance when a cell phone call to a wrong number provides the catalyst for a meeting.

PANAVISION GRAND JURY AWARD – Winner received a Panavision camera package valued at $60,000. Stranger Brothers (Faux Frères) (France), Lucas Delangle Guillaume returns to the village where he grew up to pick up the car he inherited from his father years before. Once there, he encounters his step brother, and things get a little more complicated.

FUTURE FILMMAKER AWARD – Winner received a $2,000 cash prize and a GoPro Hero 3 Camera courtesy of Radiant Images. Rhino Full Throttle (Nashorn Im Galopp) (Germany), Erick Schmitt Bruno roams the streets of Berlin, gazing behind the many facades and surfaces as he seeks the soul of the city. Unexpectedly, he meets an ally in his quest and immediately falls in love. But she is also on a quest, and it’s one that has her leaving Bruno and Berlin very soon.

Jury Special Mention -The jury would like to give a special mention to the short film The Wall from Norway for its grit, humanity and creativity.

AUDIENCE AWARDS

AUDIENCE FAVORITE LIVE ACTION SHORT

Walking the Dogs (UK), Jeremy Brock Emma Thompson stars as Queen Elizabeth in this delicious rendering of the infamous 1982 incident in which a man broke into the Queen’s bedroom while her security guard was out in the palace grounds walking the dogs.

Runner-up – Great (Germany), Andreas Henn

AUDIENCE FAVORITE DOCUMENTARY SHORT

Not Anymore: A Story of Revolution (USA), Matthew VanDyke Shot on the ground with a hand held camera and told in striking first person, the Syrian struggle for freedom as experienced by a 32 year old rebel commander, Mowya, and a 24 year old female journalist, Nour, in Aleppo, Syria is exposed like no TV newscast could do.

Runner-up – SLOMO (USA), Josh Izenberg

AUDIENCE FAVORITE ANIMATION SHORT

A Girl Named Elastika (Canada), Guillaume Blanchet A spirited girl made of rubber bands journeys across her corkboard universe in this delightful stop-motion film.

Runner-up – Chopper (Netherlands), Lars Damoiseaux, Frederik Palmaers

Returning for a second year, the Palm Springs International ShortFest continued the ShortFest Online Film Festival. Ten films were chosen to represent the Festival online. The ShortFest Online Audience Award went to Shelved (New Zealand), directed by James Cunningham. The film will be available to view on the PSIFF website for the next three months.

JURY CATEGORY AWARDS

Awards in the non-student and student categories were selected by ShortFest jury members Sydney Netter (Founder, SND Films), Missi Pyle (Actress) and Betsy Sharkey (Film Critic, Los Angeles Times). All first place winners in the non-student categories received a cash award of $2,000. First place winners in the non-student Animation and Live Action categories may be eligible for Academy Awards consideration. Second place recipients received a $500 cash prize.

BEST ANIMATION SHORT First Place ($2,000) – Arts & Crafts Spectacular #2 (Germany),Ian Ritterskamp & Sébastien Wolf This surreal claymation extravaganza wryly celebrates the close encounter of such disparate pop figures as Popeye and Yoko Ono during a be-in at a museum somewhere in time.

Second Place ($500) –Chopper (Netherlands), Lars Damoiseaux & Frederik Palmaers

BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT OVER 15 MINUTES

First Place ($2,000) – Wild Horses (USA), Stephanie Martin Mireille Enos stars in this story of cruelty, courage, love and memory as two generations of women bear witness to the brutality common to wild horse roundups in the American West.

Second Place ($500) – Spring Tides (Les Grandes Marées) (France), Mathias Pardo

BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT 15 MINUTES AND UNDER

First Place ($2,000) – We Keep On Dancing (Australia), Jessica Lawton Two distinctly disparate characters come together over a broken down Volkswagen Beetle in this sweet, amusing tale of love, loss and… car trouble.

Second Place ($500) – Not Funny (No Tiene Gracia) (Spain), Carlos Violadé

BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT

First Place ($2,000) – Letters from Pyongyang (Canada),Jason Lee The tragedy of a divided Korea is powerfully evoked in this profound personal journey undertaken by filmmaker Jason Lee, who ventures with his father from South to North, across the Korean peninsula, in search of clues of his family’s unsettled past.

Second Place ($500) –December 25 (Australia),Wendy Dent

STUDENT CATEGORIES All first place winners in these categories received a stock footage DVD set courtesy of Footage Firm.

BEST STUDENT ANIMATION

First Place – Harald (

Germany), Moritz Schneider Harald is a champion wrestler with a monster mother for his coach. Though his true love is growing flowers, coach mom doesn’t wanted him distracted by such trifles, so when she takes away his latest plant, Harald is forced to seize the day.

Second Place – The Magnificent Lion Boy (UK), Ana Caro

BEST STUDENT LIVE ACTION SHORT OVER 15 MINUTES

First Place - Magma (Poland), Pawel Maslona Dedicated furniture salesman Janusz always knows just how to close a sale but after an extremely rare accident at work, he finds his carefully constructed life unraveling.

Second Place – Pauline in a Beautiful World (USA), William Thompson

BEST STUDENT LIVE ACTION SHORT 15 MINUTES AND UNDER

First Place – Jump (Australia), Aimee Lee Curran In a visually dazzling story about the importance of family when pursuing your dreams, Jump tells the tale of 12-year-old Edwin, a circus clown like his father, who dreams of becoming a trapeze artist.

Second Place – Relics(USA),Jennie Allen

BEST STUDENT DOCUMENTARY SHORT

First Place – Empty Nest (Myanmar), Zaw Naing Oo In one small pocket of Yangon, the urban center of Myanmar, Daw Ni Lang lives very modestly with her husband and young son. It’s a hard life, but she’s managed to raise four children who are all well-educated... if only they would call home a little more often.

Second Place – Jonathan (Ecuador), Abe Zverow

BEST STUDENT CINEMATOGRAPHY

Leigh Lisbão Underwood (cinematographer), The Boy Scout (USA) Trapped in their car for days after an unexpected snowstorm strands them on a remote mountain road during an impromptu trip, Grant and Leah confront a life-or-death choice… With another storm on the way, should they stay or should they go.

Second Place – Tam Morris (cinematographer), Jump (Australia)

BEST US FILM SCHOOL STUDENT FILM AWARD - $2,000 cash prize courtesy of KQED, San Francisco. First Place – My Father’s Truck (Xe Tai Cua Bo) (Brazil/Vietnam), Mauricio Osaki 10-year-old Mai Vy skips school one day to help her father with his passenger truck for hire. Set along the countryside of Northern Vietnam, Mai Vy is soon confronted with varying shades of morality and harsh realities as she learns how things outside the classroom really are.

ADDITIONAL PRIZES The Alexis Award for Best Emerging Student Filmmaker

went toOstrichLand (USA), directed by David McCracken. The recipient received Final Cut Pro X courtesy of Apple Computer; 1-year download membership to videoblocks.com and stock footage DVD set courtesy of Video Block and Footage Firm. The Alexis Award is selected by the Festival’s programming team and was created in honor of Alexis Echavarria, a young filmmaker, whose talent as a budding filmmaker and gift for inspiring excellence among his fellow students were cut short suddenly in 2005 at age 16.

Bridging the Borders Award presented by Cinema Without Borders went to That Wasn't Me (Aquel No Era Yo) (Spain) directed by Esteban Crespo. The winner received the award’s diploma and an HP Elitebook Mobile Workstation with a built-in HP DreamColor display, an approximately $5000 value. The runner-up received a certificate for an upcoming Method Acting Intensive Workshop provided by The Lee Strasberg Theater and Film Institute with a value of $2000. The runner-up was Tryouts (USA), directed by Susana Casares.

Designated by AMPAS as an award-qualifying festival, and accredited by the International Short Film Conference, the Palm Springs International ShortFest and its Short Film Market are the largest and most prominent short film showcase in North America. The Festival and its concurrent 3,000-film Market continue to serve as a scouting ground for new filmmaking talent and are well attended by those in the business of buying and selling short films.

The Palm Springs International Film Festival will be held January 3-13, 2014.

Source: The Palm Springs International ShortFest