This Is Not a Fiction 2025 Shorts Program

ABOUT THE FILMS:

“Movie and Sound,” Dir. Daniel Contaldo, 11 Mins, Italy

World Premiere

In an industrial area by a Tuscan river, a solitary figure approaches a mysterious building. The footage halts and rewinds, revealing a film lab where a technician watches the same scene on an analogue projector. The hidden operations of a Tuscan film laboratory are unveiled, capturing the intricate process of celluloid film development. From the darkroom shown with an infrared camera, to the baths that develop the film and reveal a latent image, to the scanner that converts the image on the film to a digital image; the machines come alive. In the yard, Czechoslovak wolves are raised by the lab’s owners.

FORMAT: 35mm

“Light, Protect Me from Oblivion,” Dir. Camilo Barria, 7 Mins, USA

West Coast Premiere

Through the use of a fictional device—a portal, a sorceress—life is imagined as a moment encapsulated inside the flash of an instantaneous photograph to present fragmented biographic elements—a disintegrated family, rootlessness, the scar of a suicidal attempt, two loyal companions, the promises of a new land—subverting the idea of a home movie and transform it into a pilgrimage tool of self-discovery, mimicking the fragile nature of memories. Originally conceived as a contemplative project to explore displacement and belonging, it evolved into a six-month expedition compiling images that evoke the antagonistic feelings of being deprived of a place in the world while realizing life’s transient beauty.

FORMAT: DCP

“Questions for Memories,” Dir. Anderson Matthew, 13 Mins, USA

Four friends reflect on a road trip through Mexico, sifting through fragments of super 8mm, evoking questions of home, family and the textures of memory itself.

FORMAT: DCP

“Lizzy,” Dir. Susanna Wallin, 15 Mins, USA

L.A. Premiere

“Lizzy” is the result of the days spent in the aftermath of the death of a neighbour, who passed in the house where she had lived out her whole life on the Hillsborough River in Tampa, Florida and who left behind an electric organ addressed to the filmmaker, without a note. To receive it was like a wild riddle. How might one story continue in the hands of another? What powers organize the telling? Through weaving indoors with outdoors, dust with swamp, celebration with critique, the film traverses binary notions such as self-world, truth-fiction, witnessing-imagining and nature-experience among others.

FORMAT: DCP

“Marine Layer,” Dir. Mia Hagerty and Aric Lopez, 8 Mins, USA

World Premiere

Marine Layer takes audiences through a cinematic experience to reveal the ways in which our current world has become radically transformed by pollution. With a focus on Ormond Beach in Oxnard California, the film blends bold camera perspectives with expressive sound design and textural music to show a world that may already be in the depths of a pollution crisis.

FORMAT: DCP

“ZØØ,” Dir. Andrew Schrader, 9 Mins, USA

In the spirit of Luis Buñuel’s LAND WITHOUT BREAD, ZØØ is a surrealist documentary following a group of zoo animals plotting their escape—and the deranged zookeeper determined to stop them.

FORMAT: DCP

“What I Had to Leave Behind,” Dir. Sean David Christensen, 9 Mins, USA

A visual memoir taking place one afternoon moving out of his old apartment, writer/director Sean David Christensen blends together hand-painted animation, miniatures and an original jazz score to craft a story about letting go of the past.

FORMAT: DCP

“A Hand to Hold,” Dir. Reed Martin, 23 Mins, USA

In the heart of Los Angeles, two members of an innovative Street Medicine team devote their livelihood to helping their unhoused patients receive care, hope, and connection.

FORMAT: DCP

“Considering Cats,” Dir. Matthew Newby, 12 Mins, USA

A short, experimental, documentary shot at the Long Island Pet Expo in 2023. Take a moment to consider the cat.

FORMAT: DCP