IndieWorks: Insider Series W/Arilyn Martinez Cora

May 20, 2016 in IndieWorks

Part of our effort for IndieWorks is to feature & support indie filmmakers outside of our monthly screenings. We bring our winning filmmakers to your screen for a chat with one of our IndieWorks hosts in our series titled "IndieWorks: Insider Series".congestedcat.com/indieworks/

Arilyn screened her short "The Texture of the Light" with us at our October Screening in 2015 and won the Silver Whiskers Award. She also went on to win Best Director at our Year 3 Best of Fest! We used our Best of Fest screening to chat with her a bit about the inspiration behind and making of the film.

Arilyn I Martinez Cora:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Arilyna89

IndieWorks: Best of Fest Year 3 Recap

April 22, 2016 in IndieWorks

INDIEWORKS: BEST OF FEST

Tuesday was a special night at IndieWorks! We celebrated the conclusion of our 3rd year and began screening at our new home for the series! Between the 10 phenomenal films, the brilliant filmmakers and the wonderful audience, we had a lot of fun and made some new connections! We hope everyone that was part of it enjoyed the night as much as we did! In total, we had just over 80 people in attendance, which is bit smaller than last year & even the year before. But considering the factors of moving from Manhattan to LIC, moving to Tuesday night, having one less film than past years, it being Election Day AND it coinciding with Tribeca, that turnout wasn't too shabby! We're excited about our huge new venue, The Local, and hope audiences will still join us from all over the City each month despite it being just outside Manhattan.

THANK YOU.

To all of the incredible people involved in this community who submit their work, attend our monthly series, follow our content and spread the word of anything IndieWorks... we truly thank you. It's been another great year of fantastic films and talented filmmakers.

Three years ago, Christina decided she wanted to create a monthly film series for local independent filmmakers to showcase their work for an audience and connect with their (our) peers in a friendly, supportive, engaging and still encouragingly competitive environment. Sure enough, she made it happen pretty quickly and it has grown to something so wonderful, more so than we could have imagined, in just three years. It's been a real passion project from our team, and we hope it has stayed true to the ideals of helping independent filmmakers find an audience and build a network & community of likeminded, productive & talented individuals. Thank you all for being part of it! We're honored to screen & support your work!

The lineup & nominations can be found in our previous post.

Photos of the night include Step & Repeat and Award coverage by Grayson Davis & additional floor coverage by Jingjing Yang. Also, video coverage (coming soon) by Shelby Zoe Coley. Big thanks for their time & talent all night! See all the fun we had below!

THE AWARDS GO TO...

AUDIENCE CHOICE: "Live a Little" - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign. — **AUDIENCE CHOICE**: "**Live a Little**" - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign.

BEST EDITING: "Larry Gone Demon" - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign. — **BEST EDITING**: "**Larry Gone Demon**" - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign.

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY: "Tadaima" - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign. — **BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY**: "**Tadaima**" - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign.

BEST PERFORMANCE: "Before We Lose" (Saadet Yuce) - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign. — **BEST PERFORMANCE**: "**Before We Lose**" (Saadet Yuce) - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign.

BEST DIRECTOR: "The Texture of the Light" (Arilyn Martinez Cora) - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign. — **BEST DIRECTOR**: "**The Texture of the Light**" (Arilyn Martinez Cora) - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign.

GOLDEN WHISKERS (BEST OF FEST): "Before We Lose" - Wins $200 towards a Seed&Spark campaign & distribution in the Seed&Spark Cinema. And a free consultation with a local casting director. — **GOLDEN WHISKERS** (**BEST OF FEST**): "**Before We Lose**" - Wins $200 towards a Seed&Spark campaign & distribution in the Seed&Spark Cinema. And a free consultation with a local casting director.

THAT'S A WRAP!

Check out the recaps from ALL 9 SCREENINGS of Year 3 of IndieWorks.

As we take next month as an opportunity to go out and make things, we hope you will too. Our 4th Year of IndieWorks kicks off in June -- so keep in touch & stay up to date through our social media accounts. We want to see YOU at the next screening!

Be sure to submit your films on our IndieWork page, and watch episodes of our Insider Series with the monthly Winners from all 3 years to get more insight into their screened films & upcoming work.

IndieWorks: October Recap

October 09, 2015 in IndieWorks

Wednesday was the October edition of IndieWorks, and it was a lovely evening! We had a smaller crowd than usual of about 30 people (we think because we have 2 screenings this month), but the audience was in no way lacking. Whenever we have smaller crowds, we tend to have a little more audience engagement during the Q&A's. That was certainly the case here, and the discussions had and stories told were just amazing.

We'd like to say thank you to everyone who came out to support the filmmakers and spend the evening with us & them. We hope you enjoyed all the films and the opportunity to network with other filmmakers and film enthusiasts, and we hope some connections were made!

We'd also like to say a big thank you to our new guest hosts who filled in as MC's of the evening (and who we'll definitely have back again), Ricardo Manigat & Shelby Zoe Coley. Also, a thank you to our intern Flavio Barreiro for covering photography of the evening.

See photos from the night:

The films of the night:

Araignee (Directed by Jeremy Jensen)
Two talented spiders compete against each other. Who will be the best weaving master?

Coffee Shop Conversations (Directed by Kimberly DiPersia)
A comedic series of vignettes in a coffee shop, capturing moments in the lives of patrons and employees.

Introducing Parker Dowd (Directed by Lauren Ashley Carter/ Written & Produced by Rebecca Blaine Carton)
A dark comedy about a struggling actress who loses a role to her dog and must watch him skyrocket to celebrity as she descends into vengeful madness.

The Texture of the Light (Directed by Arilyn I. Martinez Cora)
A single mother is forced to revisit her past when she desperately needs the stem cells of her ex-boyfriend Javier to help improve her son’s eyesight

Feeling Wanted (Directed by Yasmin Mistry)
Charell, age 6, woke up to find herself alone. She made breakfast, dropped her baby sister off with a neighbor, and walked to school. With a dad incarcerated for murder, a mom on drugs & a childhood in foster care, Charell knew it was time to break the cycle.

The awards go to...

At the end of the evening, we announced our winning filmmakers for both Audience Choice Award & Silver Whiskers Award. The Audience Choice Award is voted upon by all those in attendance, and the Silver Whiskers Award is judged by the CongestedCat Team based on a system rating 8 categories of Story, Dialogue/Writing, Direction, Acting, Cinematography, Sound, Editing, and Production Value. The Silver Whiskers winner goes on to screen again at our end of year Best of Fest event in April!

The Silver Whiskers winner also receives $50 towards a crowdfunding campaign on SeedandSpark.com should they use the platform, and both winners received a free 2015 subscription to Bright Ideas Magazine and have the opportunity to be interviewed for our Insider Series.

For the October 2015 lineup, our winning films were:
Audience Choice Award: "Feeling Wanted"
Silver Whiskers Award: "The Texture of the Light"

See trailers for the winning films below:

Join us On October 28th for our Halloween Special!