sashia dumont

IndieWorks - March Recap

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Last Tuesday evening was our March screening of IndieWorks, and it was a great night! We had just under 30 people in house, which was kind of the perfect number for having a solid audience for the 4 films of the evening, while still being able to maintain comfortable space in the venue as social distancing was just starting to become a necessary topic of discussion. The films were all different in style and genre but all featured surfacing secrets and explored disconnection and miscommunication, either with oneself or others. They were moving, thought-provoking, unnerving, and even downright hilarious. We had excellent Q&A sessions with a lot of questions focused on craft, particularly thanks to a couple aspiring filmmakers in the neighborhood who just happened to come across our event that evening! We believe some valuable connections were made for future collaboration!

We'd like to say thank you to the filmmakers and the audience for coming out to spend the evening with us. We hope all enjoyed the films, as well as the opportunity to network with other filmmakers and film enthusiasts. We know we sure did! It felt like the perfect way to close out our monthly screenings of Year 7, and have one last in-person celebration together before, those of us who can, make it a priority to stay home more in order to make it safer out in the world for those of us who still have to go out to work on the daily over the next few weeks.

See photos from the evening:

The Films of the night:

Devotion (written & directed by TJ Choi)
A young boy's devotion to his family is tested when he decides to tell his mother about his father's affair.

While Fay’s Away (written & directed by Evalena Marie)
A homeless, pregnant, and desperate young woman navigates a delicate chance at friendship.

Jones (directed by Stacey Maltin, written by Margarita Zhitnikova)
Aware that her drinking has become destructive, Jones takes a go at living the sober life. Not wanting to be someone else’s problem, she pushes away help and comes face to face with herself and her lack of control.

The Gaffer (directed by Paul Robinson, written by Sashia Dumont)
When Daniel Foster crosses a dangerous crime leader, he resorts to humor in a desperate attempt to save his life.

Watch our Q&A Recap. *Please know there are some film spoilers - feel free to look for an opportunity to catch the films at a festival or computer screen near you & then come back to watch!

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 rating system of 8 categories:   Story, Dialogue/Writing, Direction, Acting, Cinematography, Sound, Editing, and Production Value, along with a nuanced discussion focused on inclusion and originality. The Silver Whiskers winner goes on to screen again at our end of year Best of Fest screening in April. 

The Silver Whiskers winner also receives $50 towards a crowdfunding campaign on SeedandSpark.com should they use the platform and 50% off 4MileCircus' post-production audio cleaning service for a future project. 

The March 2020 winning films were:
    Audience Choice:  While Fay’s Away
    Silver Whiskers Award:  The Gaffer





It’s at this point that we’d normally plug our annual Best of Fest screening, featuring the 10 Silver Whiskers Award winning films of the last year. Our 7th annual edition was scheduled for April 21st, but with the importance of social distancing right now in order to flatten the curve during the COVID-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic, we’re reevaluating what the safest course of action is for honoring the winners of Year 7. Please follow our social channels for updates as we make announcements. And for our freelancer friends out there, hopefully this community-sourced and ever-evolving list will be helpful in the tough times ahead.