meeting macguffin

IndieWorks: Best of Fest Year 5 Recap

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INDIEWORKS: BEST OF FEST

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Last Tuesday was a special night at IndieWorks! We celebrated the conclusion of our 5th year! Between watching the 10 fantastic films, mingling with the talented filmmakers, and engaging with the wonderful audience, we had a ton of fun! In total, we had nearly 80 people in attendance and it was clear the crowd enjoyed the lineup and the evening as a whole. We hope new connections were made!

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 innovative, local films and filmmakers.

Five years ago, Christina decided she wanted to create a monthly film series for local independent filmmakers to showcase and discuss their work with an audience and connect with their (our) peers in a friendly, supportive, engaging and still encouragingly competitive environment. Sure enough, we made it happen and it has grown into something so wonderful, more so than we could have imagined over the past five 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 full lineup & nominations can be found in our previous post.  

THE AWARDS GO TO...

AUDIENCE CHOICE: "Sibs" (Samantha Slater & Cynthia Silver) - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign and script coverage from the CongestedCat team of one future short screenplay.

BEST EDITING: "Runaway" (Harrison Heller) - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign and script coverage from the CongestedCat team of one future short screenplay.

BEST ENSEMBLE PERFORMANCE: "Chocolates" (Patricia Selznick & Ford) - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign and script coverage from the CongestedCat team of one future short screenplay.

BEST WRITER/DIRECTOR: "Cake" (Anne Hu) - Wins $50 towards a Seed&Spark campaign and script coverage from the CongestedCat team of one future short screenplay.

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY (DJ Carroll) & GOLDEN WHISKERS (BEST OF FEST): "Madness" (TJ Choi) - Wins $250 towards a Seed&Spark campaign, a 1TB G-drive, 50% Off any a la carte Post-Production Service 4milecircus offers, script coverage from the CongestedCat team of two future short screenplays, and a day of social media promotion from the CongestedCat team.

Our team with all the talented filmmakers of the night!

Photos by Chris Carroll. Video coverage by Kimberly Drew Whiten. Big thanks for their time & talent throughout night! See all the fun we had below! 

THAT'S A WRAP!

Check out the recaps from ALL 10 SCREENINGS of Year 5 of IndieWorks. 

As we take next month as an opportunity to go out and make things, we hope you will too. Our 6th Year of IndieWorks kicks off in June on the 5th, with our Pride-themed screening -- so keep in touch & stay up to date through our social media accounts. We want to see YOU at the next screening!

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Be sure to submit your films on our IndieWork page, and watch episodes of our Insider Series with the monthly Winners from all 5 years to get more insight into their screened films & upcoming work. 

IndieWorks: November Recap

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Last Tuesday was the November edition of IndieWorks! It was a surprising night in that we had our smallest turnout ever, in the nearly 5 years we've been doing this! We had exactly 27 people in house (not including our team). Not a bad turnout for a super cold night and a lineup of only 4 shorts; but it was still a surprise. Despite that though, we had a really engaged group for our eclectic and innovative lineup of shorts that included animation, scifi, and documentary; all playing into themes of changing societies and past vs present. Some very interesting conversations were had!

We'd just like to say thank you to everyone who came out to support the filmmakers and spend the evening with us & them. We do hope you enjoyed all the films and the opportunity to network with other filmmakers and film enthusiasts. We know some connections were made! AND we hope you'll join us again for our December screening on the 12th - for a grouping of films that tackle stories related to family!

See photos from the evening:

The Films of the night:

Rudy's Hobby Shop (Directed by Jason Guzman)
Marvin Cochran, owner of Rudy’s Hobby & Art in Astoria Queens, let's us have a glimpse at the day-to-day in this once ice cream parlor, turned hobby shop. We get a chance to see what a day at Rudy's looks like, sample some the inventory and hear from customers. 

Runaway (Written & Co-Directed by Harrison Heller, Co-Directed by Tommy Kraft)
Maria is an android on the run--falsely accused of murdering her master. Pursued through the woods by ruthless bounty hunters, Maria struggles to reach the Free States and maybe discover her humanity along the way.

Meeting MacGuffin (Written & Directed by Catya Plate)
In a post-apocalyptic future where humanity has fallen apart, a group of scientists and an animated sign complete the construction of a new human race and meet a groundhog climatologist who prepares them for their mission to restore balance to the decimated Earth.

Block (Written & Directed by Brandon Buikema)
Traditional animation is combined with stop motion to create a unique, handcrafted style. This style is used to tell the story of a young writer who needs some life experience.

Watch our Q&A Recap (edited by Kimberly Drew Whiten). *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 system rating 8 categories of 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 next April. 

The Silver Whiskers winner also receives $50 towards a crowdfunding campaign on SeedandSpark.com should they use the platform and a free Social Media audit ($200 value) from 4MileCircus. 

For the November 2017 lineup, our winning films were:
    Audience Choice Award:  "Meeting MacGuffin"
    Silver Whiskers Award:  "Runaway"

Join us next month for our December edition on the 12th!