A girl sits for a portrait, allowing flowers to adorn her until they cover her completely. “Haus Des Meeres,” directed by Kristine Morgan, is a lovely video art piece envisioned as both a beautiful object and a reaction against beautiful objects. Regina Soza is the girl in the flowers, and her st...

Roaming through rural France on their tandem bike, young post-punk musicians look for an audience and a name for their band. “Gwendoline,” directed by Joaquim Bayle, is a beautifully shot musical odyssey in 16mm black-and-white film that’s both bleak and lighthearted. On the road desperately seek...

A nervous magician performs one last trick. Gordy De St. Jeor directs “A Tale of an Unimpressive Magician,” a nightmarish, monochrome sequence, all in a single location where dark fate and punishment awaits. Smashed drywall litters the floor. Dust floats into the nether. An old man shivers as he ...

Linas Phillips continues his Shawnsey series in a quick pic about the man from Boston with bad hearing trying to get his stand-up routine off the ground. Whatever Phillips does, I'm on board with & there's a couple hilarious moments here, as when he's reviewing footage of his routine and tweaking...

Wandering the dappled grounds of an old farmhouse, Henry plays schoolmaster at an open-air painting retreat, where his instructional duties seem to involve holding forth at candlelit dinners in the garden and sucking down endless cans of Budweiser on the lawn while the work of painting and posing...

A burly stranger looking for a place to lay his head arrives at the home of a newly single mother renting out her guest house. “Rebound,” written by Wes Haney and directed by NoBudge Hall-of-Famer Doron Max Hagay, is pure comedy gold, built with priceless performances from Katy Fullan and George ...

A dejected man living in Los Angeles limps through a prolonged break-up and the distractions in the aftermath. Brian Follmer directs “Dys-Sympathetic,” a satirical featurette poking at casual sex, casual romance, and the emotional deterioration of it all. Tyler waits for his ex-girlfriend, Zoe, a...

In 2027, the government enforces a revolutionary law that disables all tech devices at sundown in order to enhance civilians' well-being. Erin O’Connor directs ‘half-light,” a patient, future-fiction character study that observes a young woman amidst this tech-free world. We encounter the 20-year...

A portrait of a young woman on the day of her Quinceñera in Los Angeles. Austin Spies directs “The 15,” a vérité style documentary that observes scenes and moments from a teenager's 15th birthday celebration. Sasha Sanchez sits in the chair of a beauty salon receiving touch ups for the big evenin...

A lo-fi parable about a young kid in Detroit who turns to scrapping to provide for his family. Portraying poverty and struggle without sensationalizing, it treats its characters as complicated individuals -- real people faced with real choices -- not as symbols of poor urban life. The oldest sibl...

Crashing on the couch of a family friend, a young man acclimates to life in New York City. Brendan Kirk directs “Henry Gets a Shot,” a low-key comedy about a kid from the suburbs and his reluctant battle to take some adult action. Henry lays passed out on the sofa. Danny, an older family friend, ...

An encounter between a police officer and civilian turns deadly. Directed by Jeanpaul Isaacs.

For one night only, a raggedy group of circus performers are upended by a train crash and stranded in Walpole, Maine. In “Circus 196977,” a mysterious documentarian encounters the group in a large barn and tracks their medley of song and dance. The film features avant-garde dance sequences paired...

Three young men escape city life for the serenity of the woods but something is amiss. Brendan Lee Hickey directs “Sweet Sorghum,” an ornate horror-comedy built as an unpredictable series of vignettes. Dressed from head to toe in tweed and corduroy, the three gentlemen sprint through the woods wh...

Cheyenne is a teen punk fan trying to convince her friend, Maggie, to come with her to their first show. “This is Not a Love Song,” by director Ursula Ellis, is a MFA student short from Columbia University which captures the raw enthusiasm of teenage rebellion, led by a charismatic lead performan...

The morning after a new love affair, a woman reflects on her past relationships. “Four Chairs,” directed by Ester Song Kim and Nika Burnett, is a poetic portrait that unfolds with sensory detail and surreal shifts. Waking up for the first time with a new man, a woman prepares coffee and tries to ...

Sisters Maureen and Louise return to their Midwestern hometown after a coincidence of tragedy strikes the family. “World of Facts,” a quietly observed dramatic feature from director Mike Gibisser, reckons with a suspended period of heartache, in two separate cases of comatose partners. The first ...

A meager apology tests a woman's fortitude to forgive. “Squirrel,” by director Alex Kavutskiy, is a masterfully-crafted cringe comedy about the unlikely intersection of two L.A. residents who must come to terms with a new reality and one another. As their scenario unfolds, Noreen and Patrick, pla...

A father takes his son to the woods for a rite of passage. “Sylvain’s Hunt,” directed by Theo Cohn, is an unsettling portrait of father-son bonding built with inventive mixed-media images (see: miniature sets) and a Lynchian tone. Early one morning, a son is awoken by his dad and they drive to so...