How long should a sundance short film be

Only 60 short films are chosen from a submission pool of around 9,—all due on September And sorry filmmakers, but Barrera said there is absolutely no wiggle-room for the shorts submission date. So get on it! The programmers highlighted a special category called Next, which are U.

Barrera advised the audience to add a festival marketing line item to your post-production budget. Another way to save during the submissions process is to send Vimeo links. Although DVDs will still be accepted, the programmers highly recommend not wasting your money on them. Online links not only save money, but time as well.

Vimeo is the most common way filmmakers submit their films. But remember not to change your password during the process, so programmers can have easy access to your film. Both Zwicker and Barrera emphasized how powerful it is to build professional networks within the industry, including their own. The bottom line? Today, festivals are receiving more and more short film submissions, making standing out from the pack increasingly important and difficult.

Earlier this month, during the Sundance NEXT Fest at the Ace Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles, Senior Short Film Programmer for the Sundance Film Festival, Mike Plante, conducted a two-part master class breaking down the construction of the seven different short film programs at the festival and offering advice on how filmmakers can use festivals as a tool for their success.

Plante, who has been working in the festival world since and for Sundance since , opened the conversation by providing harsh numbers that prove how coveted a spot in the Sundance program really is.

Of the 8, short film submissions they receive each year, about 70 of those films will play at the festival. With no first-round screeners for shorts, every single submission is seen by at lest one of the ten programmers working with Plante. With only about 90 minutes per shorts block, the Sundance selection process is an arduous debate about what films create a diverse experience while still forming a cohesive program. Out of the seven programs, four are comprised of a variety of shorts in all genres and mediums, while the other three focus on specific niches: animation, documentary, and genre Midnight shorts.

A handful of shorts are screened before a feature as long as they pair well with the longer piece and are shorter than 10 minutes. Anything that goes over 15 minutes must be especially impressive in order to beat out other films that could play in that time.

Almost always something about the plot is unfulfilled, or something about the characters is starting to grow, and then the film ends. On the other hand, Plante and his team are more receptive to longer documentary shorts. Not only does Sundance Senior Shorts Programmer Mike Plante and his team get to watch thousands of short films each year in preparation for the annual film festival, they also get paid to do it. Plante says this year, the festival received over 9, submissions from all over the world.

Ultimately, only 50 made the final cut. What short is a little bit longer, maybe a bigger, heavier story or a bigger production? That might be the last short in a program and then we see what can play from there in between.

The screening and selection process takes six months and Plante and the other short programmers watch each and every film submitted.

Plante says the majority of the submissions are from the United States -- the film hubs of New York and Los Angeles in particular -- but he and his team try to showcase filmmakers from across the globe. When it comes to figuring out which shorts get put into each program, Plante says a good rule of thumb is to not have too many films of the same genre grouped together.

That way, comedies seem more funny and dramas more impactful if they are not competing with a similar short.