by | Jun 15, 2022 | Films

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:30 Short Trailer
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~ ENCORE SCREENING ~
Tuesday August 9, 7:00 pm


The 2022 Sundance Film Festival Short Films
July 8 – 9 – 10 and 15 – 16 – 17

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Jury Award Winners and Nominees
with audience discussion after each screening

Our eighth annual presentation of the Sundance Shorts is a 97-minute program of 7 Jury Award Nominees and Winners from this year’s Sundance Film Festival. The thought provoking slate is fast-paced with a mix of fiction, documentary, and animation telling stories that are funny, sad, inspirational, and full of strong characters.

Held in the Garfield Theatre, the program repeats on six days spanning two weekends, offering flexibility for busy patrons. Discount dinner options and ample parking enhance the convenience factor.

Shorts Tour Filmmakers

10,374 short films were submitted to Sundance 2022 with only 59 selected for the festival — showing why it is the premier showcase for short films and the launchpad for many now-prominent independent filmmakers.

Curated by expert Sundance short film programmers many of this year’s films have gone on to become winners and nominees at some of the world’s top-tier festivals.The filmmaker teams include 10 women and 7 men from around the world with racial and ethnic diversity.

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Film Description Summary
Warsha: A construction worker finds personal and artistic freedom at the top of the tallest crane in Beirut.
You Go Girl: A New York woman climbs an Oregon mountain on an emotional mission.
Stranger Than Rotterdam: A filmmaker smuggles a controversial film across the Atlantic Ocean.
Training Wheels: A socially inept young woman rents a male escort to practice for a romantic encounter.
Au Revoir Jerome: A surreal, animated version of Heaven with an interesting twist,
Lika Liku Laki: A young man copes with his identity, soccer madness and the dark side of toxic male culture.
If I Go Will You Miss Me: Living in the LAX flight path, a young man dreams of flying and freedom. An ode to fatherhood and family.

WHAT, WHERE, WHEN, HOW MUCH ... DRINKS & DINING

Safety Protocol Update:

♦ Effective June 24, we have amended the proof of Covid-19 vaccination requirement for CWC films at the Garfield Theatre:
♦ Proof of vaccination will not be required for FRIDAY and SATURDAY screenings.
♦ Proof of vaccination is required for SUNDAY screenings.

Masks are welcome throughout the Garfield but are not mandatory.

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WHAT:
“THE SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL SHORTS TOUR.”  A 97-minute program with seven short films selected by Sundance senior curators. * Most people find the post-film discussion worthwhile — budget two hours for the complete experience.

WHERE:
☀ THE GARFIELD THEATRE, 719 Race St., Cincinnati, OH 45202. Google Map    Garfield Parking Options

WHEN:
ENCORE SCREENING – TUESDAY AUGUST 9, 7:00
☀ Note: proof-of-vaccination required for Sunday screenings only.

Fri July 08 – 7:00 Sat July 09 – 4:00 Sat July 09 – 7:00 Sun July 10 – 4:00 Sun July 10 – 7:00
Fri July 15 – 7:00 Sat July 15 – 4:00 Sat July 16 -7:00 Sun July 17 – 4:00 Sun July 17 – 7:00

TICKETS:
INFLATION FIGHTER: THE ADVANCE TICKET PRICE IS THE SAME NOW AS IT WAS 8 YEARS AGO !!
Tickets are $10.00 in advance, available online via the Tix Button, and by phone at (859) 957-3456.
If not sold out, tickets at the door are $15.00.

ADA ACCESS & SAFETY PROTOCOLS:
The Garfield is ADA accessible. ADA details and Covid-19 safety information can be found on the CWC Policies Page.

TERMS OF PURCHASE:
Purchase of a ticket confirms acceptance by the purchaser that the presenter/host and their staff will not be liable for any loss, damage, action, claim, cost or expenses which may arise in the consequence of attendance at this event.
Purchaser declares that they will not attend unless in good health on the day of the event. Further, purchaser understands it is impossible to guarantee that they will not be exposed to Covid-19 and will attend at their own risk.

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CLICK TO ENLARGEDRINKS & DINING:
It couldn’t be easier – across the street from the Garfield Theatre, you’ll find the Butcher & Barrel, home of delicious shareables, salads, entrees, sides and desserts, plus excellent wine, craft beer and mixed drinks.

CWC patrons receive a 15% discount on their order, excluding alcohol; menu is on the website. Reservations are strongly recommended, especially if you are dining between weekend sessions. You should present your online confirmation or ticket from the event, and let your server know if there are time constraints. The discount is valid only for the date of ticket.

HOURS: MON-TUE, closed; WED-THS, 4-10 pm; FRI-SAT, 4-12 am; SUN, 4-10 pm. The kitchen closes one hour before the restaurant, every night. Hours and menu subject to change – check the website before booking. RESERVATIONS: 513-954-8974 or thebutcherbarrel.com.

FILM DETAILS:

Warsha

Warsha | Lebanon/France | 2022 | 16 min | written and directed by Dania Bdeir

WarshaMohammad, a lonely migrant construction worker in Beirut, is faced with horrible living conditions and lack of privacy in the overpopulated lodgings where he lives with numerous other migrants and co-workers.

Ultimately he finds solace and freedom in a most unusual place when he volunteers to run the tallest and notoriously most dangerous crane in Lebanon.

Moving and beautifully made, with excellent camera work, perfect staging and impressive sound, director Dania Bdeir gives us an intimate, character-driven story anchored by Khansa’s outstanding performance as she turns the film into a jaw-dropping stage-show mounted above the city of Beirut.

Winner, Sundance Film Festival, Short Film Jury Prize – Best International Fiction
Nominee, Sundance Film Festival, Short Film Grand Jury Prize – Best Short Film
Nominee, Clermont-Ferrand Intl Short Film Festival, National Competition – Gran Prix
Winner, Aspen ShortsFest, Special Recognition Youth Jury
Nominee, SXSW Film Festival, SXSW Grand Jury Award – Best Narrative Short Film
Winner, Festival Intl Du Court Metrage au Saguenay, Jury Prize
Winner, Tampere Film Festival, International Competition – Best Fiction
Nominee, Tampere Film Festival, International Competition – Gran Prix

Sundance Meet the Artist, video with Dania Bdeir – 2.5 minutes.

Dania BdeirDania Bdeir is an award-winning Lebanese/Canadian writer & director, based between Dubai and New York. She received her BA in Graphic Design from the American University of Beirut and holds an MFA in directing from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. She is also a member of the Brooklyn Filmmakers Collective.

Her pre-thesis film Meshkal/Kaleidoscope (2014) was screened internationally and won a few notable awards including Award of Excellence at the 2014 Canada International film festival and Golden Palm at the 2014 Mexico International Film Festival. Her thesis film, In White (2016), which received a grant from the Spike Lee Production Fund, world premiered at the Clermont Ferrand Film Festival and won many awards internationally, including the International Grand Prize at the Rio de Janeiro International short film festival thus making it eligible for the 2019 Academy Awards in the short live-action category.

In 2019, Bdeir was selected as a Berlinale Talent and participated in its Short Film Station with her short film Warsha. Bdeir finds her intense love/hate relationship with Lebanon to be her biggest heartache and most sincere inspiration.

You Go Girl

You Go Girl | USA | 2022 | 13 min | written and directed by Shariffa Chelimo Ali

You Go GirlThis short narrative film follows Audrey (Tiffany Mann), a New York City comedian who can make a joke of just about any situation. After receiving devastating news, Audrey travels to the beautiful mountains of Oregon where she is faced with a staggering challenge.

Set in two contrasting locations — a comedy club and an Oregon mountain trail — “You Go Girl!” tells the story of a woman on a quest to overcome her physical and emotional struggles. Tiffany Mann takes full command of Audrey as a comedian conquering the stage as she works towards her big break; and as a woman conquering her fears out in the mountains following a major loss. Audrey’s inner journey is powerfully familiar and reflective of reality.

The film balances comedy and grief with nuanced specificity. Ali uses humor, fear, vulnerability, loss, peace and the beauty of a natural environment to express a poignant message — one that we can all benefit from. “You Go Girl!” celebrates Black mothers, life, healing, and self-discovery.

In speaking about the project, Ali notes: “This film began as a love letter to my mom – all her passion, quirks, and resilience. Throughout the pandemic, it has morphed into therapy. Black women are fierce. We care for each other deeply. We belong everywhere. Amid such trying times, You Go Girl! is an affirmation for us – less an escape into the outdoors and more a spiritual journey to celebrate our Black mothers. My hope is that everyone may use Audrey’s humor as medicine. Relish the peace and beauty of Nature. Embrace joy through heartbreak. Let this film be an elixir of healing.

Short Trailer — :40.

Nominee, Sundance Film Festival, Short Film Grand Jury Prize – Best Short Film

Shariffa Chelimo Ali is an award winning director of Film, VR & Theatre committed to working with an open-heart at the intersection of the performing arts and humanitarianism. Originally from Kenya and raised in South Africa, Shariffa has been a New York resident since 2013. Shariffa’s works have been featured at acclaimed film/VR festivals & institutions worldwide including Sundance Film Festival (USA); Zeitz Museum of Contemporary African Art (South Africa); Brooklyn Film Festival (USA); Pan African Film Festival (USA); Electric Africa VR festival (South Africa) and DOK Neuland (Germany).

As a theatre artist and academic Shariffa has directed taught at NYU, Brooklyn College, Yale University and Princeton University where she is a faculty member in the Theatre Program. Past theatre productions include Eclipsed, Detroit ’67, Intimate Apparel, We Are Proud to Present…and an original new musical We Were Everywhere. Shariffa’s Off-Broadway and Regional Theatre credits include Mies Julie (Classic Stage Company) School Girls; Or, The African Mean Girls Play (Pittsburgh Public Theatre), The Copper Children, (Oregon Shakespeare Festival) and Mlima’s Tale (St Louis Rep).

Shariffa served as Assistant Director to her mentor Cynthia Nixon for plays Rasheeda Speaking, Steve (The New Group) and Motherstruck! (Culture Project). Shariffa was the executive consultant to Ms. Nixon’s during her TV directorial debut in episode 106 of HBO Max’s And Just Like That, the sequel to the hit series Sex and the City.gaze—one that can map out our memories, not drawing lines between camera and subject, identity and politics. She is a 2020 Sundance Ignite x Adobe Fellow.

Stranger Than Rotterdam With Sara Driver

Stranger Than Rotterdam With Sara Driver | USA | 2021 | 9 min | directed by Lewie & Noah Kloster, written by Sara Driver.

Stranger Than RotterdamIn 1982, the completion of Jim Jarmusch’s sophomore film, Stranger Than Paradise, hinged on producer Sara Driver’s willingness and ability to smuggle one of the world’s rarest and most controversial films across the Atlantic Ocean.

This is the delightfully fun, bizarre and true story of how Jarmusch’s film got to the Rotterdam Film Festival in 1983, told by producer Sara Driver in the Kloster Brothers’ animated cut-out puppet documentary short.

There’s humor, there’s intrigue, there’s danger, there’s sex, all wrapped up into a 9 minute short that will leave you amusingly informed about a bit of film history.  Jarmusch’s film is a black-and-white absurdist comedy about two Hungarian cousins and one cousin’s friend and gambling partner and their time in New York, Cleveland, and Florida. It ultimately won the Caméra d’Or award for debut films at Cannes in 1984 and was an important part of opening the door for independent American filmmaking in that decade and beyond.

In the animated retelling, Driver explains how when Jarmusch’s short was selected for the famed Rotterdam Film Festival, it was the perfect opportunity to secure funding for the full-length feature. The only problem: The festival only had money to fly the director out. Jarmusch being more of an “ideas guy” than a planner, Driver needed to be there to talk to financiers. The then director of the Rotterdam Festival, Huub Bals, devised a plan to have Sara accompany Jim on his trip if she would hand-carry Robert Frank’s personal print of C***S***** Blues, the only one in existence.

Since its release, the vulgarity of the 1972 Rolling Stones U.S. Tour film, directed by Robert Frank and Danny Seymour, has prompted outrage and legal woes — Mick Jagger personally wanted the film destroyed. Above all, it was illegal to transport pornographic material internationally. So, with a title like that, Driver was sure to be stopped by someone…

As illuminating as it is entertaining, Stranger Than Rotterdam with Sara Driver is an amusing peek behind the scenes of how a classic American independent film went from a short film to a feature, narrated by someone who was a huge part of making that happen. 

Sundance Meet the Artists, with Lewie & Noah Kloster – 2 minutes.
Short Trailer – :30.
Sundance Short Stories, Q & A with Sara, Lewie and Noah – 24 minutes.

Winner, Sundance Film Festival, Special Jury Prize – Screenwriting, Sara Driver
Nominee, Sundance Film Festival, Grand Jury Prize – Best Short Film
Winner, Aspen ShortsFest, Jury Award  – Best Short Film
Winner, Thessaloniki Documentary Festival, Audience Award  – Best Documentary Short Film
Nominee, Reykjavik Intl Film Festival, Grand Jury Prize – Best Documentary Short Film

Lewie and Noah Kloster are co-founders of the animation team, Tall Glass with Ice Inc. Lewie is a class of 2017 alumni of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA in Film & Television. They live and work out of Brooklyn, NY, focusing on documentary storytelling via the form of animation, driven by first-person narration.

Training Wheels

Training Wheels | USA | 2022 | 15 min | written and directed by Alison Rich.

Training WheelsA romantically inexperienced and socially inept woman, Enid (Alison Rich), rents a male escort, Ricky  (George Basil), to prepare for an encounter with her ideal man, John.

So, in her journey to find love and happiness Enid rents Ricky for the 48-hour period before going on a first-date with John, as a crash course in relationships. It turns out that both Enid and Ricky have vulnerability issues and they open up, building a real relationship.

The idea of using someone to practice on before the real thing isn’t a new, but the humor is plentiful, the set ups and style are excellent, the characters are real and relatable and you are rooting for Enid. BTW, Training Wheels was shot during the pandemic–just before the Delta surge.

Sundance Meet the Artist, with Alison Rich – 2 minutes.
Short Trailer – 1 minute.

Nominee, Sundance Film Festival, Grand Jury Award – Best Narrative Short
Nominee, Florida Film Festival, Grand Jury Award – Best Short Film

ALISON RICH (writer, director, actor) is a comedian and filmmaker living in Los Angeles. Training Wheels is her second narrative short. Her first short The Other Morgan premiered at the 2021 SXSW Film Festival.

As an actor, Alison can be seen in the new seasons of The Other Two on HBO Max, Tuca and Bertie on Adult Swim and The Goldbergs on ABC. Previous acting credits include Drunk History, Angie Tribeca, The Lonely Island’s Popstar, 2 Broke Girls, Life in Pieces, and more. She was also a series regular on The Lonely Island’s Fox sketch show Party Over Here. As a writer,

Alison has staffed on Saturday Night Live, The Goldbergs, and Billy on the Street. She’s sold and developed shows for Comedy Central and TBS. Alison also wrote and directed a digital series called The MacMillan Genius Grant. She’s directed viral videos for CollegeHumor as well as multiple music videos. In 2015 she was selected as one of the New Faces Characters at the Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal.

Au revoir Jérôme!

Au revoir Jérôme! (Goodbye Jerome!) | France | 2021 | 8 min | jointly directed, animated and edited by Chloé Farr, Gabrielle Selnet and Adam Sillard, of Gobelins, l’école de l’image, Paris.

Goodbye Jerome!Heaven – idyllic or surreal and bittersweet? In this cleverly written and deftly executed short animated film about being in love, we first encounter a squeaky gate, sacred tones and a sea of  flowers.

Having just arrived in Heaven, Jérôme sets out to reunite with his late wife Maryline. He discovers a telephone book on a table and promptly dials his beloved but gets her answering machine. So, he continues in search of his deceased lover who left him a year ago, asking the bird woman, the hotdog vendor and all the other creatures for guidance.

Paradise is indeed surreal, bursting with color, and very unorthodox. Just like its inhabitants, especially Maryline. Mentored by Marjane Satrapi (creator of Persepolis) the in their thesis film the Gobelins student trio gives us detailed animation, saturated colors and a score that morphs from celestial to jazz. Their version of Heaven is like no other – far from idyllic and quite exciting.

Sundance Meet the Artists, video with the directors – 2 minutes.

Nominee, Sundance Film Festival, Short Film Grand Jury Prize – Best Short Film, Animation
Winner, Berlinale 2022, Special International Jury Prize – Best Short Film
Nominee, Berlinale 2022, Crystal Bear – Best Short Film
Winner, Anima Brussels, Audience Award – Best Short Film
Nominee, Anima Brussels, Gran Prix – Best International Short Film
Nominee, Annecy Intl Animated Film Festival, Cristal Prix – Best Graduation Film
Winner, GLAS Animation Festival, – Best New Talent Award
Nominee, GLAS Animation Festival, Gran Prix – Best Short Film
Winner, VIS Vienna Independent Shorts Festival, Jury Prize – Best Image and Sound Design
Nominee, Zagreb World Festival of Animated Film – Best Student Film
Nominee, Stuttgart Intl Festival of Animated Film, Animation Competition – Best Student Film
Winner, Festival Premiers Plans d’Angers, Audience Award – Best Short Film
Winner, FICAM Meknes Intl Animation Film Festival – Best Short Student Film

Chloé Farr, Gabrielle Selnet and Adam Sillard are graduates with a degree in animation from Gobelins, l’école de l’image and will next study movie direction at the French academy La Poudrière.

Lika Liku Laki (Makassar is a City for Football Fans)
Lika Liku Laki (Makassar is a City for Football Fans) | Indonesia/France | 2020 | 20 min | written and directed by Khozy Rizal.

MakassarFilmmaker Khozy Rizal explores societal norms In Makassar, a conservative religious city where men must behave a certain way to gain acceptance by their peers, for example: act “manly,” exert dominance over women and weaker men, deny sensitive emotions, echo homophobic and misogynistic sentiments, and go crazy about football.

Akbar deals with this toxic masculinity by pretending to love football in order to prevent rejection and abuse from his new college friends.

A twist at the end yields pivotal questions for viewer interpretation. — is Akbar gay or does he just long for intimacy with his male peers, one that is shut off by constant verbal poking and prodding so that only when no one is looking can two straight men feel warmth toward each other?  And, gay or straight, does it matter either way in a culture where fear, supposition and homophobic stigmatization is rampant? Where camouflage is a safe route for acceptance?

Sundance Meet the Artist, video with Khozy Rizal- 1.5 minutes.

Winner, Sundance Film Festival Asia, Jury Prize – Best Short Film
Nominee, Sundance Film Festival, Short Film Grand Jury Prize – Best Short Film
Winner, Palm Springs Intl ShortsFest, Special Mention – Best Short Film
Winner, Bali Intl Short Film Festival – Best Fiction Short Film
Winner, Film Festival Indonesia, Best Short Story Film
Winner, Minikino (Indonesia) Film Week, Best Short Film
Nominee, Jogja-NETPAC Asian Film Festival 2021
Nominee, Bangkok ASEAN Film Festival 2021
Nominee, Tampere Film Festival 2022
Nominee, BFI London Film Festival

Khozy Rizal is a film director based in Makassar, South Sulawesi, Indonesia. His first short film, Annisa, won the Grand Prize International at 14th Mobile Film Festival and a grant to produce his new short film, Makassar is a City for Football Fans.

If I Go Will They Miss Me

If I Go Will They Miss Me | USA | 2021 | 12 min | written and directed by Walter Thompson-Hernández

If I Go Will They Miss Me A meditation on the filmmaker’s roots and childhood home inspired by real events, If I Go explores themes of fatherhood and freedom to explore life. 12-year-old Anthony “Lil’ Ant” Harris, Jr. is obsessed with airplanes and with the mythological character Pegasus.

He and his father watch the busy skies above them showing us what it is like living below the flight path for LAX. He is able to call out the names of various airliners based on their size and color because they are so much a part of their community. Lil’ Ant yearns to fly and ponders how to realize his dream.

The film is rooted in magical realism, taking place in the real world while utilizing fantastical elements. This is depicted through the airplane characters in the film. The ‘airplane people’ don’t have wings coming out of their backs and they’re not hovering in the air. But they are dressed plainly in white t-shirts and black pants, and they stand with their arms extended backwards to portray airplanes. They appear the main character’s home, in their front yard, and they can only be seen by the father and son. “The ‘airplane people’ aren’t real, but rather a collection of dreams, of hopes, of desires of folks in the community,” says director Thompson-Hernández.

Back Story: In 2020, when a Delta airliner dumped roughly 15,000 gallons of jet fuel on multiple neighborhoods and schools in southeast Los Angeles, the incident inspired Walter Thompson-Hernández to reflect on his own experience living under the LAX flight path and the environmental impact southeast Los Angeles has endured for decades.

“For a lot of us who grow up here, we’re looking up at the sky, imaging these airplanes, dreaming about travel and freedom. The irony about the airplanes dropping jet fuel is that the things that we yearn for and dream about and idolize can also hurt us.”

Short Trailer – 1 minute.
Sundance Meet the Artist, video with the director – 1.25 minutes.
Short Film Jury Award: U.S. Fiction – 1 minute.

Winner, Sundance Film Festival, Short Film Jury Award – Best U.S. Fiction
Nominee, Sundance Film Festival, Short Film Grand Jury Prize – Best Short Film
Nominee, SXSW Film Festival, Grand Jury Prize – Best Narrative Short

Walter Thompson-Hernández is from Huntington Park and his childhood home is near the Park Avenue Elementary school in Cudahy, where multiple children were doused with chemical-enriched petroleum fuel dumped by Delta Flight 89. He was raised by a single mother who at age 14 migrated to L.A. from Magdalena, a small rural town in the state of Jalisco, Mexico. She later went on to pursue her PhD in literature at the University of California, Los Angeles while juggling several other gigs to make ends meet.

For a majority of his early childhood, Thompson-Hernández—who is an only child—and his mother shared a home in Huntington Park with his aunt, uncle and his wife, and two cousins. He was the youngest child in the household, and also the only person in his family and at his predominantly Latino school to have a Black parent. He often spent his free time watching and marveling at the planes that flew above their heads every few minutes and he and his friends would race the planes flying over their school. Sometimes, when he was alone, he would think about traveling somewhere far away.

Known for storytelling across journalism, podcasts, and film, Thompson-Hernández seeks to meditate on ideas related to belonging in communities of color throughout the U.S. and the world.  A UCLA (MA) and Stanford (PhD) alum, he began as a New York Times writer traveling the globe, publishing commentaries in both English and Spanish, before his transition into filmmaking. In addition, his work has been featured by The New Yorker, CNN, The Guardian, and others.

Walter is currently in post-production for a feature film titled “The Sky is Blue,” set in the Rio de Janeiro neighborhood of Santo Amaro. He is the author of “The Compton Cowboys: A New Generation of Cowboys in America’s Urban Heartland,” a compelling story of a group of Black men and women who defy stereotypes and continue the proud, centuries-old tradition of Black cowboys in the heart of Compton, California. The book, released in 2020, is currently in development as a feature adaptation for Searchlight Films.

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