Category: FI-LA 2026 Official Selections

2026 Official Selection: Screenplay – Screenplay – Feature Film

Some wounds burn forever. A Southern Gothic folk horror reckoning with artistic ownership and the high cost of being seen.

• Writer(s): Jeremy Christensen

Language: English

Country: Not Specified

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When a struggling country singer is compelled to return to the haunted Kentucky holler where she grew up, she must confront her dark past with her grandfather, the town she fled, and the sinister presence of a long dead witch that will kill to escape. As the darkness heals her scars and reshapes her confidence, bodies pile up, and she must choose who to become. A Southern Gothic folk horror reckoning with artistic ownership and the high cost of being seen.

When a struggling country singer is compelled to return to the haunted Kentucky holler where she grew up, she must confront her dark past with her grandfather, the town she fled, and the sinister presence of a long dead witch that will kill to escape. As the darkness heals her scars and reshapes her confidence, bodies pile up, and she must choose who to become. A Southern Gothic folk horror reckoning with artistic ownership and the high cost of being seen.

2026 Official Selection: Short Film – Drama

Chaos ensues when a group of college students stumble upon a dead body at a frat party.

• Director(s): Isaiah Silas Wright
• Writer(s): Marcus Lamar Corrothers
• Producer(s): Aja Hinds, Luke Pengelly
• Key Cast: Aja Hinds, Jeff Lawless, Nate Bartoshuk, Zach Cowan, Marcus Lamar Corrothers, Yaya Ogun, Gabriella David

Language: English

Runtime: 9m

Country: United States

Synopsis: Two college students with plans for a one night stand are soon interrupted when they discover a dead body in the Frat House. With little information to go around, and as more party-goers discover the body, their situation—as well as their ideas for a solution—only grow worse. With reputations, careers and futures now hanging in the balance, everyone begins to wonder how responsible they really want to be.

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2026 Official Selection: Screenplay – Screenplay – Feature Film

In the end, the love we carry is what gives us the strength to let go.

• Writer(s): MP Soldo

Language: English

Country: Not Specified

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Haunted by the loss of the woman he never stopped loving and spiraling toward self-destruction, a scarred musician agrees to a raw on-camera interview that unfolds through music and memory, reliving love, loss, and sacrifice as he discovers that the love we carry is what gives us the strength to let go.

Haunted by the loss of the woman he never stopped loving and spiraling toward self-destruction, a scarred musician agrees to a raw on-camera interview that unfolds through music and memory, reliving love, loss, and sacrifice as he discovers that the love we carry is what gives us the strength to let go.

2026 Official Selection: Featurette – SciFi

In a dystopian future, a grieving scientist discovers Earth exists within a single neuron. He launches a desperate quest across space and time to find his son.

• Director(s): Raphael Buisson
• Writer(s): Raphael Buisson
• Producer(s): Raphael Buisson, Jack McMann, Kip Thorne, Rafael Maman, Hsiao Shih-Chun
• Key Cast: David Alan Graf, Kip Thorne, Ranen Warren, Jessica Park, Alan Aymie, Tamara Becker Cimmerian, Christian Haines

Language: English

Runtime: 22m

Country: United States

Synopsis: In a dystopian future, a grieving scientist discovers Earth exists within a single neuron. He launches a desperate quest across space and time to find his son.

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2026 Official Selection: Screenplay – Screenplay – Short Film

An anxious man who struggles with asthma meets the woman who takes his breath away.

• Director(s): Erika Carsella
• Writer(s): Erika Carsella
• Producer(s): Erika Carsella
• Key Cast: Brooke Emerick, Annie Tank

Language: English

Country: Not Specified

World Premiere

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While eating alone at a diner, a socially anxious man believes his insecurity and embarrassment cost him a chance at connection, unaware that the women he idolized may be far more like him than he ever imagined.

While eating alone at a diner, a socially anxious man believes his insecurity and embarrassment cost him a chance at connection, unaware that the women he idolized may be far more like him than he ever imagined.

2026 Official Selection: Screenplay – Screenplay – Feature Film

An executed serial killer’s soul infects store mannequins as a grieving teen must survive a locked-in party to escape the killer before he finishes his ritual for Hell’s power.

• Writer(s): Warren Proulx Jr

Language: English

Country: Not Specified

In 1987, occult serial killer Nikolas Holcomb dies by electric chair, trading his soul to the Devil. Instead of gaining hellish powers, his spirit is trapped inside the plastic mannequins of Reilly’s Department Store. Teen Kara—whose sister was Nikolas’s last victim—sneaks into the store with friends for a graduation party. The mannequins come alive, hunting the teens to finish Nikolas’s ritual. Facing her sister’s killer, Kara fights back, destroying him for good.

In 1987, occult serial killer Nikolas Holcomb dies by electric chair, trading his soul to the Devil. Instead of gaining hellish powers, his spirit is trapped inside the plastic mannequins of Reilly’s Department Store. Teen Kara—whose sister was Nikolas’s last victim—sneaks into the store with friends for a graduation party. The mannequins come alive, hunting the teens to finish Nikolas’s ritual. Facing her sister’s killer, Kara fights back, destroying him for good.

2026 Official Selection: Screenplay – Screenplay – Short Film

Father knows best, son knows better?

• Writer(s): Chris Paseka

Country: Not Specified

After a health scare, an Archie Bunker-like father and his gay son struggle with connecting. Are they exactly alike or worlds apart?

After a health scare, an Archie Bunker-like father and his gay son struggle with connecting. Are they exactly alike or worlds apart?

2026 Official Selection: Comedy – Short

While at a funeral for an uncle he barely knew, Jonathan must sneak out to avoid more uncomfortable conversations and to make it the party of a lifetime.

• Director(s): Michael Rojo
• Writer(s): Michael Rojo
• Producer(s): Jane A Rogers, Emmanuel Salgado
• Key Cast: Michael Rojo, Jane A Rogers, Spencer Kramber
• Cinematographer(s): Emmanuel Salgado
• Composer(s): Zach Spound

Language: English

Runtime: 11m

Country: United States

Synopsis: Jonathan has a problem: the hottest party of the year is happening on the exact same day as the funeral of an uncle he barely knew. Determined not to miss out on the party, he launches a series of lies in an attempt to sneak out of the funeral. Faced with the regret of a relationship never explored, he learns that some opportunities can’t be rescheduled—and some goodbyes deserve to be heard.

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2026 Official Selection: Comedy – Short

Sometimes you have to get the blame off of you.

• Director(s): Alex Sovoda
• Writer(s): Alex Sovoda
• Producer(s): Jessica Dimento, Chet Oshima
• Key Cast: Will Duncan, Haley Stiel, Maria Smal, Leo Reilly, Wes Dunlap
• Editor(s): Alex Sovoda
• Cinematographer(s): Steven Xie
• Sound Designer(s): Matt Rollins
• Composer(s): Zach Michel

Language: English

Runtime: 18m

Country: United States

Los Angeles Premiere

Synopsis: A friend starts stealing from others at a game night, and then makes matters infinitely worse.

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2026 Official Selection: Drama – Short

Built like a cadavre exquis, the film assembles dreams, memories, and ruptures into the portrait of a man whose death gives birth to the truth he never dared to live.

• Director(s): Lorenzo Sterzi
• Writer(s): Lorenzo Sterzi
• Producer(s): Aurélien Kik
• Key Cast: Yves Jacques, Mattis Savard-Verhoeven, Émile Auger, Luis Oliva, Danielle Barbeau, Lorraine Pintal, France Castel, Bénédicte Décary
• Editor(s): Yvann Thibaudeau
• Cinematographer(s): Jean-Francois Noël
• Production Designer(s): Élie Arsenault-Boisvert
• Sound Designer(s): Christian Rivest
• Composer(s): Georges Dimitrov

Language: French

Runtime: 11m

Country: Canada

Los Angeles Premiere

Synopsis: Constructed like a cadavre exquis, the film unfolds in fragments, between dream and reality, revealing the many facets of a fractured identity. A posthumous coming-out where a man’s death becomes the birth of his truth.

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