Worcester State will screen the 10 finalists of the Manhattan Short Film Festival from Monday, September 30 to Friday, October 4 in Eager Auditorium. The films, which range from five to 22 minutes in length, will run on a continuous loop from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. each day. Admittance to the auditorium is free for faculty and students.
Now in its 27th year, the Manhattan Short Film Festival determines winners by audience vote. Upon entry at Eager Auditorium, attendees will be given a QR code that they can follow to vote for best film and best actor.
“Hosting the Manhattan Short Film Festival is a great way to expose our students to high quality, often extremely topical, short films in a single event,” said Professor and Chair of Urban Studies Thomas Conroy, Ph.D. “The films in this and previous festivals come from all over the world, underscoring the idea that good cinema comes from more than Hollywood alone.”
That is part of the appeal of the festival for the Urban Studies Department, which is sponsoring the festival along with the School of Humanities and Social Sciences. The Urban Studies Department focused on global cities and peoples, and that includes their cultural output. “The selections in the Manhattan Short Film Festival are a mix of dramatic, comedic, and sometimes experimental works that are wonderfully creative and engaging,” Conroy said. “They highlight for students the power of the short film format, but they also remind us all of our very human need for good stories and good storytelling.”
The films being screened at Worcester state are:
The Talent
Directed by: Thomas May Bailey
Principal Cast: Emma D’Arcy, Leo Suter, Rhianne Barreto, David Mills
Country: United Kingdom
Time: 15:00
I’m Not a Robot
Directed by: Victoria Warmerdam
Principal Cast: Ellen Parren, Henry van Loon, Thekla Reuten
Country: The Netherlands
Time: 22:00
Mother
Directed by: Mariia Felenko
Principal Cast: Veronika Shostak, Inna Belikova
Country: Ukraine
Time: 8:00
Dovecote
Directed by: Marco Perego
Principal Cast: Zoe Saldana, Marcello Fonte, Gaia Scodellaro, and twenty inmates from the Giudecca Prison in Venice
Country: Italy
Time: 17:30
Pathological
Directed by: Alison Rich
Principal Cast: Alison Rich, Meaghan Rath, Luke Cook, Heather Pasternack
Country: USA
Time: 17:00
Alarms
Directed by: Nicolas Panay
Principal Cast: Thomas Coumans, Laurence Côte, Eminé Meyrem
Country: France
Time: 17:00
Favourites
Directed by: Nick Russell
Principal Cast: Stephen Curry, Sibylla Budd, Tony Briggs, Maria Angelico, Chris Labbett, Imogen Labbett, Amanda Russell
Country: Australia
Time: 5:17
The Man Who Could Not Remain Silent
Directed by: Nebojša Slijepčević
Principal Cast: Goran Bogdan, Alexis Manenti, Dragan Mićanović, Silvio Mumelaš
Country: Croatia, Bulgaria, France, Slovenia
Time: 13:00
Room Taken
Directed by: TJ O’Grady-Peyton
Principal Cast: Gabriel Adewusi, Brid Brennan
Country: Ireland
Time: 18:00
Jane Austen’s Period Drama
Directed by: Julia Aks, Steve Pinder
Principal Cast: Julia Aks, Lachlan Ta’imua Hannemann, Samantha Smart, Nicole Alyse Nelson, Hugo Armstrong
Country: USA
Time: 13:00
More information about the films can be found here.
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