Video: See Everything You Missed at the 2025 Sloan Summit
Last month, in association with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, we held the 2025 Sloan Film Summit, three days where we brought together the worlds of science and filmmaking. Leading scientists, film organizations, film schools and creators with projects about the worlds of the sciences met in person in Los Angeles to share knowledge, get inspired, plan on new projects, and of course, watch some movies.
The topics covered in the programing was diverse. There were panels on AI & VR, new media, and using science consultants on film projects. The films screened, Magma, and Love Me, brought emotion and humanity to the topics of communicating safety concerns to the public and AI grappling with emotion respectively. And Amy Mazer brought down the house with her keynote on finding and stopping asteroids from hitting Earth. You know, saving the world, no big deal.
Of course we couldn’t let the invitees have all the fun, so today we’re bringing you, the science lover everything you missed on that action packed, 95-degree weekend in North Hollywood.
PANEL: The Consultants’ Cut: Scientific Accuracy in Storytelling
From quantum physics to medical breakthroughs, science continues to revolutionize our world—yet accurately translating complex scientific concepts to compelling entertainment remains a formidable challenge. This panel brings together renowned science consultants and storytellers to explore the delicate balance between scientific accuracy and narrative engagement. Drawing from their experiences across television, film and other media, these experts will discuss the creative process behind translating technical concepts for general audiences, share success stories and pitfalls in science communication and examine how authentic scientific representation can enhance rather than hinder storytelling. The conversation will provide unique insights into the collaborative relationship between scientists and creators that brings credibility to entertainment while inspiring audiences about the wonders of science.
- David Saltzberg(The Big Bang Theory)
•David Goetsch(The Big Bang Theory)
•Erin Macdonald (Star Trek)
•Roshan Sethi (The Resident)
•Jacob F. Lentz (The Pitt)
•Moderated by Ritesh Mehta (Writer & Critic, IndieWire)
Love Me Screening Q&A
A conversation with USC computer science & psychology researcher and professor, Jonathan Gratch on Love Me by Andy & Sam Zuchero which won the Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival. Moderated by film critic and writer Manuel Betancourt.
In Love Me, a story that spans billions of years, a buoy and a satellite meet online long after humanity’s extinction. As they learn what life was like on Earth, they discover themselves and what it means to be alive and in love.
Keynote Address: Professor Amy Mainzer
Amy Mainzer, UCLA planetary science professor and Principal Investigator of NASA’s NEO Surveyor mission, will explore the science of asteroids, the nuanced challenges of communicating potential cosmic hazards, and the complex intersection with media coverage. Drawing from her leadership of the successful NEOWISE mission that tracked near-Earth objects for over a decade, Mainzer brings unparalleled expertise in planetary defense and science communication. She was the science advisor for the 2021 film Don’t Look Up.
PANEL: Beyond Screens: How Podcasts and Social Media Are Democratizing Science Storytelling
The digital revolution has transformed how scientific knowledge is shared, moving beyond traditional academic journals and documentaries to reach audiences through podcasts, TikTok, Instagram, and other social platforms. This democratization is reshaping who gets to tell science stories and how they’re told. Join innovative science communicators as they discuss the opportunities and challenges of digital-first science storytelling. From viral explainers to deep-dive audio series, these expert creators will share their approaches to making complex scientific concepts accessible, building engaged communities around science content, and navigating the tension between entertainment value and factual accuracy. The panel will explore how these emerging platforms are not just changing content distribution but fundamentally transforming the relationship between scientists, storytellers, and audiences.
•Lindsay Nikole (Zoology Science Communicator)
•Emily Graslie (The Brain Scoop)
•Dr. Kiki Sanford (This Week in Science)
•Isaias Hernandez (Queer Brown Vegan)
•Latif Nasser (Radiolab)
•Moderated by Ali Vanderkruyk (Filmmaker & Educator)
Spotlight Screening: Magma Q&A
A Q&A with USC seismology professor & researcher, John Vidale and Occidental College professor of geology, Margaret Rusmore on Magma by Cyprien Vial which won the Sloan Science on Screen Award at the 2025 San Francisco International Film Festival, Moderated by climate storyteller and writer Carmiel Banasky.
In Magma, the struggles between scientists, community members, and local politicians spill over like the titular substance that threatens the Caribbean Island of Guadeloupe.
PANEL: Reality Augmented: AI, Machine Learning and the Future of Cinematic Expression
As technology rapidly evolves, filmmakers and artists are discovering groundbreaking ways to blend artificial intelligence and machine learning with traditional storytelling. This revolutionary intersection is reshaping how stories are told, experienced and distributed across media platforms. Join innovative creators and thought leaders as they explore how emerging technologies are expanding creative possibilities, challenging conventional narrative structures and democratizing access to immersive storytelling tools. The discussion will examine both the artistic potential and ethical considerations of these powerful new mediums that are redefining the boundaries between reality and imagination.
- Jessica Brillhart(Vrai Pictures),
•Aranya Sahay(Humans in the Loop)
•Anisia Uzeyman (Neptune Frost)
•Nancy Baker Cahill (4th Wall)
•Nonny de la Peña (Hunger in Los Angeles)
•Moderated by Anisa Hosseinnezhad (Filmmaker, IDA)
The Sloan Film Summit, launched in 1999, is part of Sloan’s greater efforts through its Public Understanding of Science and Technology initiative. Celebrating eight iterations, this year’s Summit (the fourth consecutive one produced by Film Independent) is a celebration of the program’s wide-ranging success supporting emerging filmmakers, while also bringing together a new group of artists and scientists to highlight how art and science interact and collaborate.
We’re thrilled to celebrate the arts and sciences with inspiring minds in both fields.
For over 40 years, Film Independent has helped filmmakers get their projects made and seen. The nonprofit organization’s core mission is to champion creative independence in visual storytelling in all its forms, and to foster a culture of inclusion. We support a global community of artists and audiences who embody diversity, innovation, curiosity and uniqueness of vision. To support our mission with a donation, click here.
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From Skateboarding to the Vietnam War, Student Filmmakers Cover the Gamut at Fi’s ‘Exploring Civil Liberties’ Showcase
Students from two LA County schools – Dominguez High School in Compton and Renaissance High School for the Arts in Long Beach – teamed up with Film Independent to tell stories from their own communities. These 13 films were screened at the Japanese American National Museum’s Democracy Center in Downtown LA on May 7, along with a panel discussion helmed by Film Independent’s Senior Manager of Film Education, Sarah Berkovich.
Filmmaker and Film Independent Fellow Ann Kaneko participated in the conversation with insights from making her documentary, Manzanar, Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust. The film features stories from Japanese Americans who were displaced to concentration camps during World War II as well as the Owens Valley Paiute tribe, which was removed from the same region. Joining Kaneko was Monica Embrey, an activist whose family was featured in the film.
Kaneko was full of encouragement and wisdom for her fellow filmmakers, acknowledging the wide range of topics covered – from the immigration experience to the ideal conditions for skateboarding. “It was so amazing to see such a range of issues and topics and perspectives, and it’s really, really important right now,” Kaneko said.
CIVIL LIBERTIES
Timely concerns about immigration and deportation were referenced throughout the day, as films and speakers considered the potential for filmmaking to raise awareness, shift perspective, bring people together, and defend democracy.
Jim Herr, Director of the Democracy Center, kicked things off with a brief address on the purpose of JANM to serve as a monument to civil rights in the United States. “We need the voices of young people to stand up,” he said, encouraging students to use their voices and speak into the kind of country they want America to be.
“I love the process of making documentaries because it puts me in the same space with people and I get to learn from people,” said Kaneko, who spent five years making Manzanar, Diverted. “It’s a great way to bring communities together to talk about issues that are important … It’s such an honor to be able to hear people’s stories and to have these kinds of conversations that you don’t normally have the opportunity to have.”
For the student filmmakers, participating in the Film Independent program was both eye-opening about personal stories and also stressful to navigate constraints of time and availability for locations, subjects and crew (sounds like filmmaking, alright). But the rewards of capturing a story rose to the surface.
Student panelists Quetzal Colunga-Hutxins, and Sy’Enna Wallace-Collins shared highlights from the filmmaking process according to their specific stories and interests. Colunga-Hutxins – an avid skateboarder – got to showcase friends in Urban Canvas, a love letter to the concrete slabs and handrails of Long Beach. Wallace-Collins’ A Building for the People was a departure from her comfort zone making genre films, but with an architect for a dad she saw the opportunity to highlight social issues and gentrification in her film about Studio 111.
Urban Canvas
Quetzal Colunga- Hutxins
A Building For The People
Sy-Enna Wallace Collins
COLLABORATIVE STORYTELLING
Maybe the collaborative essence of documentary filmmaking is a given, but Kaneko found it worthwhile to mention the power balance between the person holding the camera and the person speaking into it. Trust and cooperation are key. “I think it’s all of us, our responsibility to remember that we are doing these things in collaboration.”
Films like Grandpa’s Interview – the story of a drafted Vietnam War veteran – depended on family trust, contextualized with the relationship between grandparent and grandchild. Voices Between Borders and The Apple Doesn’t Fall Far From the Tree were similarly situated, offering a peek into existing relationships with filmmakers and subjects as well as the stories told on screen.
Grandpa’s Interview
Cameron Hinshaw
Voices Between Borders
Adrian Pulido, Genesis Pineda, Moon Gomez, Scarlett Lopez
The Apple Doesn’t Fall Far From The Tree
Alarii Gilliam, Vanessa Sotelo
Other interviews sprang from friendships and willing storytellers. Lives Interrupted explored how the 2020 pandemic affected students and faculty at Dominguez High School – familiar territory for the filmmaking team. But Echoes of History – exploring Rancho Los Cerritos, the oldest adobe residence in Southern California – featured stories of the past and the ongoing vision to give back to the community. Playmakers offers a glimpse at playing baseball with kids who have special needs, and the headline is: everyone’s favorite coach is Coach Mike.
Lives Interrupted
Maria M., Oliver S., Ryan, Everado M., Jasmine F, Kingston
Echoes of History
Anastacia Kobliha
Playmakers
Isabella Gomez
PERSPECTIVE SHIFT
Documentaries can change minds, by the admission of filmmakers – opening our eyes to an unknown issue, as in the case of these students watching Kaneko’s Manzanar. Documentaries also showcase story angles and points of view previously unseen.
“I think anyone can tell a story because everyone has their own perspective and views, and how they view life in general,” said Wallace-Collins. “Try to get as many perspectives as you can, to not leave any story left untold.”
Topical films like We See Us in US: A Camp Wall Story – honoring the memory of Japanese Americans sent to internment camps – invited conversation and personal opinions on issues of today. Filmmakers showed what matters to them, whether it’s social change through sports (Playing for Justice), gun violence (The Cost of Freedom: Guns in America) or the stress of not having enough money (Is Money Keeping Us From Freedom?).
We See Us in US: A Camp Wall Story
Quetzal Colunga- Hutxins
Playing for Justice
Kenneth Johnson, Armando Alvarez, Ja’vontay Davis, Cedric Anderson, Emanual Soltera, Gisselle Ramirez
The Cost of Freedom: Guns in America
Devin Sandoval, Jose Jaimes, Yaritza Paz, Yolette Franco, Juan Ayon,
Alessandro Romero, Jorvon Smith
Is Money Keeping Us From Freedom?
Jaime Ramirez, Kaliegha Chandler, Samiah Rhyne, Mya Joy, Laurissa Lee
Kaneko asserted that having a voice, in itself, is resistance. “The act of making things is about creating joy. It’s about fun, right? It’s about building, bringing us together. It’s about expressing ourselves.”
ABOUT THE PROGRAM
Film Independent is at the center of the independent film community, and the long term goal of its youth programs are to build a bridge to connect the community of artists with students and educators. Youth programs serving ages 12-18, bring the organization’s vision full circle, where emerging and professional filmmakers who have grown through Film Independent’s Artist Development programs mentor a next generation of youth creators. As youth have distinct artistic vision and provide unique insight into their communities, it’s of great benefit to our culture that this vision be nurtured and these voices be heard.
The Exploring Civil Liberties program was supported by the California State Library Civil Liberties Program, which aims to educate students about the Japanese American internment experience during World War II. Students learned about this history through watching Ann Kaneko’s documentary, Manzanar Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust, and then together with filmmaker mentors, they spent the semester exploring themes of Civil Liberties and Civil Rights, making documentary and oral history projects in their own communities. They celebrated their accomplishments and screened their projects at a showcase at the Japanese American National Museum.
Film Independent promotes unique independent voices by helping filmmakers create and advance new work. To become a Member of Film Independent, just click here. To support us with a donation, click here.
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How Tribeca Doc ‘Holding Liat’ Found It’s Footing in Film Independent’s Fast Track
Applications for Fast Track 2025 are now open, with a non-Member deadline of June 9 (Film Independent Members have until June 23).
Holding Liat, the Best Documentary winner from this year’s Berlinale, is having it’s North American premiere June 9 at the Tribeca Film Festival, but the journey it took to get there was a complicated one. Brothers Brandon Kramer (Director) and Lance Kramer (Producer) found themselves in a unique situation after the events of October 7th 2023. While checking in with their Israeli-American family members, they found that their relative Liat Beinin Atzili had been kidnapped along with her husband Aviv Atzili from their kibbutz in Southern Israel. Liat is an American citizen, and her parents told the brothers about their plan to go to Washington D.C. to lobby American lawmakers to try to get their daughter and husband back.
“We did not know what was about to unfold, but we felt an imperative to start documenting the family’s experience,” said Brandon. “We were immediately thrust into the process of telling an urgent story that was unfolding rapidly in two continents, with very little control, predictability or certain outcomes.”
The brothers followed a fast-moving story, and the process was all-consuming. When the filmmakers felt like it was time to start to share their project, they needed a partner that could help fine tune their message.
“In the chaos of a storytelling process where production and post-production occurred simultaneously, we did not have much time to chart the course for a distribution plan, let alone understand how to put our hopes and goals for the film into words,” they said.
“We sought out the Film Independent Fast Track program for mentorship and camaraderie as we emerged from the field and edit room and into conversations with various industry leaders, and to better understand the funding and distribution landscape for an independent film tackling such complex themes.”
Since its inception, Film Independent’s Fast Track Finance Market has been a powerful ally to filmmakers, providing a structured-and-stacked space within which to pitch projects to independent media’s most adventurous advocates. Each year, Film Independent selects up to 10 fiction and five non-fiction feature projects to participate in an intensive film finance market that takes place over four days in November.
Designed to connect producer-director teams with industry leaders and put projects on the fast track, the market consists of meetings with top executives, financiers, agents, managers, distributors, granting organizations and production companies.
“Having to pitch our film to 30 different industry leaders in the course of two days forced a critical reckoning to distill the enormity of the film into a cohesive and succinct presentation. We reexamined essential questions about the story we were telling, how we were telling it, who we hoped we were telling the story for, and why we were telling this story,” The brothers said. “The lab accelerated months of development work into a matter of days.”
One of the things the Kramers felt lead to their success was the advanced pitch practice sessions, where they could try out their pitch with mentors before talking to distributors and financers at the big event. “The feedback from our mentor in the practice sessions helped us to gain the clarity and confidence to more directly convey the nuances of the story itself without feeling the need to fill in every possible gap, leaving the listener the space to ask questions or form their own reactions.”
The film had its world premiere at the Berlin International Film Festival, where the film also won the Best Documentary Award. The brothers went from having only a few people knowing about their project to having the world’s attention. They credit the work they did honing their pitch to being able to field questions about their project on a bigger stage.
“Overnight, we found ourselves having to talk about the film in front of thousands of people in-person and on dozens of international high-profile platforms. The preparation at Fast Track was an essential part of becoming ready for this moment.”
Fast Track is returning this November, and applications for the program are now open. Previous Fast Track projects include Bing Liu’s Academy Award-nominated Minding the Gap; Raven Jackson’s All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt, and Saim Sadiq’s Cannes Un Certain Regard and Spirit Award Winner Joyland. Other notable filmmakers who have participated in the program include Ana Lily Amirpour, Sean Baker, James Ponsoldt, Tina Mabry, Lana Wilson and Chloé Zhao.
Previous industry participants include 30WEST, Searchlight, MACRO, Mandalay Pictures, Netflix, Participant Media, Plan B, Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions and more.
For more information on the application deadline please visit our applications page.
Film Independent promotes unique independent voices by helping filmmakers create and advance new work. To become a Member of Film Independent, just click here. To support us with a donation, click here.
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Don’t-Miss Indies: What to Watch in June
June! It’s always such a refreshing chunk of Gregorian real estate, the promise of summer looming in its most ideal form, not yet curdled into the desultory, bedraggled blast-furnace blood factories of late August and September. It’s also when cinema begins to stretch her legs again after an invariably prolonged awards season hangover. And yes, this means a lot of sweaty studio would-be blockbusters. But it also means Don’t-Miss Indies. So! Seek out your local art house and keep those summertime blues at bay.
The Actor
When: Now
Where: Theaters, VOD
Director: Duke Johnson
Cast: André Holland, Gemma Chan, May Calamawy, Asim Chaudhry
Why We’re Excited: Somehow it’s been a full decade since Charlie Kaufman’s melancholic stop-motion feature Anomalisa left audiences both dazzled by its technical brilliance and disconsolate by its gutting existential questioning. Kaufman of course has gone on to direct 2020’s I’m Thinking of Ending Things and to write the absurdist doorstopper novel Antkind. But with The Actor, the enigmatic Kaufman’s Anomalisa co-director Duke Johnson finally gets to occupy the center of the frame. Trading in his articulated puppets for flesh-and-blood actors, Johnson adapts Donald E. Westlake’s noirish 2010 novel Memory. Moonlight. Robert Altman Award recipient André Holland plays Paul Cole, a thespian suffering from amnesia following a brutal assault. Stranded in an ominous and unfamiliar town, Paul must piece together the fragments of his shattered backstory and avoid being manipulated by nefarious outside parties to make his way back home. Need more? Executive producers Jeff Deutchman, Laura Rister and Devon Young are all Film Independent Members.
The Life of Chuck
When: June 6
Where: Theaters
Director: Mike Flanagan
Cast: Tom Hiddleston, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Karen Gillan, Jacob Tremblay
Why We’re Excited: Mike Flanagan is certainly no stranger to the work of Stephen King. The Hollywood horror mogul has adapted both Gerald’s Game and Doctor Sleep for the big screen and his 2021 Netflix limited series Midnight Mass bears more than a passing resemblance to Salem’s Lot. So the fact that Mr. Kate Siegel’s latest feature effort originates from a 2020 King novella is no surprise. This time, however, the Haunting Of Hill House auteur takes a page from the Frank Darabont’s handbook, turning his focus toward a King work more sentimental than spine-tingling. Tom Hiddleston plays the titular Chuck, who emerges from childhood trauma with a unique perspective on the world and an overriding love of dance. Aware that his time on Earth is limited “The Life of Chuck” takes on profound meaning. The result? A genre-defying, deeply personal work that plays to Flanagan’s strengths–even if outside of his usual genre.
Magic Farm
When: June 6
Where: Theaters, MUBI
Director: Amalia Ulman
Cast: Chloë Sevigny, Alex Wolff, Simon Rex, Guillermo Jacubowicz
Why We’re Excited: Premiering earlier this year at Sundance, Argentine-Spanish mixed-media artist Amalia Ulman’s sophomore feature (following 2021’s El Planeta) is a satirical look at the American hipster demographic’s colonialistic global obliviousness and tendency toward blithe cultural vampirism. Seeking to do a story about an elusive musician, only to learn that their quarry is in an entirely different Latin American country altogether. With a global health crisis looming, the team–including 2023 Film Independent Best Male Lead Spirit Award winner Rex–must find a way to pass the time and confront their own (mostly) unconscious bias. The film, according to our friend Carlos Aguilar in Variety, “Operates with refreshing visual anarchy” and is “a formally radical, biting satire about odious, privileged Americans.”
Misericordia
When: June 10
Where: Theaters
Director: Alain Guiraudie
Cast: Félix Kysyl, Catherine Frot, Jacques Develay, Jean-Baptiste Durand
Why We’re Excited: Few waterfront holidays are as simultaneously gruesome and unrepentantly horny as the one depicted in Alain Guiraudie’s 2013 thriller Stranger by the Lake. Two subsequent movies and a decade-plus later, the French filmmaker again returns to the thriller genre with Misericordia. Premiering at last year’s Cannes, the film follows Jérémie (Kysyl) on his return home to rural France for the funeral of an old employer. When things go wrong with one of the deceased man’s family members, Jérémie is suddenly left with a body to hide and a crime to cover up. He eventually enlists an unlikely ally: the town priest, who has a secret ulterior motive of his own (spoiler: it’s not the Eucharist.) With Guiraudie’s signature dark comedy in play and a disquieting pastoral mood, the film competed for the 2024 Queer Palm.
Materialists
When: June 13
Where: Theaters
Director: Celine Song
Cast: Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans, Pedro Pascal
Why We’re Excited: After winning Best Film and Best Director at the 2024 Film Independent Spirit Awards, Celine Song was left in the enviable/unenviable position of figuring out what to do as a follow-up. Staying the romantic vein of her breakthrough debut while dialing up the comedic flavor, Materialists is a sumptuous throwback to the starry and glamorous romcoms of the 1980s and ‘90s, a genre once indispensable to the overall Hollywood ecosystem which has somehow been lost in recent years and whose absence is widely lamented. Naturally, a love triangle animates the plot: pragmatic New York businesswoman Lucy (Johnson) finds herself caught between two opposing romantic prospects: wealthy Manhattanite mover-and-shaker Harry (Pedro Pascal) and modest caterer John (Chris Evans). The latter is a blast from Lucy’s past, the former represents the potential for a new professional and personal horizon. Film Independent Members behind the camera include the legendary indie producer Christine Vachon.
Bonjour Tristesse
When: June 13
Where: Theaters
Director: Durga Chew-Bose
Cast: Chloë Sevigny, Claes Bang, Lily McInerny
Why We’re Excited: Adapted once before in 1958 by Otto Preminger, Françoise Sagan’s enduring 1954 French-language novel again finds its way to screen, courtesy of Quebecois filmmaker Durga Chew-Bose. Set amid the lush seascapes of Southern France, budding ingénue Cécile (McInerny, a Breakthrough Performance Spirit Award nominee for 2022’s Palm Trees and Power Lines) and widowed father Raymond (Claes Bang) are all set to enjoy a long holiday soaking up the sun when the father-daughter interlude is interrupted by Anne (Sevigny, in her second Don’t-Miss Indie of the Month), an old friend–and maybe more–of Raymond and his late wife. As tension grows between the two women and additional romantic entanglements threaten to enter the frame things begin to hurdle towards an explosive conclusion. The film premiered last year in the filmmaker’s native Canada, at TIFF.
Ponyboi
When: June 25
Where: Theaters
Director: Esteban Arango
Cast: River Gallo, Dylan O’Brien, Victoria Pedretti, Murray Bartlett
Why We’re Excited: A true Renaissance they/them, Salvadorian-American actor, model, filmmaker and intersex rights activist River Gallo finally puts themselves into a lead film role, the second feature directed by Colombian filmmaker Esteban Arango. A neon-soaked crime caper, Gallo’s screenplay follows the titular Ponyboi, an intersex sex worker trapped in the downscale flats of urban New Jersey. When not also working at the local laundromat with best friend Angel (Pedretti), Ponyboi is on the downlow with their pimp Vinnie (O’Brien)–also the father of Angel’s unborn child. There’s a drug deal, and it goes off without a hitch. Just kidding! The deal goes bad and Ponyboi is soon on the run from the Jersey mob, unsure who to trust and desperate for love. With Gallo earning critical praise for their nuanced portrayal, Ponyboi premiered at the Sundance Film Festival last year (2024) before eventually being picked up by Fox for distro.
The Bear, Season 4
When: June 25
Where: FX on Hulu
Created by: Christopher Storer
Cast: Jeremy Allen White, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Ayo Edebiri, Lionel Boyce
Why We’re Excited: All your favorites are back for their fourth go-round at Chicago’s most exquisitely dysfunctional fine dining establishment. Carmy is still the genius, consumed by his vision and bedeviled by his inability to communicate said vision to others. Richie is still smoothing out his rough edges and unpacking past traumas. Syd is still struggling to find her own identity in the margins of Carmy’s enterprise–will she stay with our current Southside crew or take off for greener, less tension-fueled pastures? The Bear, of course, won the prized pewter Spirit Award valkyrie for Best New Scripted Series in 2023 for its first season, with Edebiri taking home Best Supporting Performance. This season, the staff of The Bear are up against the clock, as the acclaimed eatery still struggles for profitability under the fraught eye of its benefactor “Uncle Jimmy” (Oliver Platt), whose patience is running thinner than ever.
Sorry, Baby
When: June 27
Where: Theaters
Director: Eva Victor
Cast: Eva Victor, Naomi Ackie, Lucas Hedges, John Carroll Lynch
Why We’re Excited: Known for her recurring role in the latter seasons of Billions, Eva Viktor goes both in front of and behind in her debut feature as writer/director. Produced by Barry Jenkins, Sorry, Baby tells the story of Agnes (Victor), a young academic in New England recovering from sexual assault. Convalescing at home and struggling to bounce back both mentally and physically, she’s joined by an old classmate (Ackie) for what both parties hope will be an epic hang. As Agnes discovers how her recent experiences have forever altered her personal relationships and self-identity, life nevertheless goes on. Yet another 2025 Sundance premiere, Sorry, Baby is being released wide by A24. Executive producer Michael B. Clark and editor Randi Atkins are–you guessed it!–Film Independent Members.
KEY
Film Independent Fellow or Member
Film Independent Presents Screening, Q&A
Microbudget
Filmmaker or Lead Characters of Color
Film Independent Spirit Award Winner or Nominee
Female Filmmaker
LGBT Filmmaker or Lead LGBT Characters
First-time Filmmaker
LA Film Festival Winner or Nominee
Film Independent promotes unique independent voices by helping filmmakers create and advance new work. To become a Member of Film Independent, just click here. To support us with a donation, click here.
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Fiscal Spotlight: Reckoning with the Past & Reinventing the Future
Welcome to Fiscal Spotlight, a special monthly round up of projects—at all stages of production—working their way through Film Independent’s Fiscal Sponsorship pipeline. Enjoy!
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Institutions can be beautiful things. They bring people together, they support important causes, they are support systems for their members. One of the assets of an institution is its stability– knowledge gets passed down from generation to generation. But stability is a double-edged sword. It also means that you can be resistant to some much-needed change.
Flaws can be built into a long-standing enterprise, especially one that has lasted decades and centuries. Things can be proven incorrect later, manners and proprieties can change, and of course prejudices of another era can metastasize.
But for some people, that doesn’t mean that the institution should be given up on or thrown away. They want to change the system, but for something so established, that can be a tall task. The larger a ship is, the slower it is to change course.
The three nonfiction features in this month’s Fiscal Spotlight all deal with institutions and how to move them forward in one way or another. The films this month tackle the myth of the American West and the monuments that honor it in western states in Monumental, the ideals of a progressive church and how those ideals aren’t always lived up to in The 8thPrinciple, and a trailblazing dancer who wants to keep pushing one of the great dance companies forward in Shedding: A Dancer’s Journey of Self-Reinvention.
Keep reading to learn more, including how you can support these projects.
Monumental
Project type: Nonfiction Feature
Project status: Production
Director: Erika Bolstad
Producers: Jackie Weissman, Jen Tate
About the Project: After protesters upend five monuments in Portland in 2020, the community reckons with its symbols of westward expansion. The unfolding fate of the sculptures pits historic preservationists and the descendants of Oregon Trail settlers against artists, Indigenous activists, and others who view the monuments as relics of colonialism.
Meet the Filmmaker: Director Erika Bolstad is a journalist and filmmaker in Portland and the author of Windfall, a finalist for the Oregon Book Award. She spent a decade in Washington, D.C., covering politics and environmental issues for Climatewire and the McClatchy Washington Bureau. In 2008, she was a Pulitzer finalist for work at the Idaho Statesman. To Be Rich, her companion short documentary to Windfall, was supported by an environmental art grant from the Anonymous Was a Woman Foundation.
The 8th Principle
Project type: Nonfiction Feature
Project status: Production
Director: Sophia Uehara
Producer: Nicole Palermo
About the Project: Sophia Uehara, a mixed-race filmmaker and Unitarian Universalist, documents her congregation’s upheaval in adopting the 8th Principle, an anti-racist pledge. Interviewing various BIPOC UU leaders and activists across the United States, she explores the challenge of holding a mostly white religious community accountable to its ideals, exposing tensions between belief, allyship, and action.
Meet the Filmmaker: Sophia Uehara is a second-generation Japanese-American documentary director and production designer. With a career rooted in visual storytelling, Sophia brings a unique perspective to her work, drawing on her background in art direction to craft compelling narratives that explore identity, representation, and social change.
Raised by two classically trained visual artists, Sophia developed a fascination with the intersection of art, media, and education. As a production designer, she has designed award-winning features, commercials, and music videos including Our Son (dir. Bill Oliver), which premiered at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival, and If I Die in America (dir. Ward Kamel), which debuted at SXSW 2024. Commercial clients like Google, Lexus, Starbucks, and AT&T have also entrusted her with visually shaping their campaigns. She completed her education at Tisch School of the Arts.
Shedding: A Dancer’s Journey of Self-Reinvention
Project type: Nonfiction Feature
Project status: Production
Director: Jingqiu Guan
Producer: Selena Leoni
About the Project: Trailblazing Chinese immigrant dancer Xin Ying prepares to take her final bow after over a decade at the Martha Graham Dance Company. With her next chapter unwritten, she’s determined to shape the legacy of American modern dance—not just as a performer, but as a leading force in its future.
Meet the Filmmaker: Originally from Chengdu, China, Jingqiu Guan is an independent filmmaker and choreographer based in Los Angeles. From the Chinese Theater in Hollywood to the National Performing Art Center in China, her dance films and documentaries have been screened in a number of screendance festivals and film festivals in various cities in the US, the UK, Norway, Spain, Austria, Mexico, mainland China, and Hong Kong. Her dance film Family Portrait won the 2020 Chinese Screendance Maker Award from Jumping Frames International Video Dance Festival in HK, Best Student Film Award from San Francisco Dance Film Festival and the Grand Jury Award from Chicago’s In Motion Dance Film Festival. Her documentary film Inside the Frame won the Best Editing Award for the documentary shorts category at Silver State Film Festival.
Learn more about Fiscal Sponsorship, including its benefits and eligibility requirements by visiting our website. See which projects are currently being supported via our Sponsored Projects page.
Film Independent Artist Development promotes unique independent voices by helping filmmakers create and advance new work. To support our work with a donation, please click here. Become a Member of Film Independent here.
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THE FUTURE IS OURS: Humanity, Technology, and the Power of Narrative
How is technology making life better, worse or more complicated for filmmakers and audiences? In a panel discussion at Film Independent’s Sloan Summit – a weekend celebrating the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation’s science and technology Film Program – moderator Anisa Hosseinnezhad (filmmaker, IDA) led a discussion on the potential and the problems with tech advancements in the arts.
The panel featured traditional filmmakers and XR creators – innovators and thought leaders in narrative design – in a passionate discussion of the future of technology to tell stories.
THE CREATIVE POTENTIAL
With machine learning, AI tools and VR headsets, how are tech tools offering us new creative freedom?
For artist Nancy Baker Cahill, VR led to an entirely fresh and visceral way of creating. Using Augmented Reality to spin a design through real environments, Cahill found a way to invite viewers into her work like never before.
“People who experienced them reported feeling the drawings in their bodies, and that was an intoxicating idea to me,” Cahill said. “I thought, how could I amplify that feeling? How could I take that and turn it up to 11?” After struggling through options with 3D and haptics, the prospect of VR came as a light bulb moment.
Cahill now shares her drawings through 4th Wall, a free app that lets viewers experience each piece in any environment they choose.
For Jessica Brillhart, VR made an emotional connection that caught her entirely off guard. As a filmmaker for Google, she was invited by a group of engineers to experience a prototype 360 VR rig. “I kind of tried to ignore them,” she admitted, before finally going to see what they were pestering her about.
The first few stitches they showed her had Brillhart in a state of confusion. When they finally showed her an impromptu recording with no audio phasing, no clues to observe, she found herself among a group of engineers playing with the thing they made. “I can’t even describe how emotional this thing was, and it was literally just a bunch of engineers hanging out. It was literally just engineers who had turned on the rig for the first time, and they were just so happy that it worked so they’re waving at it. They were throwing shit at it. They were like, skipping around it. They were just laughing and having the best time.”
The line between filmmaking and technology was blurred in a way that Brillhart had never seen or made in any traditional medium, and that compelled new work. “It has been a bit like falling forward awkwardly, ever since.”
ETHICS & OPPORTUNITIES
Rwandan filmmaker Anisia Uzeyman (Neptune Frost) pushed the artistic limits of the iPhone 4 in order to make her first feature in 2016, Dreamstates. Fueled by a desire to showcase underrepresented skin colors and an opportunity to tour the United States with a band of musicians, Uzeyman had an idea for a film.
“I went to see producers and people trying to get a camera, trying to get stuff to be able to actually just witness something that I thought would be very interesting, and nobody gave me anything.” The room laughed with Uzeyman, because really who hasn’t had this experience? But the communication machine in her pocket gave Uzeyman the freedom to greenlight her own vision.
Aranya Sahay (Humans in the Loop) explored opportunities in technology for rural Indian women through Nehma, the lead character in his film about a tribal woman who becomes a data annotator for India’s burgeoning AI industry.
“Can AI ever represent the reality of an indigenous woman?” Sahay asked. “She’s working to enable it in this film, but can she find her own identity in it?” In his conversations with women in Jharkhand, India, Sahay heard about interconnectedness. Centuries of knowledge systems handed down colloquially, like mycelium among trees – systems that were deemed primitive by colonizers.
“I kind of noticed that there is an agency that they’re beginning to assert … for example, there’s a scene in the film where she’s told, ‘Okay, there’s a plant that you have to label as a pest. Now, pest is a value term, right?” Nehma has the opportunity through her job to resist a top-down value system and choose to protect the plant instead of killing it.
Sahay acknowledged the double-edged sword of high-tech cinematic tools, especially as regards inherent bias. “What is the training method?” Sahay asked. “How much diversity is there in training, data, etc?” Filming in India with AI tools primarily trained for fair skin, Sahay’s team had to create workarounds for the images that AI could not “see.”
Uzeyman referenced TikTok filters that were blind to black skin, stating, ”It is a long history in
the story of what’s visible and invisible in technology.” Cahill agreed with the ongoing frustration next to the potential for human connection through technology. “I think a lot about who it helps and who it harms,” she added. “But if we are going to use these tools – these tools whose very existence relies on forced labor disproportionately absorbed by the global South – how do we use them in a way that is responsible, compelling, and engenders some kind of human connection?”
THE FUTURE
Uzeyman expressed disillusionment with tech tools as the future of filmmaking, given the human motives driving those innovations. “Where all those have been, I think invested in by police states … There is nothing magic about it, that it’s all man-made.” If the expectation is to focus on big business and money-making, rather than openness and accessibility, then what framework will make these changes truly worthwhile for humanity, community, and connection?
Brillhart observed the juxtaposition of control. As a traditionally trained filmmaker, she was used to controlling the narrative for audiences. The human agency of VR led to an entirely different “mess – you can’t control mess,” she pointed out. “I would not even put immersive entertainment and AI in the same group, because the crux of control is very different between the two things.” Whereas immersive invites control, AI is a system for which the control is inherited – even the creator does not control it. Whoever owns the system controls AI. “Control is the future.”
Uzeyman brought it back to the heart of the matter – narratives. “Because I’m interested in telling stories about power and disempowered people. So at the end of the day, I think technology is very ancient.” Referencing her 2021 sci-fi romantic musical set in a post-civil war Rwanda, Uzeyman described how she explored human engineering through story. “Our internal engineering that intersects so many things. Community as technology. So, in a way, it’s tech versus organic life. You know, there is something in that relationship that I think is essential. And it’s essential to understand that in that intersection, we are the greatest technology.”
The Sloan Film Summit, launched in 1999, is part of Sloan’s greater efforts through its Public Understanding of Science and Technology initiative. Celebrating eight iterations, this year’s Summit (the fourth consecutive one produced by Film Independent) is a celebration of the program’s wide-ranging success supporting emerging filmmakers, while also bringing together a new group of artists and scientists to highlight how art and science interact and collaborate.
We’re thrilled to celebrate the arts and sciences with inspiring minds in both fields.
For over 40 years, Film Independent has helped filmmakers get their projects made and seen. The nonprofit organization’s core mission is to champion creative independence in visual storytelling in all its forms, and to foster a culture of inclusion. We support a global community of artists and audiences who embody diversity, innovation, curiosity and uniqueness of vision. To support our mission with a donation, click here.
Keep up with Film Independent…
MAKING IT FEEL REAL: Scientific Consultants Panel at Sloan Summit
In a power-packed weekend of seminars, panels and pitch sessions, hundreds of filmmakers gathered from the four corners of the earth (technical term) to celebrate the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation’s pioneering science and technology film program.
On Saturday afternoon, Film Independent assembled a panel of science consultants and storytellers to explore the delicate balance between technical accuracy and effective storytelling. What’s it like to consult on a show or a movie?
Maybe not as uppity and exacting as we might expect.
“We’re not the science police,” commented David Saltzberg (The Big Bang Theory), “it’s their story.” Saltzberg embraces his supporting role as a noticer of inconsistencies and a suggester of solutions – as do the four other science experts joining him on the panel moderated by IndieWire writer and critic, Ritesh Mehta.
From Star Trek to The Resident, read on for a fun peek behind the curtain of “[insert science here]” and the people who fill the space between brackets.
THE CREATIVE PROCESS
So how does one go about translating theoretical physics for general audiences? Do you have to have a whiteboard?
The Big Bang Theory has three. “There were about three whiteboards on the walls in 279 episodes,” Saltzberg recalled. “Every one had to be filled with science.” Producer David Goetsch explained the “really brilliant process” they had of writing “[science to come]” in the scripts the writers sent to Saltzberg.
Saltzberg was imaginative about what science he provided; for whiteboard equations, he considered visual interest as well as current events in the world of science. Mainly he took the story into account; if Leonard and Sheldon were going to write on a whiteboard, it’s because they had been discussing it. Maybe not in the scene, but just before.
Now and then a conflict arose between actual science and the story that the writers wanted to tell. Saltzberg referenced an episode where Leonard’s mother was working with Sheldon on Quantum Brain Dynamic Theory, “which made sense because she was a neuroscientist and he was a quantum particle physicist. The problem is a lot of scientists don’t take that theory very seriously – but they’d already written so much and I felt so bad.”
Saltzberg mentioned it and moved on, but the next draft he received had clearly taken his notes to heart – now the episode was about disproving Quantum Brain Dynamic Theory.
AUTHENTIC REPRESENTATION
Astrophysicist Erin Macdonald (Star Trek) recounted a more mixed result to one run-in with science and storytelling. “In season four of Star Trek Discovery, they wanted to have a plot where they have to ride the gravitational waves out of this anomaly. Gravitational waves don’t work that way – and that’s okay, but it was a cool idea!”
Being the topic for her PhD, Macdonald was intrigued to see gravitational waves featured in Star Trek. So a scene was written and filmed in the ready room, explaining how this escape tactic would work – with the starship surfing the waves to freedom.
Macdonald worked with the motion graphics teams to clarify that these waves are more like sound waves than ocean waves. “To their credit, they redid the whole scene with the sound compression waves in there. And then we all watched it … it just didn’t work for what they were talking about, and it would throw the audience.”
Rather than mess with the viewer’s sense of riding waves, Macdonald encouraged the team to stick with their original concept – and face the consequences from her colleagues.
“It’s fine,” she said. “I’m fine.”
Practicing oncologist Roshan Sethi (The Resident) was very focused on accuracy when he first began consulting. “I’ve since crossed over, and I now mainly do screenwriting and directing. And when my work occasionally does touch medicine, I am cavalier in being accurate! My priorities have all shifted.”
By his own admission, Sethi is happy to trade fastidious accuracy for a tinge of recklessness in storytelling – especially where it would ludicrously impose on the viewer’s patience. What’s the point of accurately portraying a procedure that takes ten minutes in real life?
But he still gets email complaints about it.
CONFIDENCE BOOST
So how much does it matter to the audience if the science is right? Results may differ for the particular show (“Star Trek fans will pause and check the math,” Macdonald asserted), but the panel agreed that a backbone of scientific accuracy can be felt by everyone – from the set and prop designers to the makeup artists and the actors.
Jacob F. Lentz (The Pitt) was a writer before becoming an Emergency Room physician. He now answers questions about what we should see on a monitor, or whether the props department is buying the right medical equipment (for thousands of dollars).
Though these technical details won’t factor into the script, they can instill confidence in the actors slinging jargon and pretending at procedures. This is, after all, supposed to be entertainment. “They’re not there to learn,” said Sethi. “Nobody is watching The Resident or The Pitt to learn.”
But watching how Noah Wylie and Tracy Ifeachor handle cases – not stopping to explain how they know what they know, but just knowing it (“competence porn,” Macdonald called it) keeps audiences connected to the story. The technical details help it all feel right.
ADVICE FOR COLLABORATORS
“Writers, don’t be afraid of consultants,” said Saltzberg encouragingly. “We’re not going to give you a C-minus. We’re here to help you. There’ll be no quiz.” Speaking from his experience interacting with The Big Bang Theory writers and consultants, Goetsch observed that having opportunities to meet in person and interact was a big help to get comfortable sharing ideas.
Sethi now keeps his writing and medicine separate, letting his accuracy show up in medicine so that he can write freely as a screenwriter. Even so, he strongly encouraged consultants – and scientists in general – to write as much as possible from their experience.
“In the beginning I was so intimidated by the practice of screenwriting as a medical consultant,” Sethi began (“It’s so much easier than being a doctor,” Goetsch quipped). “The more the stories come out of us, the more interesting possibilities there are because we have so much to say.”
The Sloan Film Summit, launched in 1999, is part of Sloan’s greater efforts through its Public Understanding of Science and Technology initiative. Celebrating eight iterations, this year’s Summit (the fourth consecutive one produced by Film Independent) is a celebration of the program’s wide-ranging success supporting emerging filmmakers, while also bringing together a new group of artists and scientists to highlight how art and science interact and collaborate.
We’re thrilled to celebrate the arts and sciences with inspiring minds in both fields.
For over 40 years, Film Independent has helped filmmakers get their projects made and seen. The nonprofit organization’s core mission is to champion creative independence in visual storytelling in all its forms, and to foster a culture of inclusion. We support a global community of artists and audiences who embody diversity, innovation, curiosity and uniqueness of vision. To support our mission with a donation, click here.
Keep up with Film Independent…
Don’t-Miss Indies: What to Watch in May
It’s not technically summer yet, but May is usually when things start to heat up– both outside and at the movie theater. After the earlier frenzy of awards season, moviegoers can expect a more robust release schedule, with May being the official start of summer blockbuster season. While this May’s movies include the standard fare of superheroes and the eighth and final reckoning of an iconic action franchise, they also showcase a diverse slate of indie counter-programming, including horror, comedy, and romance. Read on to see which independent films we’re excited to watch in May.
HURRY UP TOMORROW
When You Can Watch: May 16
Where you Can Watch: Theaters
Director: Trey Edward Shults Cast: The Weeknd, Jenna Ortega, Barry Keoghan
Why We’re Excited: One of the most exciting things about director Trey Edward Shults, a John Cassavetes Award winner at the Film Independent Spirit Awards, is that he keeps you on your toes. Whether it’s the taut, unsettling drama of his breakout Krisha, the emotional fallout of his aptly named Waves, or the psychological horror of It Comes At Night, Shults has a penchant for setting us on edge. These talents are on full display in the trailer for his latest, a psychological horror called Hurry Up Tomorrow. Produced by and starring Abel Tesfaye, aka The Weeknd, the film is a companion piece to his album of the same name, and is heavily influenced by Abel’s own experiences as a megastar musician. It follows a fictionalized version of the pop star ‘on the verge of a breakdown’, sending him on a dark odyssey exploring fame and identity. If the mind- bending visuals, intriguing premise, and disturbing tone of the trailer don’t sell you, the buzzy cast will. Modern scream queen Jenna Ortega stars opposite Tesfaye, and Barry Keoghan’s presence exudes the potential for another wild performance like the one he blessed us with in Saltburn. With all this musical and movie talent on display, Hurry Up Tomorrow looks like a deranged mind trip worth the journey.
FRIENDSHIP
When You Can Watch: May 9 (limited), May 23 (wide)
Where you Can Watch: Theaters
Director: Andrew DeYoung
Cast: Paul Rudd, Tim Robinson, Kate Mara
Why We’re Excited: There’s already one great comedy movie about male friendship starring Paul Rudd, but we can always use another. In fact, Indiewire described this film as ‘I Love You Man for sickos’, which is a pretty great elevator pitch. Friendship adds Tim Robinson’s discomfiting brand of humor to the mix, while director Andrew DeYoung’s work on shows like Pen15 means there will be plenty of awkwardness to go around. Paul Rudd plays a magnetic next-door-neighbor and de-facto leader of a group of guys, who takes Tim Robinson’s off-putting loner under his wing. Rudd, who still has the boyish looks and charm to make any film more ebullient, appears to play against his perpetual nice guy type here. As implied in the trailer’s menacing undertones, he soon sours on Robinson, making room for the comedian’s singular ability to make everyone uncomfortable as he relentlessly stalks the group, trying to figure out why they rejected him. Not enough films explore male friendship or its breakup, and not enough theatrical releases these days include comedies. As fun as it is to watch Robinson go all-in on a joke in his TV gems Detroiters or I Think You Should Leave, there’s just something about the collective experience of laughing with an audience in the theater. Even though Tim’s character tries to convince his wife to see the ‘new Marvel movie’ in the trailer, the cast and concept for this theatrical comedy have us sold on Friendship.
BRING HER BACK
When You Can Watch: May 30
Where you Can Watch: Theaters
Director: Danny Philippou, Michael Philippou
Cast: Sally Hawkins, Billy Barratt
Why We’re Excited: Bring Her Back is the sophomore effort from the Australian directing duo of last year’s breakout Talk To Me, which became A24’s highest grossing horror film to date. Like their successful directorial debut, this film looks to be another visually evocative, terrifying descent into the supernatural consequences of death and grief. While the trailer wisely keeps much of the plot veiled in mystery, the title implies a desire to commune with the dead, a recurring theme for the Philippou brothers. They’ve called this film a ‘spiritual successor’ to Talk To Me, in which the severed, embalmed hand provided a clever new construct to explore supernatural possession. While Talk To Me centered on a grieving young woman looking for answers about her mother’s death, Bring Her Back focuses on a pair of siblings who encounter frightening rituals at the home of their new foster mother, played by Academy Award and Spirit Award nominee Sally Hawkins. The trailer alone makes for some of the creepiest cinematic imagery we’ve seen this year, not least the close up of a determined finger tracing a foreboding circle over and over again on a child’s shaved head. While Talk To Me was a confident first step into unflinching horror, Bring Her Back should cement the filmmakers as a terrifying presence in the genre for years to come.
SWAMP DOGG GETS HIS POOL PAINTED
When You Can Watch: May 2nd
Where you Can Watch: Theaters
Director: Isaac Gale, Ryan Olson
Cast: Jerry “Swamp Dogg” Williams, David “Guitar Shorty” Kearney, Larry “Moogstar” Clemon
Why We’re Excited: You might never have heard of Little Jerry Williams, Swamp Dogg, or any of the other monikers Jerry Williams Jr. has given himself over his long and storied career, but our programmer’s pick Swamp Dogg Gets His Pool Painted finally puts him in the spotlight . A singer, songwriter, and producer who got his start in 1954, Jerry Williams Jr. has been making music since he was 12. His pseudonym Swamp Dogg came about when he decided to combine the idea of ‘swamp music’ —funk music played by white musicians influenced by black R&B artists— with the lovable ‘everyman’ persona of a dog. This was before Snoop Dogg was even born, making him the ‘original D-O-double G’. Despite producing a number of hits for iconic acts and being instrumental in the formation of the ‘World Class Wrecking’ CRU, Swamp Dogg never achieved mainstream fame. This is exactly what makes him the perfect subject for a documentary— he’s an eccentric talent with a story still to be told. Using psychedelic font, low-fi footage, and other eclectic touches to showcase the cult icon, this a music documentary like no other. It showcases Swamp Dogg’s house in the San Fernando valley of Los Angeles, where he’s built an artistic haven with roommates and fellow musicians, Guitar Shorty and Moogstar. This is a story as much about their professional legacies as it is about their personal history of friendship and endurance in an unforgiving industry.
JANE AUSTEN WRECKED MY LIFE
When You Can Watch: May 23
Where you Can Watch: Select Theaters
Director: Laura Piani
Cast: Camille Rutherford, Charlie Anson, Pablo Pauly
Why We’re Excited: If the title is any indication, Jane Austen Wrecked My Life is a witty, meta refresher on a timeless love story. When pondering how a famous author who wrote about women and romance could ruin someone’s life, we’d bet all our copies of Pride and Prejudice it has something to do with the unrealistic expectations her books give fans in today’s turbulent dating age. The charming trailer features Agathe, a book seller and self-anointed Jane Austen stan, who gets the opportunity to workshop her book pages at the ‘Jane Austen Residency’. While there, she meets the ‘great great great great great… nephew’ of Jane Austen, who, of all worst ways he could make a first impression, tells our heroine he thinks his famous relative’s work is ‘over-rated’. It’s a classic Elizabeth Bennet/Mr. Darcy meet cute. She thinks he’s the worst, he’s intrigued by her… and they will surely bicker a lot more before they realize all that tension between them is actually the good kind. The film builds to a love triangle in which our heroine’s best friend shows up unexpectedly, dressed as Mr. Darcy, in an attempt to finally woo her, just as Agathe and her literary hero’s great great great great nephew start to realize their feelings for each other. Set at a bucolic writer’s retreat, it’s the kind of wish-fulfillment, romantic escapism perfect for summer.
OVERCOMPENSATING
When You Can Watch: May 15
Where you Can Watch: Amazon Prime
Creator: Benito Skinner
Cast: Connie Britton, Benito Skinner, Kyle MacLachlan, Adam DiMarco
Why We’re Excited: This TV show from A24 and Amazon Prime was developed by star Benito Skinner, known for his online persona ‘Benny Drama’, of Instagram and TikTok fame. While he gained traction online doing celebrity impressions and creating original characters like Jenni the Hairdresser, the show is based on his sold-out performance of ‘Overcompensating’ at the New York Comedy Festival. It explores the trials and tribulations of a closeted high school football star’s first year at college, as he befriends an outsider named Carmen. Given that his work is firmly rooted in pop culture, it’s no wonder the show is stacked with guest stars like Charlie XCX, Megan Fox, Lukas Gage, Bowen Yang, and James Van Der Beek. Skinner, who came out his senior year of college, probably knows a thing or two about navigating freshman year anxiety, sexuality, and relationships. The trailer includes a funny moment where he refers to the sound he and a fellow jock made while ogling women as ‘bird calls’, indicating some of the ‘overcompensating’ the title refers to. A self-aware, coming-of-age comedy like this is the kind of crushable show made for summer Fridays.
THE PHOENICIAN SCHEME
When You Can Watch: May 30
Where you Can Watch: Theaters
Director: Wes Anderson
Cast: Benicio del Toro, Scarlett Johansson, Bill Murray, Tom Hanks, Michael Cera
Why We’re Excited: Singular director Wes Anderson is back with another quirky romp in his signature, visual style. His latest stars Benicio del Toro as Zsa-zsa Korda, ‘one of the richest men in Europe’, so naturally, everyone is trying to kill him. Despite having nine sons, he appoints his only daughter Liesl, played by Mia Threapleton (looking more and more like her mother Kate Winslet every day) sole heir to his estate. Father and daughter soon become the target of various assassins, tycoons, and terrorists in this globe-trotting, espionage-infused comedy. Adding to the absurdity is the fact that Liesl is a nun, and one highlight of the trailer includes her blessing an assassin with holy water in an elevator after he’s caught and takes a cyanide pill to escape questioning. In true Wes Anderson fashion, the sets look like small worlds unto themselves, the trailer has no shortage of witty one-liners, and even the violence retains a farcical quality. As with any of his films, it also includes a star-studded cast longer than a CVS receipt. When combined with his stunning cinematography and wry humor, it’s guaranteed to be a good time.
LILLY
When You Can Watch: May 9
Where you Can Watch: Select Theaters
Director: Rachel Feldman
Cast: Patricia Clarkson, John Benjamin Hickey, Thomas Sadoski
Why We’re Excited: Based on a true story, Lilly focuses on real life fair pay activist, Lilly Ledbetter. An Alabama tire factor worker, Lilly was cheated out of fair pay after twenty years with the company, getting paid half the salary the men were. As she takes her fight all the way to the Supreme Court, the trailer makes the point that it’s not just about what Lilly’s owed; it’s about how companies across the country take advantage of their workers. This makes the film feel particularly relevant, as the working class continues to struggle. Writer, director, and producer Rachel Feldman is also an activist for women behind the camera. She participated in Geena Davis’s documentary This Changes Everything, which examines sexism in Hollywood, and was a former chair of the DGA Women’s Steering Committee, focusing on supporting and uplifting women in the industry. Starring acting powerhouse Patricia Clarkson, a Film Independent Spirit Award nominee for her performance in High Art, edited by Film Independent member Joan Sobel, and executive produced by Member Jayne Baron Sherman, Lilly is about a fight everyone can get behind.
MOUNTAINHEAD
When You Can Watch: May 31
Where you Can Watch: Streaming on Max
Director: Jesse Armstrong
Cast: Ramy Youssef, Cory Michael Smith, Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman
Why We’re Excited: Succession fans rejoice. Series creator Jesse Armstrong makes his feature directorial debut with Mountainhead, which looks to be another pitch black comedy about the billionaire class. This time, we’re following four wealthy friends who gather at one of their group’s snowy mountain cabin. The guys, led by comedic heavyweight Steve Carrell, are all rich as sin, but some of them have more of a conscience about it than others. Of course, can you really have a conscience when there’s no such thing as an ethical billionaire? The remote snowy locale provides a haven as they drink and snowmobile and play poker, even as news of a disastrous financial crisis affecting the outside world reaches them. There are hints that at least one of the group is responsible for the mess, creating a pressure cooker situation that hopefully reaches the kind of emotional boiling point that made Succession an Emmy- winning hit. The trailer has shades of the apocalypse, with god-like figures of wealth and power arguing atop a mountain, deciding our fates from on high while we suffer down below. But will any of these über rich pay for what they’ve done? If art is anything like life, we know they rarely do.
KEY
Film Independent Fellow or Member
Film Independent Presents Screening, Q&A
Microbudget
Filmmaker or Lead Characters of Color
Film Independent Spirit Award Winner or Nominee
Female Filmmaker
LGBT Filmmaker or Lead LGBT Characters
First-time Filmmaker
LA Film Festival Winner or Nominee
Film Independent promotes unique independent voices by helping filmmakers create and advance new work. To become a Member of Film Independent, just click here. To support us with a donation, click here.
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Sloan Summit 25: A Look Back at Some of Our Favorite Sloan Grantee Films
With the 2025 Sloan Film Summit just around the corner, we want to look back at some of our favorite films that have been supported in the past by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. These films are dramas, science fictions, biopics and big budget blockbusters. Yes, they all have science, math, technology, economics or engineering at their core, and this list goes to show just how much storytelling juice you can get out of those topics.
The films on this list show how universal stories about the sciences can be. We all care about nature, we all look up at the stars and wonder and we all love solving a good puzzle. And that’s what the sciences are all about. Both art and science help you understand the world better, just in different ways, and these films prove what you can do when they come together.
Adventures of a Mathematician (2020)
Writer/Director: Thor Klein
Featuring: Philippe Tlokinski, Esther Garrel, Sam Keeley
Cambridge, USA, 1942. Stan Ulam is a 30-year-old talented Polish Jewish mathematician, a good-looking bon vivant who is quick with a joke. Stan’s life becomes complicated when he loses his fellowship at Harvard but his best friend, the Hungarian genius Johnny von Neumann quickly offers him a mysterious job which takes him to New Mexico. Stan moves to Los Alamos with Françoise, a French woman he meets and marries after a whirlwind romance. Surrounded by young, eccentric, charismatic immigrant scientists Stan begins top secret work on a nuclear bomb that could potentially blow up the entire world. While desperately trying to help his sister flee Nazi occupied Poland, Stan teams up with Johnny to create the first computer giving birth to the digital age as Europe bursts into flames.
2017, Tribeca Film Institute: Sloan Filmmaker Fund: Screenplay Development Award
2017, Film Independent: Sloan Producer’s Grant
2019, Tribeca Film Institute: Sloan Discretionary Fund
2020, Film Independent: Sloan Distribution Grant
After Yang (2021)
Director: Kogonada
Writer: Alexander Weinstein, Kogonada
Featuring: Colin Farrell, Jodie Turner-Smith, Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja
When his young daughter’s beloved companion, an android named Yang, malfunctions, Jake (Colin Farrell) searches for a way to repair him. In the process, Jake discovers the life that has been passing in front of him, reconnecting with his wife (Jodie Turner-Smith) and daughter across a distance he didn’t know was there.
2022, Sundance Institute: Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize
2022, Film Independent: Sloan Distribution Grant
Hidden Figures (2016)
Director: Theodore Melfi
Writer: Allison Schroeder, Theodore Melfi, Margot Lee Shetterfly
Featuring: Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, Janelle Monae
As the United States raced against Russia to put a man in space, NASA found untapped talent in a group of female African American mathematicians who served as the brains behind one of the greatest operations in U.S. history. Based on the unbelievable true life stories of three of these women known as “human computers,” follow these women as they quickly rose through the ranks of NASA alongside many of history’s greatest minds, specifically tasked with calculating the momentous launch of astronaut John Glenn into orbit and guaranteeing his safe return. Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson and Katherine Goble Johnson crossed all gender race, and professional lines while their brilliance and desire to dream big, beyond anything ever accomplished before by the human race, firmly cemented them in U.S. history as true American heroes.
2016, SFFILM: Sloan Science in Cinema Prize
Radical (2023)
Director: Christopher Zalla
Writer: Christopher Zalla, Joshaua Davis
Featuring: Eugenio Derbez, Daniel Haddad, Jennifer Trejo
Who will the sixth-grade students at Jose Urbina Lopez Elementary in Matamoros become? They are among the worst performing students in Mexico, the world they know is one of violence and hardship, and their classrooms are dominated by an atmosphere of overbearing discipline, not possibility. It might seem like a dead end… but it is also the perfect place for new teacher Sergio Juarez to try something different. There’s just one problem: Sergio (played by an amazing Eugenio Derbez) has no idea what he’s doing.
2023, Film Independent: Sloan Distribution Grant
The Theory of Everything (2014)
Director: James Marsh
Writer: Anthony McCarten, Jane Hawking
Featuring: Eddie Redmayne, Felicity Jones, Tom Prior
The Theory of Everything is the story of the most brilliant and celebrated physicist of our time, Stephen Hawking, and Jane Wilde, the arts student he fell in love with while studying at Cambridge in the 1960s. Little was expected from Hawking, a bright but shiftless student of cosmology, after he was given just two years to live following the diagnosis of a fatal illness (ALS) at 21 years of age. He became galvanized, however, by the love of Jane Wilde, and went on to be called the “successor to Einstein,” as well as a husband and father to their three children. Over the course of their marriage, however, as Stephen’s body collapsed and his academic renown soared, fault lines were exposed that tested the resolve of their relationship and dramatically altered the course of both of their lives.
2025, NYU Tisch School of the Arts: Sloan Screenwriting Grant
Tesla (2020)
Writer/Director: Michael Almereyda
Featuring: Ethan Hawke, Eve Hewson, Eli A. Smith
A freewheeling take on visionary inventor Nikola Tesla, his interactions with Thomas Edison and J.P. Morgan’s daughter Anne and his breakthroughs in transmitting electrical power and light.
2020, Sundance Institute: Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize
2016, SFFILM: Sloan Science in Cinema Filmmaker Fellowship
Twisters (2024)
Director: Lee Isaac Chung
Writer: Mark L Smith, Joseph Kosinski, Michael Crichton
Featuring: Daisy Edgar-Jones, Glen Powell, Anthony Ramos
As storm season intensifies, the paths of former storm chaser Kate Carter, lured back to the open plains after a devastating encounter years prior, and reckless social-media superstar Tyler Owens collide when terrifying phenomena never seen before are unleashed. The pair and their competing teams find themselves squarely in the paths of multiple storm systems converging over central Oklahoma in the fight of their lives.
2024, SFFILM: Sloan Science in Cinema Prize
For over 40 years, Film Independent has helped filmmakers get their projects made and seen. The nonprofit organization’s core mission is to champion creative independence in visual storytelling in all its forms, and to foster a culture of inclusion. We support a global community of artists and audiences who embody diversity, innovation, curiosity and uniqueness of vision. To support our mission with a donation, click here.
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We Are Ready: Everything You Need to Know About the 2025 Sloan Film Summit and How to Watch it Live
Think science and film don’t mix? Think again. Introducing the 2025 Sloan Film Summit: Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and Film Independent’s triennial, weekend-long celebration of the intersecting fields of cinema, science, math and engineering.
This invitation-only event will bring together more than 100 award-winning screenwriters, directors and producers alongside working scientists and representatives from leading film schools and organizations, who all work to bridge the gap between science & technology and popular culture.
Note: While Summit attendance is exclusive to invitees, we’ll be sharing highlights here on the blog along with live updates on our Instagram, so you can still take part in the excitement.
Since its inception, the Sloan Foundation’s pioneering Film Program has supported over 850 science-themed film projects from some of the most innovative storytellers around the world. That includes more than 30 completed feature films, ranging from independent gems to major blockbusters like Oppenheimer, Twisters and Hidden Figures.
This year’s exciting summit will feature a keynote address from astronomer Amy Mainzer and screenings of recent science-focused, Sloan-awarded films, including Magma and Love Me, along with panels and conversations with a wide-range of experts in a variety of fields in the sciences and the arts.
You can check this weekend’s programming below and, as a warm-up, catch highlights of the 2022 Sloan Summit here:
FRIDAY, MAY 9
The Sloan Film Summit will kick off this Friday, May 9 with an opening reception, followed by a screening of Magma by Cyprien Vial, awarded the Sloan Science on Screen Award at the 2025 San Francisco International Film Festival, and a Q&A with USC seismology professor & researcher, John Vidale.
SATURDAY, MAY 10
The second day begins with Sloan Grantee Introductions. Next up is Reality Augmented: AI, Machine Learning and the Future of Cinematic Expression, a panel featuring leading artists and scientists discussing the future of storytelling in the age of artificial intelligence. UCLA planetary science professor and principal investigator of NASA’s NEO Surveyor mission Amy Mainzer will deliver a Keynote Speech, and in the afternoon, we’ll feature an exclusive Live Read of selected Sloan-supported projects in development.
Rounding out the day is the panel The Consultants’ Cut: Scientific Accuracy in Storytelling, exploring the delicate balance between scientific accuracy and narrative engagement. The day will conclude with a “Science in Motion” cocktail hour.
Tune in to the following Saturday events via Instagram Live (@filmindependent):
8:30 am PT: Sloan Grantee Introductions
2:15 pm PT: Amy Mainzer Keynote Speech
4:30 pm PT: Live readings of selected Sloan-supported projects in development
SUNDAY, MAY 11
The final day begins with a showcase of Sloan-winning short films, followed by a live Q&A. The day’s panel, Beyond Screens: How Podcasts and Social Media are Democratizing Science Storytelling, will focus on how the digital revolution has transformed how scientific knowledge is shared. The Summit concludes with a screening of Love Me at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures – a post-apocalyptic romance in which a buoy and a satellite fall in love, from directors Andrew and Sam Zuchero, starring Kristen Stewart and Steven Yuen. The screening will include a timely discussion with Jonathan Gratch (Research Professor of Computer Science, Psychology and Media Arts and Practice, USC), followed by a farewell reception for the artists and scientists.
Film Independent Members, you and a guest are invited to attend the screening of Love Me on May 11, as well as watch the shorts program from the comfort of home, May 12-15. Register using the links below:
2025 Sloan Summit Shorts Program
2025 Sloan Summit Closing Night Screening: Love Me
Tune in to the following Sunday events via Instagram Live (@filmindependent):
10:45 am PT: Q&A with filmmakers of Sloan-winning short films
11:30 am PT: Panel discussion – Beyond Screens: How Podcasts and Social Media are Democratizing Science Storytelling
The Sloan Film Summit, launched in 1999, is part of Sloan’s greater efforts through its Public Understanding of Science and Technology initiative. Celebrating eight iterations, this year’s Summit (the fourth consecutive one produced by Film Independent) is a celebration of the program’s wide-ranging success supporting emerging filmmakers, while also bringing together a new group of artists and scientists to highlight how art and science interact and collaborate.
We’re thrilled to celebrate the arts and sciences with inspiring minds in both fields.
For over 40 years, Film Independent has helped filmmakers get their projects made and seen. The nonprofit organization’s core mission is to champion creative independence in visual storytelling in all its forms, and to foster a culture of inclusion. We support a global community of artists and audiences who embody diversity, innovation, curiosity and uniqueness of vision. To support our mission with a donation, click here.
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Header, top row L-R: Amy Mainzer (UCLA Department of Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences), David Saltzberg (Popular Science), Anisia Uzeyman (Rockwell Creative), Ritesh Mehta (IndieWire), Dr. Kiki Sanford (This Week in Science); bottom row L-R: Roshan Sethi (Getty Images), Jessica Brillhart (I Am a Scientist), Latif Nasser (Kaila Colbin)
They Made the Cut: Meet the 2025 Documentary Story Lab Fellows
If there’s one thing every documentary director knows all too well, it’s the “big board”. It’s fretted over, it’s tinkered with, it’s argued about. All that fuss over a cork board with story-beat cards!
But when the cards (and scenes) line up in just the right order, you get clarity, emotion and hopefully an unforgettable story.
Luckily, this year’s Film Independent Documentary Story Lab Fellows are up for the challenge. In its second year, the one-week intensive focuses on projects in post-production, where filmmakers can hone story structure and editing, and ends with a final pitch event with industry execs.
“This year’s Documentary Story Lab Fellows are not united by geography or genre, but a fearless and tenacious commitment to telling the truth,” said Daniel Cardone, Senior Manager of Nonfiction Programs & Fiscal Sponsorship at Film Independent. “Whether exploring identity, justice, legacy or the fragility of our environment, these filmmakers aren’t just documenting the world—they’re questioning it and reframing it, helping us see it anew.”
The Fellows will workshop their projects with both Editing and Directing Mentors, with Editing Mentors, including Pablo Proenza (Fahrenheit 11/9), Christy Denes (Seduced: Inside the NXIVM Cult), Sara Newens (Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields), Claire Didier (Rock Hudson: All That Heaven Allowed) and Mikaela Shwer (Allen v. Farrow). Directing Mentors include Smriti Mundhra (Indian Matchmaking), Anayansi Prado (Uvalde Mom), Kirsten Johnson (Dick Johnson Is Dead), Ted Passon (Patrice: The Movie),Alysa Nahmias (Art and Krimes by Krimes) and Tracy Droz Tragos (Plan C).
Additionally, the Cayton-Goldrich Family Foundation Fellowship, an unrestricted $10,000 grant awarded to a Jewish filmmaker accepted into one of our Artist Development Programs, has been awarded to Emily Cohen Ibañez, participating in the program with her film Orquidea.
Without further ado, we’re very proud to announce this year’s fellows and their projects:
Natalie Baszile
Natalie Baszile is the author of the novel, Queen Sugar, which was adapted for seven television seasons by writer/director Ava DuVernay, and co-produced by Oprah Winfrey, and the non-fiction book, We Are Each Other’s Harvest: Celebrating African American Farmers, Land & Legacy which was an Amazon Editor’s Pick and was a Wall Street Journal Book of the Year, 2021. Her non-fiction work has appeared in National Geographic, The Bitter Southerner, O, The Oprah Magazine, and numerous anthologies. Baszile was a SFFILM Resident and received the SFFILM / Bonnie Rattner fellowship at the Djerassi Resident Arts Program. Harvest is her first documentary feature.
Hyacinth Parker
Hyacinth Parker worked as a Creative Strategist for The New York Times before entering production where she worked on FX’s docuseries, Welcome to Wrexham. She has since worked with award-winning directors on series including Netflix’s With Love, Meghan, and ID / Max’s The Fall of Diddy. Hyacinth directs, writes, and produces narrative and documentary films and series, and is passionate about telling stories about unusual people in unexpected places. She has received grants from the Ford Foundation and SF Film Invest, and fellowships from Film Independent, The Redford Center, and Chicken and Egg’s (Egg)Celerator Lab.
Harvest
Logline: The Nelson brothers are determined to be the USA’s biggest farmers, but after two years of poor harvests, the new year brings much opportunity as uncertainty. This season the brothers farm more land than ever, facing the headwinds of climate change, equipment failures, racism and familial tension along the way.
Emily Cohen Ibañez
Colombian-American filmmaker Emily Cohen Ibañez pairs lyricism with social activism, advocating for labor and environmental justice. Her feature documentary, Fruits of Labor, had its World Premiere at SXSW 2021 and broadcast on PBS POV | American Documentary. Her short films are distributed with POV Shorts, The Guardian, The Intercept, and TIME. She was recently awarded the SFFILM Rainin grant for her first fiction screenplay, From Honey To Ashes, and is completing a short film about competitive river rafters in the Colombian Amazon, supported by the Points North Pretty Wild Fellowship.
Orquídea
Logline: From Colombia’s Amazon River Basin to the top of a volcanic mountain, guerilla ex-combatants, Indigenous elders, and biologists safeguard orchids and the forests they inhabit. Just as a wandering filmmaker in search of home seeks them out, a glacier melts and throws nature out of balance.
Bobby Herrera
Bobby Herrera is a South Texas-born Mexican American narrative and documentary filmmaker based in St. Louis City. His recent feature screenplay is supported by the Sundance Institute, SFFILM, and Antigravity Academy. He shot, directed, and edited the feature documentary The Gray Seasons, which premiered in festivals in 2011. His no-budget narrative, Palacios, premiered in festivals in 2017. Both films earned worldwide distribution. In 2024, Herrera was selected as a Berlinale Talent and for participation in the Berlinale Doc Station with his latest documentary feature. He also directs and produces a wide range of commercial and creative content.
The Seven Ages of Olajuwon
Logline: Told on stage and through 16+ years of intimate and powerful footage, a gifted Black performer struggles to exist as he stares down a defining journey towards purpose when met with unreal expectations, risks to his livelihood and injustice when the FBI ensnares him in a deadly terrorist plot.
Julia Hunter
Julia Hunter is a Midwest-based documentary filmmaker whose work resists objectivity and centers, harm reduction and the politics of personal archives. Her film survivorship –This is Me Loving You (post-production) has received support from Big Sky, BAVC, ITVS and Film Independent. Hunter is currently in, a documentary produced by Christina Shaver exploring the surrealist painter Gertrude production on Gertrude Abercrombie’s tumultuous life and explosive posthumous rise. With a background in creative writing, she works across genres and in 2022 lensed the feature comedy Everything Fun You Could Possibly Do in Aledo, Illinois.
This Is Me Loving You
Logline: Sydney, a gregarious heroin user, moves into a Chicago recovery home and befriends Julia, an alcoholic filmmaker. When Sydney gets pregnant and returns to her abusive boyfriend, both women re-enter a world of abuse and addiction where they must choose between protecting those they love and saving themselves.
Nadav Kurtz
Nadav Kurtz is a director whose work has screened at Sundance, True/False, Sheffield, and been featured by The Criterion Channel, PBS’ POV, the New York Times Op-Docs, and Sundance Doc Club. His debut short, Paraíso, about high-rise window washers in Chicago, won Best Documentary Short at Tribeca, AFI-Silverdocs, and others, and was short-listed for an Academy Award. Kurtz was named a 2020 New Face of Independent Film by Filmmaker Magazine and is a CIFF Points North Fellow. His upcoming feature, Untitled Sam Project, follows an immigrant family’s entanglement with filmmaking and the justice system. He previously spent over a decade as a film and commercial editor.
Untitled Sam Project
Logline: When film producer Kaz Bader was sentenced to 24 years in prison, his brother Malik helped raise Kaz’s 8-year-old son Omar. Now, 14 years later, Omar struggles finding his own path. As the family confronts its unspoken past – Omar gains the courage to pursue his artistic dreams.
Daniel Lombroso
Daniel Lombroso is a director and journalist who spent the last nine years building the Oscar-nominated video departments at The New Yorker and The Atlantic. His debut feature, White Noise, based on his reporting inside white nationalist movements, was named one of the top documentaries of 2020 by Vox and The Boston Globe. His short, Nina & Irena, Executive Produced by Errol Morris, won multiple festival awards, while Nina’s full interview was added to the U.S. Holocaust Museum’s Permanent Collection. Lombroso’s work has premiered at Sundance, TIFF, SXSW, and has earned eight Vimeo Staff Picks, two National Magazine Award nominations, an IDA nomination, and a spot on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list.
You’ll Be Happier
Logline: You’ll Be Happier follows a year in the life of Bill Moore, a gay businessman in Dallas striving to make penis enlargement as common as Botox. This darkly funny and deeply empathetic film is a frank exploration of how men are navigating new standards of masculinity and beauty in the age of Trump.
The Documentary Story Lab is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts.
For over 40 years, Film Independent has helped filmmakers get their projects made and seen. The nonprofit organization’s core mission is to champion creative independence in visual storytelling and support a community of artists who embody diversity, innovation and uniqueness of vision. To support our mission with a donation, click here.
Keep up with Film Independent…
FiSpo Updates: Hope, Curiosity and Axolotl – Coming to a Screen Near You!
With all the great films the Film Independent’s Fiscal Sponsorship program supports, we can’t help to brag about all the awesome work in the program from time to time. That’s exactly what we do in our FiSpo Update columns.
This month, we’re featuring a personal portrait of a filmmaker’s artist father, a film about building community through adversity, and a documentary on the push and pull between tradition and environmentalism in Mexico’s legendary Lake Xochimilco.
Through Fiscal Sponsorship, independent filmmakers and media artists gain access to nonprofit funding, helping bring their unique visions to life. These projects embrace diversity, push creative boundaries, and showcase the power of independent storytelling. Want to explore the full lineup of sponsored projects? Head over to our Sponsored Projects page and take a look!
THE EVER CURIOUS MAN
Project Type: Nonfiction Feature
Project Status: Post Production
Filmmaker: Ivan Cash
Synopsis: An elder artist and compulsive creator confronts his legacy and grapples with the fate of a lifetime’s worth of work, while seeking redemption from his family.
Filmmaker Update: We are excited to have reached the rough cut phase and are honing in on a September 2025 completion date. Additionally, we’ve onboarded Emmy-winner Mandy Patinkin as Executive Producer and director Ivan Cash’s last film Sea Lion Cow (2025) was acquired by Rolling Stone last month.
RENOVATING HOPE
Project Type: Nonfiction Feature
Project Status: Post Production
Filmmakers: Jaye and Adam Fenderson
Synopsis: In the heart of Atlanta, best-selling author, stroke survivor, and wheelchair user Katherine Wolf transforms a 1990s Italian restaurant into Mend, a new coffee & retail concept intentionally built to offer people with disabilities meaningful community and dignified employment.
Filmmaker Update: Physical production is (mostly) wrapped!
After over a year and a half of filming, working with an incredible Atlanta-based crew, Director/Producers Jaye and Adam Fenderson, and Director of Photography John Gardiner have captured the full journey — from the renovation and development to the build and grand opening of Mend Coffee & Goods.
Along the way, we uncovered inspiring stories from campers at Hope Heals Camp, a summer camp founded by Katherine and Jay for families affected by disabilities. We also followed Katherine as she released and promoted her powerful new book, Treasures in the Dark.
Aside from a few pick-up shots and one final sit-down interview, production is officially complete — and now, it’s time for post!
With hours of beautiful footage and powerful stories, we’re excited to dive into post-production this spring. As we continue raising funds to bring the film to life, we’re also developing an impact campaign aimed at sparking a movement around the importance of combining beauty and accessibility in community spaces around the world.
COMPANION OF THE SETTING SUN
Project Type: Nonfiction Short
Project Status: Production
Filmmakers: Isabela Zawistowska and Chamberlain Staub
Synopsis: Companion of the Setting Sun illuminates the profound connection between ancestral Indigenous farming practices and the survival of an endemic species—both intricately tied to the fragile ecosystem of Lake Xochimilco.
At the heart of the story is 86-year-old Doña Susana, one of the last remaining chinamperas of her generation. Raised on the knowledge passed down through centuries, she bears witness to the gradual loss of a way of life. Once vibrant with flowers and wild Axolotls, the canals now stand as a fading memory of ecological and cultural abundance.
Despite the hardships and heartbreak she has endured, Doña Susana remains a beacon of hope. Her quiet resilience and maternal wisdom drive her to share the chinampero way of life with younger generations—planting seeds of resistance and renewal in the hopes of saving Lake Xochimilco and its guardian creature, the Axolotl.
Filmmakers Update: We are actively crowdfunding to complete our film and return to Mexico City to film the more surreal and mythological elements of this story.
Our goal with Companion of the Setting Sun is to bring visibility to those who are preserving a traditional way of life that ultimately supports the natural functionings of Mother Earth and fosters respect for every living being. As a women-led production team, we’re also inspired by women and aim to uplift female voices through this film.
This short documentary encapsulates my overall aspirations as a director to appeal to our collective responsibility of taking care of the planet as well as our deep connection to nature, land, and history.
To learn how Fiscal Sponsorship works, check out the above video or read about it here.
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