Mia and her brother Alex find a powerful stone that thrusts them into different paths while bringing them closer then they've ever been.

Project type: Animation
Writer/Director: Fabian Molina
Producer: Ariel Mahler

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It’s 2008 and Maxine’s sanity is crashing almost as fast as the economy. She always imagined that at 24 she’d be climbing the ladder towards success, but her reality is far from that. It will take an unexpected mission involving a hamster named Donut to change her life forever.

Writer/Director: Ari Basile
Producer: Troian Bellisario
Producer: Cheryl Nichols

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A reclusive young classical composer with writer’s block attempts to find inspiration at an old family lake house but instead discovers a mysterious sound emanating from the bottom of the private lake. In the face of failure, she must confront the lake, her family’s dark past, and her broken present, to uncover the music she has deep within her.

Project type: Fiction Feature
Writers/Directors: Matt Valdez and Collin Davis
Producer: Sid Ganji, Alex Knapp, Alex Schwarm

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Downstaged is a coming-of-age drama depicting women desperately seeking love and validation from men who, in turn, can’t even love or validate themselves. These lives suddenly intersect on a fateful night, catapulting forever changes. Viscerally explore our culture’s intrinsic patterns of toxic masculinity, self-doubt, and internalized homophobia where trauma is nurtured and pain is cyclical.

Project type: Fiction Feature
Project status: Development
Director/Producer: Ana-Julia Cavana
Producer/Director of Photography: Valentina Martinico

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A young Black basketball prodigy struggles with the burden of single-handedly saving his family from hardship on the night of the NBA draft.

Project type: Fiction Short
Director: Tom Glinkowski
Writer/"Pops": Shawn Williams
"Number One": Joseph David-Jones
Producer: Jillian Nordby, Sierra Oleson, Avery Chung-Melino
Cinematographer: Kenzen Takahashi

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Never before seen archival video reveals the untold story of an underground LGBTQ nightclub that became a political and creative center for a community besieged by AIDS and discrimination. As club owners Paul V. and Mr. Dan prepare for the Dragstrip 66 finale, patrons, staff, and celebrities reflect on their memories and impressions as the beloved nightclub comes to the end of its historic run.

Project type: Nonfiction Feature
Director/Producer: Phil Scanlon
Co-director/Co-producer: Paul Vitagliano

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After sending their dying father on a last trip back to his native Hawai’i, a pair of middle-aged twin sisters try to turn their cat-sitting duty into a bonding staycation, but find that old childhood antics won’t work to fix their grief—or their fractured relationship.

Writers/Directors: Yadao Twins
Producer: Lisa Yadao, Irene Yadao, Michelle Sampior-Castaneda

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After having her bright and spunky spirit beaten down one too many times by her abusive husband, Earl, Frankie accidentally kills him. Her best friend Ava Mae helms the escape, and in their police chased mad dash to ditch the body, Earl transforms into a loveable zombie. Breaking up really IS hard to do... But one way or another, EARL’S GOTTA DIE.

Project type: Fiction Short
Writer/Director: Heather Shapiro
Writer/Co-Executive Producer: Amanda Hinkley
Producer: Faoileán Cosgrove

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In 1986, a spirited high school student attempts to find his long-lost father by setting off a device that sends him and a young diner server into a dangerous parallel world.

Project type: Fiction Short
Director: Travis Misenti
Producers: Hadrien Fages, Miriam Arghandiwal
Cinematographer: Dante Cheng

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A burned-out ICU nurse and a retired racehorse with an injury unexpectedly form a bond that leads to a new future for them both.

Project type: Fiction Short
Director: Annika Hylmo
Producer: Betsy Pollock

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A POW aboard a roaming dieselpunk labor camp is cornered on his last day by a radical mycologist who claims to possess the secret to saving their war-ravaged world.

Project type: Fiction Short
Co-Writer/Co-Director: Benjamin Pierson
Co-Writer/Co-Director: Sascha Montgomery
Executive Producer: Salem Daniel
Line Producer: Brianna Fish
1st Assistant Director: Samuel Bear
Cinematographer: Daniel Kleen
 

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After being rescued by a charismatic vaquero on the streets of East LA, gay goth skater Santiago must put an end to closeted young love, leading to personal transformation and a newfound connection to familia.

A coming-of-age comedy with stylish edge, El Paisa bridges alternative Latinx subcultures to celebrate unifying notions of family, young love and Queer identity.

Project type: Fiction Short
Writer/Director/Producer: Daniel Eduvijes Carrera
Producer: Candi Guterres
Production Manager: Karla Legaspy
Director of Photography:Smokey Nelson
 

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El Tonto Por Cristo is the tale of an unlikely saint. A monk in a monastery on the coast of Texas embraces the life of a Holy Fool.

Project type: Fiction Feature
Director: Josh David Jordan
Producer: Jessica Marie Jordan
Cinematographer: Hutch Crane
Composer: Michael Paraskevas
Lead Actor: Matthew Posey

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As a storm passes over a small Southern town, two long-time friends drink cheap whiskey, trade familiar jokes, and quietly avoid the looming elephant in the room that neither are ready to face.

Producer: Yoni Azulay
Producer: Virginia Newcomb
Director of Photography: Yuqian Zhang

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In a world where teleportation has made all other means of transportation obsolete, we follow the last traditional commuter through his city's once-vibrant streets. We see this stubborn outsider cling to his outdated routine in a society that has left the daily commute behind.

Writer/Director: Madison Lin
Producer: Phoebe J Yung
Producer: Jake Behn
Producer: Michael Farmer

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Emerging Artists LA offers access to the film festival experience FREE to filmmakers and film aficionados alike. Submitting a film is free and attending the festival is free and that’s the way we’d like to keep it!

Project type: Festival
Curator/Program Director: Erica Mountain
Curator/Art Director: Carla Harris

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A self-conscious high school senior navigates first love and the uncertainty of her athletic ambitions all while trying to make it to graduation.

Project type: Fiction Feature
Writer/Director: Jackie Mahoney
Producer: Annie Huang, Paulina Jaskiewicz

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Asher (she/they, late 20s, Chinese American) spends her last night in Shanghai with Hip Hop dance teacher Tori (she/her, late 20s, native Chinese). Their attraction towards each other grows as the night progresses. But Asher knows that it’s unlikely they will see each other again after her return to Los Angeles.

Project type: Fiction Feature
Writer/Director: Shan Jiang
Co-Writer: Ashley Jiang
Producers: Jane Zheng, Kennie Zhou
Co-Producer: Sol Ye

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Set in an alternate West Asia never colonized by European powers, Even a Dog in Babylon tells the story of Jamshid, a young man from Shiraz, Iran, who is recruited to work on a VR game that simulates alternate realities, including uncanny visions of “our” world: displacement, violence, and borders.

Co-Writer: Matt Polzin
Director: Lior Shamriz
Co-Producer: Mahshid Modares, Azad Azizyan

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Following her grandmother’s death, a young woman journeys to the Blue Ridge Mountains with the man her Nana loved late in life to honor her memory.

Writer/Director: Natalie Jasmine Harris
Producer: Yoko Kohmoto
Producer: Ryan Arrington

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