THIS EVENT IS SOLD OUT
From more than 250 entries our festival selection committee has chosen 10 finalists. We will screen each short film and our jury will select the “Best Overall” film at the conclusion of the program. Several of the filmmakers will be in attendance including John Simmons (Wrong Address), John Gray (A Guest In My Country), Kyle Sykes (Negro League Nights), Zahra Sadeghi (Sleeping Sky) and Jane Fraser (The Wishing Wand).
Our Jury:
Diana Barrett – Diana has been a long time festival jury member and president and founder of the Fledgling Fund, a philanthropic organization that supports documentary films that have a social impact.
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Sarah Kernochan – Sarah is a two-time Academy Award winner for short documentary film, a director, and screenwriter.
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David Helpern -David is an Academy Award nominated producer and director, most recently an executive producer of “Monsieur Spade” starring Clive Owen as the iconic private eye Sam Spade. (David is a seasonal resident of Martha’s Vineyard).
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Amir Youssef – Amir’s breathtaking short film Dawn Every Day won the grand prize in last year’s shorts competition.
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*** Extreme Thanks to our Short Film Selection committee: Anne Evasick, Jennifer Turner Smith, Steven Berry, and Deborah Alves for their work over the last six months to view, rate and select our finalists from close to 250 submissions. Bravo!
2025 MVIFF SHORT FILM FINALISTS
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DOBRINA (5:00)
Director Hannes Rall (Germany)
Lotte Reiniger meets Sergio Leone in this animated short, where desire burns as bright as the desert sun.
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WRONG ADDRESS (10:45)
Director John Simmons (USA)
Ahmadu, a young aspiring artist of African origin, is caught up as a target of dangerous police rage after he retrieves his pizza, delivered to the wrong address.
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John Simmons, ASC is an Emmy Award-winning cinematographer and director whose career spans feature films, television, music videos, and acclaimed documentaries. Inducted into the American Society of Cinematographers in 2004, he has earned three Emmy nominations and won Best Cinematography in 2016 for the Nickelodeon primetime series Nicky, Ricky, Dicky and Dawn. His photographs are held in the collections of the Getty Museum, Harvard Art Museums, and the High Museum of Art.
For Wrong Address, Simmons collaborated with Abdoulaye Ahmadu Ndiaye, a Senegalese-born filmmaker, visual artist, and the film’s writer, producer, and lead actor. Based in Los Angeles, Ndiaye brings deeply personal storytelling to urgent social themes, blending cultural authenticity with cinematic storytelling. His debut short has won multiple international awards, including Cannes World Film Festival, Independent Shorts Awards, and Athens International Monthly Art Film Festival, and has been officially selected by the Hollywood Black Film Festival and Martha’s Vineyard International Film Festival.
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PARENTS CONFERENCE (13:00)
Director Inbal Voitiz Sass (Israel)
A mother and daughter spend a long day at school, meeting all teachers. But parenting can’t be taught.
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A GUEST IN MY COUNTRY (15:26)
Director John Gray (USA)
An immigrant Ubër driver takes an upscale couple across town, and the drama that unfolds among them reveals truths they all would have preferred stayed hidden.
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John Gray is a New York/Massachusetts based writer-director-producer. He created the long running hit CBS series, GHOST WHISPERER, starring Jennifer Love Hewitt, as well as writing and directing many award-winning and critically acclaimed movies for television, such as MARTIN AND LEWIS, starring Sean Hayes and Jeremy Northam; the Emmy® nominated A PLACE FOR ANNIE with Sissy Spacek; the Emmy® nominated mini-series HAVEN with Natasha Richardson and Anne Bancroft; HELTER SKELTER with Clea DuVall and Bruno Kirby, and many others. Gray has directed dozens of episodes of broadcast and cable series and was also the producing director of the CBS series RECKLESS. He has written and directed several studio and independent feature films, including the award winning WHITE IRISH DRINKERS, starring Stephen Lang and Karen Allen, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. Gray’s acclaimed short films have played and are currently playing in film festivals all over the world, including FRENCH KISS, which has also notched 6.3 million views to date on YouTube. His first novel, the award winning supernatural thriller THE DESECRATED, was published in 2022.
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DEFNE (19:58)
Director Hamdi Furkan Yıldırım (Turkey)
A little girl from an isolated cottage goes to the woods to find the doctor for her ailing grandmother and encounters dangerous men.
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THE SINGERS (17:00)
Director Sam Davis (USA)
A genre-bending film adaptation of a 19th-century short story written by Ivan Turgenev, in which a lowly pub full of downtrodden men connect unexpectedly through an impromptu sing-off. With a cast comprised of first-time actors from the unlikeliest corners of TikTok and YouTube, the film is a celebration of diamonds in the rough and a testament to the power of vulnerability through art.
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DON’T BE LATE, MYRA (14:58)
Director Afia Serena Nathaniel (Pakistan)
Myra misses her school bus and must find her way back home alone. The short thriller takes a turn as she tries to dodge men harassing her on the streets of Lahore.
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NEGRO LEAGUE NIGHTS (12:52)
Director Kyle Sykes (USA)
Doc Sykes helps his team, the Baltimore Black Sox, advance to the Colored World Series in 1923 by beating the New York Black Yankees at Yankee Stadium. His excitement soon turns to anger and disappointment when he realizes the all-Black showers at the stadium are filthy and disgusting. When he and two of his teammates make the bold choice to use the White showers instead, the racist stadium manager instantly apprehends them. Threatened with arrest, Doc and his teammates are escorted outside while their loyal fans, and two young kids, clamor for their release, prompting the stadium manager to relent and release them.
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Kyle Sykes is an award winning African American director currently working in Los Angeles. Born in Boston, he moved to California to study Film and Race at Stanford University, and recently completed his MFA at USC ’s School of Cinematic Arts. After having spent his early years interning at HBO, he began shooting and editing projects for commercial clients in the bay area: Airbnb, Afrotech, Hypebeast, Levis, BET, Harley Davidson, Rolling Stone, Pinterest, etc. As a fellow of the 2022 Deutsche Bank Frieze Los Angeles Film Award, he was highlighted online and in the Frieze Art Fair and magazine as one of ten distinguished minority film makers telling diverse stories in Los Angeles. The short film he made last year with this fellowship, Nomadic, was screened on a panel at the Martha’s Vineyard Film Festival. It was also official selection at the Micheaux Film Festival and the Toronto Short Film Festival. For the 2022 fall season, he was the Director of Photography for The Hollywood Reporter’s roundtable series on actors, actresses, directors, and producers. The year prior, he did a sports documentary about basketball and gentrification in Portland, Jumptown, which is currently being distributed on Roku. In 2024, he was one of eight international scholars sent to China to create a documentary, and one of eight diversity scholars selected to teach film to undergraduates at USC. With every script, film, and photo, he tries to select topics that further glorify the Black Diaspora: standing up for your community, being a trailblazer in new rooms, and celebrating where you come from. To fulfill a sense of Duty. Of pride. Of legacy.
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SLEEPING SKY (14:35)
Director Zahra Sadeghi (Iran)
Trapped in an endless cycle, even our deepest wishes repeat themselves, like a story read every night but never finished.
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Zahra Sadeghi is an Iranian filmmaker based in the United States with over a decade of experience in film and media production. Her work often explores complexities of human relationships, resilience, and the psychological impact of political and social pressures. Through her films, she uses cinema as a bridge for empathy and cultural dialogue, crafting stories that invite audiences to see the world through different eyes.
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THE WISHING WAND (3:19)
Director Jane Fraser (USA)
If you had a magic wand, what would you wish for? When Jane’s pug Maisy destroys her favorite wand, disaster turns into wonder when a new wand serendipitously arrives at the door. Jane discovers that with one wave, sweet things can happen. “The Wishing Wand” is a short-film by Jane Fraser, a first-time filmmaker with Down Syndrome. The film is dedicated to her late grandmother Claire, Jane’s best friend and personal wand-maker.
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Jane Fraser is a 28 year old filmmaker with Down Syndrome in Nevada City, CA. After many years volunteering at local film festivals (SYRCL Wild & Scenic and Nevada City Film Festival), Jane became interested in making films of her own. For the past two years, Jane has been studying with local filmmaker Robert Bryant. “The Wishing Wand” is her first short film and involves mentorship from and collaboration with many artists and creators from her town’s small artistic community.
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