Here are the awards for the 2024 Black & White Film Festival season. Over 1100 films were submitted and these are the best of the best from around the world today. We are proud to showcase these amazing films that fall under the black & white umbrella.
AUDIENCE AWARDS
Best Activist Film: SACE
Best Animation: IS, or: A beautiful, tiny, reddish hair, as thin as fiber
Best Art Film: VISUALS FOR MUSIC BOX
Best Black & White Film: MK-ULTRA
Best Cinematography: SWING
Best Comedy Short: SUNDAY REST
Best Dance Film: 2020 – 2021
Best Direction: RED HORSE
Best Documentary: EL MULATTO
Best Drama Film: TADARERU/BECOMES SORE
Best Editing: THE ESCAPE
Best Experimental Film: THE SOUL
Best Family Film: WHILE THE NIGHT FALLS
Best Horror Film: THE STATEMENT
Best Human Rights Film: CLARA
Best LGBTQ+ Short: IT’S A GIRL!
Best Long Form Short: KING CHARLES III: THE REAL ME
Best Message Film: CYCLE OF EMOTIONS
Best Micro-Short: VISUALS FOR MUSIC BOX
Best Music Video: OLD HOUSE
Best Performances: WE HAS CHEMISTRY
Best Politics Film: WE WEAR THE MASK
Best Relationship Film: THE SINK
Best Romance Film: THE VIRTUAL CONNECTION
Best Sci-Fi Film: THE HOUSE ON THE CLIFF
Best Short Form Short: replay
Best Story: EXTREME GRAVITY
Best Student Film: CHIFFON CAKE
Best Style Film: JE
Best Sound & Music: LAZARE
INFO of each film that played at the festival in 2024:
THE SINK, 17min., Brazil
Directed by Eduardo Mattos
Neusa Sueli is a trans actress who finds in Vado’s bathroom a wonder that could lead them finally produce their play. As they expose their discovery, the other writers confront Neusa and Vado about the authenticity of their story.
https://www.facebook.com/eduardo.mattos.589
https://www.instagram.com/edumattos/
THE VIRTUAL CONNECTION, 15min., USA
Directed by Billy Clift
A MAN, of a certain age, newly single after a long relationship, finds himself navigating dating and romance through the mediator of the smart phone. Along the way, he meets A YOUNGER MAN, a native born resident of the virtual world, and ANOTHER MAN, also of a certain age. The Virtual Connection presents opportunities he never knew he’d get out of life.
https://www.facebook.com/TheVirtualConnectionFilm
https://instagram.com/thevirtualconnectionfilm
SACE, 15min,. USA
Directed by Ose Oyamendan
Based on true events. In northern Nigeria, thousands of young women are kidnapped annually and sold into sex trafficking. Only a few of them escape. This is the story of one of those women who escaped.
https://oseoyamendan.com/
https://www.facebook.com/ose.oyamendan
https://www.instagram.com/oseoyamendan/
TADARERU/BECOMES SORE, 17min.
Directed by Keishi Suenaga
Kazuya and Miyuki Matsuhashi’s May-December marriage has lost its spark. It’s already been four days since Miyuki’s younger sister, Chiharu, showed up on their doorstep. Living each day in frustration, Miyuki can’t bear Chiharu’s reckless abandon, nor her husband’s favourable treatment of Chiharu any longer. One day on her way home, Miyuki spots Kazuya and Chiharu holding hands, and her suspicion grows…
https://www.facebook.com/tadarerubecomessore/
CHIFFON CAKE, 18min., Taiwan
Directed by Iwei Zhan
Delivery guy A-Rong is bringing a birthday cake to his lover on Little Liuqui Island. On the ferry to Little Liuqiu, he encounters Xiao-Yu, who is rushing to a destination wedding on the island. Xiao-Yu left her luggage on the taxi she took to Donggang. All she has on her now are the wedding invitation and some cigarettes.
SUNDAY REST (DOMINGO DE DESCANSO), 4min., Puerto Rico
Directed by Ana Paula Teixeira
A queer silent satire short about the nun’s day off.
http://tayshayra.com/
https://instagram.com/tayshayra
WE HAD CHEMISTRY, 10min., USA
Directed by Robert Sebree, Jesse Myers
A celebrated photographer returns to his hometown to exhibit his work in an effort to connect with his past.
EL MULATTO, 4min., USA
Directed by Andy Hodgson
A young mixed race man ‘unearths’ his freedom in the face of racism. This film follows on from Leo Award winning film, El Color Negro (2020). This film was shot on 35mm film and was inspired by Langford Hughes’ poetic words about the identity struggles of a person who is born half black and half white.
REPLAY, 2min., Canada
Directed by Andy Nguyen
An experimental student film exploring human life, body, identity, and gender through a mixture of film, photography, stop-motion animation, sound design, and prop design. In this abstract short, the spirit of a trans person looks back on his past life as he tries to find the answers to the questions asked by the flowers of life.
https://www.instagram.com/nghtanh
2020 – 2021?, 13min., USA
Directed by Leslie Yusuke Watanabe
“2020 – 2021?” illuminates the social and emotional challenges we face individually and as a community, by reminding us of the hope and resilience in the human spirit — awe-inspiring, even in the face of the COVID pandemic.
https://www.instagram.com/lwatan33/
IT’S A GIRL!, 3min., Canada
Directed by Andy Nguyen
A self-potrait short experimental film on 16mm from a Vietnamese trans man.
https://www.instagram.com/nghtanh
THE ESCAPE, 8min., Russia
Directed by Liudmila Komrakova
The patient in an insane asylum is given an injection to calm her down. She is left alone lying on the bed in a straitjacket overhelmed with her hallucinations and memories.
IS, or: A beautiful, tiny, reddish hair, as thin as fiber, 5min., Greece
Directed by Kostas Bakouris
On a human head, a common, humble little hair has only…a lifetime struggling against scissors and combs to claim her diversity.
WE WEAR THE MASK, 2min., USA
Directed by Frederick Taylor
“We Wear the Mask” was written by African American poet and novelist Paul Laurence Dunbar in 1895. Like much of Dunbar’s work, “We Wear the Mask” is a reaction to the experience of being black in America in the late 19th century, following the Civil War—a period when life seemed to have improved for black Americans yet in reality was still marked by intense racism and hardship. Dunbar compares surviving the pain of oppression to wearing a mask that hides the suffering of its wearer while presenting a more joyful face to the world. All that said, the poem itself does not specifically mention race; its message is applicable to any circumstance in which marginalized people are forced to present a brave face in order to survive in an unsympathetic, prejudiced society.
https://instagram.com/Fr3deR1cK
VISUALS FOR MUSIC BOX, 2min., Argentina
Directed by Alejandro Thornton
Short visual about stereotyped sex, violence and fun that let us sleep comfortably.
THE HOUSE ON THE CLIFF, 5min., USA
Directed by Sarah Le
A writer staying at a secluded rental house in the Rocky Mountains experiences a bizarre encounter.
RED HORSE, 25min., China
Directed by Matthew Baren
In the months that follow the seventy day citywide covid lock-down, during which people were forbidden to leave there homes, three couples in Shanghai meet to talk, and to manifest their traumas in acts of fantastical violence.
https://instagram.com/matthewbaren
MK-ULTRA, 3min., USA
Directed by Andrew Hooper
A look into the MK-ULTRA experiments of the 1950’s.
THE STATEMENT, 17min,. UK
Directed by Callum Wilkins
Descending into a cave, two men seek answers to a book of unknown horrors. What will they find and will their sanity prevail?
https://www.instagram.com/filmsbycolossal/
CLARA, 3min., France
Directed by Emeric Gallego
It’s been several months since Clara has been the victim of harassment at college. A tragedy has occurred… His mother then tries to find out the truth…
https://www.instagram.com/emeric.gallego/
CYCLE OF EMOTIONS, 6min., Greece
Directed by Natasha Smyrnaiou
Cycle Of Emotions are patterns of emotional response…
In a hidden search… In the complex stages of exploration that the Soul goes through… Through the emotions…
https://instagram.com/natasha_smyrnaiou?igshid=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==
JE, 19min., France
Directed by Zane
Having lost the will to live, a young woman thinks about ending her life until an entity intervenes to confront her with reality.
https://www.instagram.com/jeshortfilm/
SWING, 3min., Turkey
Directed by Eda Arısoy
Swing maybe an imagination. A place designed to linger, unwind and let your thoughts go. It’s like the pages of a storybook full of memories. A swing is a tool where you can get away from the chaos of life and give you peace when you are stuck. And offers you the opportunity to get rid of all the burdens of life. Swing is like a journey and where do you get caught in the strong wind on the journey.
https://www.instagram.com/edaaarisoy
EXTREME GRAVITY, 7min., Spain
Directed by Lorenzo Ayuso
What would be the worst thing that could happen to you when trying to kill yourself? It is said that dying is not the worst, but the way you die, and Camilo is about to find out how much of that is true.
https://www.instagram.com/lorenzo_ayuso/
LAZARE, 12min., France
Directed by Güldem Durmaz
A recording studio at night.
Alone in the soundproof booth, actor Denis Lavant reads aloud a text by Marguerite Yourcenar, an extract from her short story A Lovely Morning. It tells of little Lazarus who will sneak out the next morning to join a troupe of traveling actors.
https://www.guldemdurmaz.com/lazare
OLD HOUSE, 4min., Ukraine
Directed by Alexander Sparinsky
About the depth of the hypocrisy of Russian invaders and coming consequences of their crazy adventure at XXI century. For in addition to the woes and sorrows the war has brought to Ukraine, the Kremlin’s perfidious madness is destroying Muscovy itself.
http://sparinsky.kiev.ua/
https://www.instagram.com/aleksandr.sparinsky/
THE SOUL, 10min., Armenia
Directed by Inna Avanesova
This is a film portrait of a woman who, for some reasons, works as a cleaner, but dreams of immersing herself in the world of theater. In this film I tried to raise the theme of person’s inner conflict who strives, or to be precise dreams, to realize herself as a creative person, but forced, unloved work takes all her time.
WHILE THE NIGHT FALLS, 18min., Cuba
Directed by Amir Aether Valen
“While The Night Falls” is an intimate portrait of the lives of Delvys and Carlos, siblings who live alone with their elderly mother in a rural part of a small Cuban town. The film portrays a family engulfed in their inner worlds. Between the sacrifices they make out of love for those who are present, and their longing for things that are absent, they struggle to find meaning as they reflect, contemplate, and carry the weight of existence, trying together, to move forward.
https://amiraethervalen.carrd.co/#whilethenightfalls
KING CHARLES III: THE REAL ME, The Inner Voice of Society, 45min., UK
Directed by John Plas
“KING CHARLES III: THE REAL ME, The Inner Voice of Society”.
Its content has been authorized by Buckingham Palace. I also casted the Documentary and organized hiring of the Studio. The production includes rare documentation of pictures enhanced
by Artificial Intelligence and a combination of previous public interviews in UK Media. Fortunately, the documentary has received terrific reviews on a National and International level. The Screenwriter of the Documentary has collaborated as a copywriter for the NETFLIX Show THE CROWN. In this Programme we looked highlights from the King’s life, filming shots and interviews that have been published through the years in different media sources. There are scenes with actors who represent public opinion and communities with special needs. In addition, a first person narrative is included, the content of which is based on fiction. The purpose of this production is to tribute His Majesty’s life and to show His opinions for important subjects as a summary of His life achievements. It highlights the most important facts and fields of His life. Childhood, education, Prince of Wales Ceremony, Royal Documentary, Royal Wedding with Diana, late Queen and King’s father’s funeral, Royal Wedding with Camilla, His opinions as Head of Army, Head of Church, Environment, His hobbies and His opinion for publicity and paparazzi. Multiple News Agencies wrote Articles and reported on the Documentary such as CNN, ABC News, HELLO Magazine.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27668542/
https://www.instagram.com/iamjohnplasactor
Black and White Film Festival 