Features

CHICLE
Director: Lizette Barrera (Arlington)
North Texas Pioneer Film Fund Recipient
Narrative Feature in Development

FANDOM
Director: Shadi Qutob (Austin)
Narrative Feature in Production
When Haya, a Pakistani Woman, creates a politically charged piece of fan-art of an iconic comic book character that goes viral, she realizes her newfound notoriety may be more than she bargained for. What was initially adoration slowly devolves into harassment, and eventually violence, as Haya is bombarded by hate from a fandom that is more toxic than she initially thought.

FROM THE GROUND UP
Director: Jeremy Rodgers
Documentary Feature in Post-production
FROM THE GROUND UP is the story of Daoud Nassar and his family of Palestinian farmers in the West Bank. Under constant threat of Israeli confiscation, the Nassar’s 100-acre farm is the centerpiece to an ongoing 29-year legal battle. As Daoud struggles to maintain the family’s ancestral homeland, the Nassars respond to injustice with creative, non-violent resistance. Committed to education, connecting people with the land and promoting respect for the “other” and our shared environment, Daoud and his family live by the motto: “We Refuse to be Enemies.”

FLY GIRL
Director: Angela Chen
Narrative Feature in Production
New Texas Voices Grant
When Linh, a 42-year-old, Vietnamese American, recently-divorced mom impresses at a “twerkshop”, she is invited to join a 90s-inspired hip-hop dance team: the Fly Girls. A chubby Gen-Xer in a crew of thin Millennials, Linh must overcome her insecurities to prove she belongs. The New Texas Voices Grant is a $10,000 cash grant for a filmmaker identifying with a community of color who is making his or her first feature length film.

THE IN BETWEEN
Director: Robie Flores
Documentary Feature in Production
THE IN BETWEEN is a lyrical coming-of-age story woven from singular moments of a cast of characters living along the U.S.-Mexico border.

JOCKEY
Director: Clint Bentley
North Texas Pioneer Film Grant
Narrative Feature in Post-production
JOCKEY tells the story of an aging jockey with failing health who tries to survive his final season on the racetrack and win one last championship. His dream is flipped upside down when a young jockey shows up on the track claiming to be his son.

LOS BLACKALLERES
Director: Kelly Daniela Norris
Narrative Feature in Development

A RECKONING: STORIES FOR RACIAL HEALING WITH DR. NJOKI MCELROY
Director: Christian Vasquez
Documentary Feature in Production
North Texas Pioneer Film Grant
The power of storytelling, and its capacity to mend, is explored through the life and work of Dr. Njoki McElroy, a master storyteller, educator, and activist who has witnessed the United State’s failure to reconcile the wounds of racism and embodies the idea that sharing our stories places us on a path of healing and towards a reckoning with racial injustice.

THE RIVER
Director: Ray Santisteban
Documentary Feature in Development

SAN ANTONIO
Director: Ya’Ke Smith
Narrative Feature in Development

TAZMANIAN DEVIL
Director: Solomon Onita
Narrative Feature in Distribution
Stuck On On Award
After moving to the United States, nineteen-year-old Nigerian immigrant Dayo struggles to find a balance between his desire to join a college fraternity and bonding with his estranged father who is a strict pastor at a local church.

A TIME, A PLACE
Director: Annie Silverstein
Narrative Feature in Development

TLALOC
Directors: Alejandro Sescosse and Anna Veselova
Narrative Feature in Production
MPS Camera and Lighting Award
TLALOC is a phantasmagorical romance of digital illusions set in the near future where the threat to human life is existential worldwide due to the slow collapse of natural ecosystems.

UNTITLED CRIMINAL JUSTICE HIGH SCHOOL PROJECT
Director: Margaret Crow
Documentary Feature in Production
Stuck On On Award
The UNTITLED CRIMINAL JUSTICE HIGH SCHOOL PROJECT follows a group of teenagers at a high school 10 miles from the US/Mexico border during their senior year and as they navigate what lies beyond.

ZOE AND HAHN
Director: Kim Tran
Narrative Feature in Development

Panelists

Our 2019 Panelists for feature projects included:

• Bette Gordon
• Christina Choe
• Dilcia Barerra
• Elizabeth Avellán
• Ryan Zacarias
• Megan Gilbride

Shorts

ACT OF GOD
Director: Spencer Cook
A disabled man chases after a windblown $100 bill that eventually leads to the destruction of his wheelchair.

BAHAAR (OUTSIDE)
Director: Prakshi Malik
Disaster brews when Sheher gets accepted to a boarding school.

CATHARSIS: A JOURNEY THROUGH ANGER
Director: Deborah Valcin
A Black woman releases the one emotion that she has been told to suppress.

DISRUPTED BORDERS
Directors: Ramon Villa-Hernandez and Alejandra Aragon
This documentary looks at a young woman who figures out how to make a 3D printed prostheses for a friend.

DUMPLINGS
Director: Wren Lee
Harrison McClure Endowed Film Fund Grant
The short focuses on Tina Wong, who comes back home to her Chinese immigrant family with surprising news.

ELEPHANT!
Director: Chinwe Okorie
A young Black girl befriends a wealthy but troubled classmate. Problems ensue.

POSTMAN
Director: Paul Lovelace
This documentary looks at a remote postal route in West Texas.

GIVE
Director: Kenya Gillespie
A composer turns to music to deal with the loss of his ex-boyfriend.

TESTIMONY OF ANA
Director: Sachin Dheeraj Mudigonda
This documentary looks at the life of an elderly tribal woman accused of witchcraft in rural India.

“Untitled Mugeni Project,”
Director: Amy Bench
A young woman in the Congo sets out on a solo journey across the globe after a bombing attack.

WHAT THEY FOUND
Director: Ryan Darbonne
An 8-year-old boy drifts into a fantasy world after discovering the body of a man in 1868.

AFS/Stand With Austin Fund

AFS provided additional funding to filmmakers through the AFS/Stand With Austin Fund, a special fund established by the Austin Community Foundation to assist non-profits helping those most severely impacted by the cancellation of SXSW. This supplemental money has been made possible through the Foundation and AFS’s own Travel Grant funds to provide some relief and support to filmmakers with feature-length films that were to premiere at this year’s SXSW festival and lost considerable investment in their film’s promotion and premieres. Recipients include:

WITHOUT GETTING KILLED OR CAUGHT: THE LIFE AND MUSIC OF GUY CLARK by Tamara Saviano

THE CARNIVORES by Caleb Johnson

GOOD OL GIRL by Sarah Brennan Kolb

ONE OF THESE DAYS by Bastian Günther

THE MOJO MANIFESTO: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF MOJO NIXON by Matthew Eskey

Travel Grant

Amy Bench, A LINE BIRDS CANNOT SEE

Cathy Chen, DISRUPTED BORDERS

Features

HURDLE
Documentary Feature in distribution
Director: Michael Rowley
Hurdle is the story of a new generation of Palestinians using creativity as a form of resistance. Where walls were built to contain and control, Hurdle’s characters lack freedom of movement. Through the sport of parkour and the documentation of daily life, the characters tell an untold story of what it means to strive for freedom in the modern era.

INBETWEEN GIRL
Narrative Feature in post-production
Director and writer: Mei Makino
Teenager Angie Chen finds herself in a cultural and personal identity crisis following her parents’ recent divorce. Caught between her equal-parts Chinese and American upbringing, life is only further complicated when she begins a romance with Liam, a popular jock who wants to keep their relationship a secret. As Angie contends with her burgeoning sexuality, she must face a troubled home life, a confusing romantic relationship, and a growing sense of isolation as she is left alone to determine the ultimate question: Who is the real Angie Chen?

MARTINEZ
Narrative Feature in production
Director and writer: Maria Padilla
Martinez, a cranky and lonely bureaucrat resisting retirement, receives a surprise gift from a deceased neighbor. He finally begins to enjoy life through a love affair with her through her old belongings.

MISS JUNETEENTH
Narrative Feature in post-production
Director and writer: Channing Godfrey Peoples
Centered around the Juneteenth holiday (commemorating the day slaves in Texas were freed – two long years after everybody else), Miss Juneteenth tells the story of Turquoise, a former beauty queen turned hard working single mother, as she prepares her rebellious teenage daughter for the pageant, hoping to keep her from repeating her same mistakes. The Warbach Lighting and Design New Texas Voices Grant is a $10,000 cash grant for a filmmaker identifying with a community of color who is making his or her first feature length film.

NAMES IN THE PAVEMENT
Documentary Feature in production
Director: Jim Hickcox
Names in the Pavement is an unconventional documentary about infrastructure and the history of Austin, Texas.

NAN
Documentary Feature in post-production
Director: Zuqiang Peng
Nan follows the last two years of a living situation in which the filmmaker’s uncle Nan shares an apartment with his parents, before the family of three separate and live in different homes. A reflection on time, aging, and the economies of care in contemporary China.

PRAIRIE DOGS
Narrative Feature in production
Director and writer: Dex Decker
Two wayfaring strangers meet in a rest stop bathroom and learn over French fries that they have more in common than the road and need each other more than they’ll ever understand. Sometimes it’s the kindness of a complete stranger that changes the course of one’s life.

RAISING ANIYA
Documentary Feature in production
Director: John Fiege
A teenage African-American dancer in Houston must draw on her community and her own resilience when she sets out to choreograph a performance about her experience with Hurricane Harvey and environmental justice.

THE UNKNOWN COUNTRY
Narrative Feature in post-production
Director and writer: Morrisa Maltz
An unexpected invitation from her estranged Lakota family sends a young woman on a winding road trip through the Midwest all the way down to the Texas-Mexico border. A doc-drama observational film that takes a look at one less-traveled part of America, the people who live there and the complexity of a Native woman traveling alone in the current cultural climate.

WE REAL COOL
Narrative Feature in production
Director and co-writer: Ryan Darbonne
Told over the course of one day, Austin’s first POC punk festival provides the backdrop for three intersecting stories featuring a failed musician searching for his lost van, two strangers on an awkward road trip, and a Mexican punk band on the verge of a complete breakdown.

WHEN WE WERE LIVE
Documentary Feature in post-production
Director: John Moore
When We Were Live is a feature documentary about the heyday of Public Access Television in the 1980’s and 90’s, and how it shaped the culture of a pre-internet America.

Shorts

BIRDS
Narrative Short in post-distribution
Director: Katherine Propper
Birds is a hybrid narrative short film featuring five moments in the lives of teenagers during the Texas summer.

CONTRAST
Narrative Short in production
Director: Tramaine Townsend
The story of a young black boy who is obsessed with cowboy culture. The film takes on the journey of him growing up with this secret obsession and the cultural differences of blacks and whites he encounters.

GREEN WATER
Narrative Short in production
Director: Carlos Estrada
Once their undocumented mother goes missing, 18-year-old Erik must learn to care for his younger sister during a hot summer day.

LOVE IS AN ACTION WORD
Documentary Short in post-production
Director: Liz Moskowitz and Riley Engemoen
A compassionate and effective female leader uses equine therapy to help military veterans transcend traumatic pasts.

MEN WHO TALK
Documentary Short in production
Director: Cristin Stephens
At 18, Vinicius Dias began to see himself as a Black man. At 38, Dias helps other men in Brazil understand what blackness means in a racially fluid society. Men Who Talk follows black men who tell stories of their past to understand their present.

MICHELLE
Narrative Short in distribution
Director: Kenya Gillespie
A shy 10-year-old Asian American girl fights off her bullies with a little help from her idol: decorated US Olympic figure skater Michelle Kwan.

THE PAINT WIZZARD
Documentary Short in production
Director: Jessica Wolfson and Jessie Auritt
“The Paint Wizzard” is a transgender housepainter who lives in a bright yellow motorhome in Austin, Texas. A few years ago, at the age of 58, she gained the courage to leave “Michael” behind and embrace her authentic self, cat ears and all.

THIS WORLD IS NOT MY HOME
Documentary Short in production
Director: Jonathan Caouette
Experimental filmmaker Jonathan Caouette reflects on his relationship with his grandfather Adolph.

UNTITLED CAT BACKPACK SHORT
Narrative Short in production
Director: Katie Graham and Andrew Matthews
An existential horror/comedy short from the point of view of a cat, forced by his Instagram-influencer owners to travel the country with them in a backpack.

Harrison McClure Endowed Grant

FLYING IN THE DARK
Documentary Short in production
Director: Annika Horne
Why are we still surprised to see a woman pilot? Hear the stories of female pilots – their highs and lows – and see how they refused to be shut out of the skies, from World War II to the present.

WHISTLE
Narrative Short in production
Director: Rachael Acosta
In the midst of 8th grade band practice a girl is harassed by her peers and forced to give up her instrument to one of her perpetrators.

Travel Grant

Patrick Bresnan & Ivete Lucas, PAHOKEE
Visions du Réel

Patrick Bresnan & Ivete Lucas, SKIP DAY
International Documentary Festival

Bob Byington, FRANCES FERGUSON
San Francisco International Film Festival

Andrew Edwards, FRIDAY’S CHILD
Deauville American Film Festival

Kenya Gillespie, JEREMIAH
Cannes Film Festival

Shelby Hadden, TIGHTLY WOUND
New Orleans Film Festival

Daniel Laabs, JULES OF LIGHT AND DARK
American Film Festival (Wrocław, Poland)
& New Orleans Film Festival

Paloma Martinez, ENFORCEMENT HOURS
Slamdance Film Festival
& San Francisco International Film Festival

Katherine Propper, STREET FLAME
Tribeca Film Festival

PJ Raval, CALL HER GANDA
IDA Getting Real

PJ Raval, COME & TAKE IT
New Orleans Film Festival

Annie Silverstein, BULL
Cannes Film Festival

Yen Tan, 1985
Hamptons Film Festival

Tim Tsai, SEADRIFT
Berkeley IRP Workshop & IDA Getting Real

Renee Zhan, RENEEPOPTOSIS
Sundance Film Festival

Panelists

Our 2019 Panelists for feature projects included:

• Laura Mehlhaff
• Bernardo Ruiz
• Ingrid Veninger

Our 2019 Panelists for short projects included:

• Ina Pira
• Christopher Radcliff
• Dan Schoenbrun

Features

1985
Narrative Feature in distribution
Director and writer: Yen Tan
Inspired by the award-winning short film of the same name, “1985” follows Adrian (Cory Michael Smith), a closeted young man returning to his Texas hometown for Christmas during the first wave of the AIDS crisis. Burdened with an unspeakable tragedy in New York, Adrian reconnects with his brother (Aidan Langford) and estranged childhood friend (Jamie Chung), as he struggles to divulge his dire circumstances to his religious parents (Virginia Madsen and Michael Chiklis).

BUILDING THE AMERICAN DREAM
Documentary Feature in post-production
Director: Chelsea Hernandez
In the shadow of a lucrative building boom in Texas, more construction workers die on the job than any other state. Building the American Dream follows the intimate stories of hard-working immigrant families fighting for their livelihood.

NOTHIN’ NO BETTER
Documentary Feature in post-production
Directors: Ben Powell and Bo Powell
The people of Rosedale – black and white, rich and poor, young and old – invite you to peek into their lives in this fading Mississippi Delta town. A gently composed and subtly humorous portrait of the many personalities that make up a quintessential American community, still hanging on despite a painful past and an uncertain future.

PAHOKEE
Documentary Feature in post-production
Directors: Patrick Bresnan and Ivete Lucas
Cash grant and Stuck On On DCP In-Kind Grant
In an isolated Florida town where hardship has afflicted generations, hopes for the future are concentrated on the young. PAHOKEE is a poetic observation that follows four youth ascending heartbreak and relishing in the joyous ritual and rites of passage that serve as their send-off from home.

THE CARNIVORES
Narrative Feature in post-production
Director and writer: Caleb Johnson
Cash grant and Stuck On On DCP In-Kind Grant
Alice and Bret’s dog Harvey is dying, and he’s ruining everything. What had been a bright little family is quickly getting consumed by clouds of self-doubt, suspicion, and a disturbing amount of ground beef.

UNTITLED CRIMINAL JUSTICE / HIGH SCHOOL PROJECT
Documentary Feature in production
Director: Maisie Crow

XA-LYU K’YA
Documentary Feature in production
Directors: Carlo Nasisse and Geronimo Barrera
In “Xa-lyu K’ya” (World of Mountains), the Oaxacan Chatino people, international corporations, and environmental NGOs become entangled in the debate over the fate of Mexico’s rapidly disappearing rainforest. What begins as a story of man’s relationship to the land quickly evolves into something much more as the mist, jaguars, carbon, hallucinogenic mushrooms, and dreams announce themselves as crucial actors in an environmental and epistemic conflict.

Shorts

I AM TX
Narrative Short in post-production
Director and writer: Ryan Darbonne
On their last day of tour, a black punk band find themselves in awkward, surreal and life-threatening situations with an ignorant cast of characters.

JUANA DOE
Narrative Short in post-production
Director and writer: Ramon Villa
A forensic anthropologist discovers her supernatural abilities when working with unidentifiable skeletal remains of migrants.

PIOJO
Narrative Short in production
Director and writer: Miguel Alvarez
In the near future, a struggling, single father discovers the terrible consequences of his actions when he’s caught stealing medicine for his sick son.

POR NADA
Narrative Short in production
Director: Vanessa Pla
Kodak Film Award and MPS Camera and Lighting Award
POR NADA, a timely & resonant short narrative, exposes the cruelty of immigration policy while spotlighting the resiliency & rebellious spirit of one Tejana punk girl.

SUMMER ANIMALS
Narrative Short in post-production
Director: Haley Anderson
Summer. Texas. Fifteen year old Tommy is tired of living in and out of motels with her family. She just wants to be a normal teen and escape the summer heat, but instead has to take care of her two younger siblings while her single mother, Lane, works as a housekeeper trying to secure a down payment on an apartment. When the family gets thrown out of a motel, Tommy, driven by her longing for freedom, risks Lane?s reputation by breaking into the pool of her wealthy employer.

THINGS WE LEFT BEHIND
Documentary Short in post-production
Director: Amy Bench
Things We Left Behind is a visual diary film of an immigrant’s experience, recounting objects and memories that connect her to her former life. It is a series vignettes told by a young woman who came to the US as an unaccompanied minor, with nothing save for a plastic bag to protect her from the cold. The film is a story of survival and how the unfolding of memory can propel one beyond insufferable trauma and loss.

TIGHTLY WOUND
Animated Short in distribution
Director and writer: Shelby Hadden
A woman recounts her experience living with chronic pelvic pain – how health professionals have failed her, men have rejected her, and shame, anger, and hatred have plagued her body.

Special Grants

New Texas Voices Grant
A TOWN CALLED VICTORIA
Documentary Feature in production
Director: Li Lu
Hours after the first travel ban takes effect, a mosque in Victoria, Texas erupts in flames. As details of the arson emerge and a suspect goes to trial, this quiet community must reckon with the deep rifts that drove a man to hate.

Harrison McClure endowed grant for an undergraduate filmmaker
DEAR LEO
Narrative Feature in Post-Production
Filmmaker: Emma Rappold
When a witty, anxiety-prone teenager finally responds to her cousin’s letters from the past six months, she’s forced to relive the changes she’s experienced since graduating high school — and come to terms with the people she’s lost.

North Texas Pioneer Film Grant
HURDLE
Documentary Feature in post-production
Director: Michael Rowley
In the shadow of a wall stands a new generation of Palestinian. With defiant creativity, they prove that no matter the height of the obstacle, one can always climb.

North Texas Pioneer Film Grant
LULU STREET
Narrative Feature in production
Director and writer: Jazmin Diaz
Two decades after immigrating with her family from Mexico, an aging Dalia?s previously buried struggles are laid bear before her granddaughter Sofia, an overwrought ten-year old with intentions of making it to an audition out of town.

North Texas Pioneer Film Grant
THE UNKNOWN COUNTRY
Narrative Feature in production
Director and writer: Morrisa Maltz
Spurred by the discovery of a forgotten family photograph, a young Lakota woman embarks on an epic journey that will take her from her home in Minneapolis all the way to the Texas border. This narrative/doc hybrid is an exploration of the American Midwest and the people and places found within it.

Travel Grant Recipients

Patrick Bresnan and Ivete Lucas, ROADSIDE ATTRACTION
Toronto Film Festival

Robert Byington, INFINITY BABY
Thessaloniki Film Festival

David Fenster, OPUNTIA
Viennale

Shelby Hadden, TIGHTLY WOUND
Annecy International Animated Film Festival

Don Hertzfeldt, WORLD OF TOMORROW EPISODE TWO: THE BURDEN OF OTHER PEOPLE’S THOUGHTS
Sundance Film Festival

Anna Margaret Hollyman, MAUDE
Sundance Film Festival

Daniel Laabs, UNTITLED EXPAT FILM
Venice Biennale Cinema College

Huay-Bing Law, JUNE
CAAMFEST

Clay Liford, TEXAS HIGH SCHOOL REGIONAL THEATER FESTIVAL MURDERS
IFP No Borders

PJ Raval, CALL HER GANDA
Hot Docs
Tribeca All-Access

Iliana Sosa, AN UNCERTAIN FUTURE
DOCNYC
Seattle International Film Festival

Iliana Sosa, JULIAN
Berlin Film Festival

Panelists

Our 2018 Panelists included:

• Amman Abbasi
• Audrey Chang
• Jamie Meltzer

Features

1985
Narrative Feature in post-production
Director and writer: Yen Tan
$10,000 cash for Post-Production
Kodak Film Award (in-Kind): 35mm exhibition print
A terminally ill young man visits his hometown in Texas and struggles to disclose his dire circumstances to his conservative family.

LOVE IS A SENSATION
Documentary Feature
Director: Yaphet Smith
$3,000 cash for Post-Production
Oprah Winfrey hails from Kosciusko, Mississippi, but most pilgrims trek there to visit The Unusual Artist Ms. L.V. Hull at her outlandish home. Now, as L.V.’s health fails, only one visitor would make her life complete: Blues legend B.B. King. Will The Artist meet The King before time runs out?

PAHOKEE
Documentary Feature
Director: Patrick Bresnan and Ivete Lucas
$15,000 cash for Post-Production
Pahokee, Florida (pop.6,094): one hour by car across Palm Beach County from the presidential opulence of Mar-a-Lago. Against a backdrop of industrial agriculture and economic isolation, high school senior from diverse cultural backgrounds forge a sense of meaning and community via elaborate and colorful rites of passage.

THE TEXAS HIGH SCHOOL REGIONAL THEATER FESTIVAL MURDERS
Narrative Feature in production
Director and writer: Clay Liford
$5,000 cash for Production
After witnessing a murder at a prestigious theater festival, a down-on-her-luck theater teacher and her star pupil must decide what to do in order to still win.

THE TROUBLE I SEE
Documentary Feature
Director: Sally O’Grady
EBW By Sandra Adair Grant
$5,000 cash for Post-Production
THE TROUBLE I SEE explores the impact of mass incarceration on three families in Richmond,Va. Using the annual Father-Daughter Dance at the City Jail as the catalyst, the film examines the realities of life in the corrections system for Joey, Andre and Rashaan.

THE TROUBLE WITH RAY
Documentary Feature
Director: Travis Johns
$5,000 cash for Post-Production
THE TROUBLE WITH RAY exposes the wild, untold history of LGBT activism in ultra-conservative Texas and its impact on the national stage as told by the movement’s ultimate outsider, Ray Hill: a labor activists’ son, ex-con, and “loud-mouthed queer,” whose 50 years of fearlessly protesting for LGBTQ equality energized a grassroots movement to take powerful, political action.

Untitled Jennifer Laude Documentary
Documentary Feature
Director: PJ Raval
IndiePendants Grant
$15,000 cash for Post-Production
Grassroots activists in the Philippines are spurred into action when a local transgender woman is found dead in a motel room with a 19-year-old U.S. marine as the leading suspect. As they demand answers and a just trial, hidden histories of U.S. colonization come bubbling to the surface.

WHAT BREAKS THE ICE
Narrative Feature
Director & writer: Rebecca Eskreis
EBW By Sandra Adair Grant
$10,000 cash for Production
During the summer of 1998, Sammy and Emily both 15 years old, strike up a quick and deep friendship, in spite of their disparate backgrounds. But what should have been the best summer of their lives takes an unexpected turn when they become accidental accomplices in a fatal crime: the murder of Sammy’s brother, Travis.

WHEN WE WERE LIVE
Documentary Feature
Director: John Moore
Stuck On On Post-Production Grant
WHEN WE WERE LIVE is a feature documentary about the heyday of Public Access Television in the 1980’s and 90’s, and how it shaped the culture of a pre-internet America. The film weaves together hundreds of hours of archival footage to tell the stories of five former Public Access producers from Austin, TX, the nation’s longest running Public Access Television station.

Shorts

BAD THINGS
Narrative Short
Director: Mira Lippold-Johnson
$2,000 cash for Post-Production
When her older sister gets unjustly suspended from school, eight-year-old Sue Ellen starts to doubt that brains and hard work are enough to keep her out of trouble. Bad teachers, prejudices, a bully: there are impediments to success. So Sue Ellen takes a drastic, violent step to take control.

CALLING
Narrative Short in post-production
Director: Artemis Anastasiadou
EBW By Sandra Adair Grant
$1,000 cash for Post-Production & Distribution
After a violent event comes to an end, a mother struggles to keep on being a caregiver to her handi-capable son.

THE CHEAP SEATS
Narrative short in production
Director: Brittany Reeber
Kodak Film Award: $5,000 in film stock
MPS Camera and Lighting Award: $5,000 in camera package & equipment rentals
Donna and Julianne search for ancestral connection in a place where consumerism has replaced culture and life’s sweet moments tend to be at the bottom of a cheap drink. The fictional script is set in the very real Cassadaga Spiritualist Camp, a small community in central Florida dedicated to Spiritualism and “mediumship”, or the ability to communicate with the dead.

HAO’S NAILS
Narrative Short in Production
Director: Nazanin Shirazi and Katja Straub
EBW By Sandra Adair Grant
$5,000 for production
Every two weeks, 65-year-old Cindy searches for a moment of intimacy at Hao’s Nails.

CHICLE
Narrative Short
Director: Lizette Barrera
EBW by Sandra Adair Grant
$4,000 cash for Post-Production
An ill-tempered teenager attempts to find peaceful solitude on the day of her grandfather’s passing until an estranged friend pays her a visit

JUNE
Narrative Short
Director: Huay-Bing Law
$5,000 cash for Production & Post-Production
An immigrant Chinese wife does her best to fit in at her husband’s graduation ceremony in 1950’s segregated Texas.

LET ‘EM KNOW YOU’RE THERE: THE STORY OF BIG JIM & THE TRIPLE DOUBLE
Documentary Short in post-production
Director: Field Humphrey
$2,500 cash for Post-Production
A forgotten basketball pioneer and NBA record holder, Jim Tucker reveals what is truly worth remembering as he struggles with Alzheimer’s disease

“MAUDE”
Narrative short in post-production
Director: Anna Margaret Hollyman
Stuck On On Post Production Grant
MAUDE is a comedy about a woman named Teeny who is surprised to learn that she is babysitting the daughter of a former college classmate, Priscilla, a successful Gwyneth Paltrow-esque lifestyle guru. Over the course of the day, Teeny begins to take on the other woman’s identity with hilarious consequences.

RENEEPOPTOSIS
Animated Short in production
Director: Renee Zhan
EBW By Sandra Adair Grant
$5,000 cash for production
RENEEPOPTOSIS follows the adventures of three Renees at various points of their lifespan as they go on a spiritual journey to find God (who is also Renee). Along the way, the Renees discuss and experience in full glory the trials, tribulations, and wonders of being Renee.

THE SHAKE-UP
Documentary Short
Director: Benjamin Altenberg
$5,000 cash for production
Mental healthcare patients and providers in New Mexico struggle to find a path forward after the state government makes false accusations of Medicaid fraud that result in widespread closures of clinics and the disruption of life-saving services for thousands.

THINGS WE LEFT BEHIND
Documentary Short
Director: Amy Bench
MPS Camera and Lighting Award: $5,000 in-kind
THINGS WE LEFT BEHIND is a visual diary film that touches on the refugee experience, through the objects that connect them to their former lives. It is a series of portraits of women living in the United States, who came to this country with no more than a carry-on bag or a couple of suitcases.

THROUGH A CITY SHOESTRING
Narrative Short
Director: Kent Juliff
$1,000 cash for production & post-production
On a lazy summer, two lifeguard friends get caught up in a small town mystery after their boss is kidnapped.

Special Grants

DJI Grant Recipient:
Derek Allison
Derek Allison is in post-production on his narrative short film, MENSCH, which deals with an ex-marine adjusting to life after deployment. He has directed the short films TEMPERAMENT and NIGHT’S TOUR, and worked on production in Los Angeles before moving to Austin to attend UT’s RTF Program. DJI will support Derek on his next short film, providing a production budget, and DJI equipment, including drones, cameras and stablizers.

Harrison McClure endowed grant for an undergraduate filmmaker
PERDÓNAME
Narrative short, $2500 in grant support
Filmmaker: Tani Shukla
A Catholic woman is put at odds with her faith when her cancer-afflicted sister asks her to commit the ultimate sin.

Travel Grant Recipients

Micah Barber, INTO THE WHO KNOWS!
Sarasota Film Festival

Lizette Barrera, MOSCA
NALIP Latino Media Festival

Robin Berghaus, STUMPED
Frameline Film Festival

Patrick Bresnan, THE RABBIT HUNT
Sundance Film Festival
Berlin International Film Festival

Bob Byington, INFINITY BABY
San Francisco International Film Festival

Sam Douglas, THROUGH THE REPELLENT FENCE
MoMA Doc Fortnight

David Fenster, OPUNTIA
Los Angeles Film Festival

Jose Luis González, ENSUEÑO
San Francisco International Film Festival

Kent Juliff, LAST NIGHT
Slamdance Film Festival

Daniel Laabs, JULES OF LIGHT AND DARK
IFP Rough Cut Labs

Joel Pena, PEDAZOS
Outfest

PJ Raval, Untitled Jennifer Laude Documentary
Sheffield Doc Fest Lab

Todd Rohal, THE SUPLEX DUPLEX COMPLEX
Seattle International Film Festival

Brittany Shepherd, EYE, CAMERA
Hot Docs Film Festival

Drew Xanthopoulos, THE SENSITIVES
Tribeca Film Festival

Panelists

Our 2017 Panelists included:

• Brandon Harris
• Penny Lane
• Jennifer Phang

Feature Narrative

SHOOT THE MOON –Graham Lenoir Carter– Austin, TX
$5,000 cash for Production
MPS Camera & Lighting Award (in-Kind): $10,000 in camera and equipment rentals

A musical comedy about a couple of Texas con men who scam housekeepers into stealing money from their wealthy employers. Their plans change when they meet the newly reformed Maureen… all this while a bumbling, lovesick PI is hot on their trail. Based on the James Joyce short story “Two Gallants,” and the songs of John Prine.

FRIDAY’S CHILD –Andrew J. Edwards– San Antonio, TX
Stuck On On DCP Grant (in-Kind): one theatrical digital cinema package

Friday’s Child is the story of Richie who ages out of foster care at the age of 18 and collides with the perils and temptations of a life apart. When he mistakenly murders his landlord during a botched robbery, Richie must right his wrongs and seek redemption. The film is a contemporary, narrative drama that parallels the themes of Crime and Punishment and An American Tragedy. It is a challenging study of youth, poverty, forgiveness, and love.

MUTT –Katie Graham and Andrew Matthews– Austin, TX
$8,000 cash for Production
Kodak Film Award (in-kind): $4,500 in film stock

A misunderstanding with authorities separates a homeless veteran, Daniel Sidney, from his only companion, his dog Saxton. Daniel reunites with his estranged brother to search the city’s animal shelters, leading him to the doorstep of an affluent family that is reluctant to give up the adopted dog, forcing him to weigh what’s best for the animal, and himself.

MISS JUNETEENTH –Channing Godfrey Peoples– Fort Worth, TX
$8,000 cash for Production

Turquoise, a former beauty pageant queen turned single mother prepares her teenage daughter, Kai, for the upcoming pageant while making sure her daughter doesn’t make the same mistakes in life that she did.

THE EPIPHANISTS –Scott Stark– Austin, TX
$2,500 cash for Production

THE EPIPHANISTS is an experimental narrative told entirely with found 35mm movie trailers, reprinted by hand onto raw film stock, creating a pulsing, kinetic and intensely dramatic visual joyride. Set after the Epiphany – the moment in a future time when the dire warnings about climate change have become undeniable –Tonya and a team of insurgents attempt to infiltrate the remaining vestiges of corporate power, in a last attempt to reverse planetary self-immolation.

Feature Documentary

THE SECRET LIFE OF LANCE LETSCHER –Sandra Adair– Austin, TX
$4,000 cash for Post-Production
Stuck On On DCP (in-Kind): one theatrical digital cinema package

This deeply intimate and psychological portrait of collage artist Lance Letscher traces his artistic evolution, capturing the mystery of his creative process and revealing his struggle to overcome personal tragedy.

PEYOTEROS –Eugenio del Bosque Gomez– Austin, TX
$4,000 cash for Production

Three Mexican-American men in South Texas are the only individuals left who can legally harvest and sell peyote in the United States. Traditionally known as Peyoteros, these men supply the sacred plant to members of the Native American Church with medicine for their sacrament. Supplies of the plant are dwindling, and demand continues to rise.

BORN WITH IT –Alexander Koffler– Austin, TX
$5,000 cash for Production

Grammy-nominated blues artist Cedric Burnside–grandson of the legendary R.L. Burnside–continues the legacy of the great Hill Country Bluesman, playing to crowds around the world. Juggling a rigorous touring schedule of 200 shows a year and a challenging home life, Cedric channels the transcendent power of blues as a way to cope with life and continue his struggle keeping the musical form alive and his family afloat on the banks of the Mississippi.

DOKDO: LONE ISLAND –Matthew Koshmrl– Austin, TX
$5,000 cash for Production

DOKDO: LONE ISLAND explores the disputed island territory between South Korea and Japan. It takes an intimate view into the lives of three Korean people who have dedicated their lives to fighting for the sovereignty of the island. The film meditates on the reasons that urge their fight, while challenging nationalistic thinking with a breath of irony, and exploring identity and individual legacy.

UNTITLED MICHAEL BRODY JR DOCUMENTARY –Keith Maitland– Austin, TX
$10,000 cash for Production

In 1970, Michael Brody Jr, a young hippie millionaire, announced he would give away $25M, capturing the attention of the media and inspiring scores of people before spiraling into personal tragedy. With the discovery of thousands of unopened letters written to Brody in 1970, his story and his impact on those who wrote to him is explored in a stranger-than-fiction account of a troubled young man and the chaos that ensued when he invited the world to share in his supposed good fortune.

CANINE SOLDIERS –Nancy Schiesari– Austin, TX
$3,000 cash for Post-Production

Dogs can be man’s best friend, and a soldier’s too. CANINE SOLDIERS explores the intimate bond between Soldier Handlers and their Military Working Dogs, when human survival depends upon the superior instincts of another species. In the war in Afghanistan, where the rules of engagement have shifted from traditional combat to the unforeseen and the invisible, canine intelligence and their powerful instincts are saving lives, giving soldiers comfort, hope and protection.

SEADRIFT –Timothy Tsai– Austin, TX
Powered by Dell Grant (in-kind): a post-production technology package valued at $10,000

In 1979, the fatal shooting of a white crabber in a small Texas fishing village ignites a maelstrom of hostilities against Vietnamese fishing communities along the Gulf Coast. Seadrift inspects the circumstances surrounding the incident and its tumultuous aftermath, and tells the story of Vietnamese refugees who flee their home country only to be confronted by angry fishermen and the KKK as they search for a new home in a strange land.

INNER SANCTUM –Aaron Jacob Weiss and Robert Weiss– Austin, TX
$5,000 cash for Production

INNER SANCTUM is a film inspired by candid conversations with mortician Dale Carter. They explore unique perspectives about the fragility and complexity of the human condition. Through being granted access to this foreign and forbidden world of the funerary process, they present this subject through the lens of spirituality and mysticism paired with social realism.

Narrative Shorts

ATLANTIC CITY –Miguel Alvarez– Austin, TX
Colaborator Narrative Short Film Grant, co-sponsored by TXMPA: $5,000 cash for Production and an in-kind package worth $33,000 including a Panavision camera package, Assimilate Software, Final Draft Software, and GoPro Hero 4 Black Camera.

ATLANTIC CITY is a short film that examines family and loss as told through the eyes of two homeless day laborers drifting through San Antonio, Texas.

ESCAPE VELOCITY –Caleb Michael Johnson– Austin, TX
$2,000 cash for Post-Production

A small kid goes looking for his astronaut father.

INBETWEEN DAYS –Madli Laane– Austin, TX
$3,000 cash for Production

In the midst of the 1991 coup in Soviet Union, an Estonian girl and a Russian boy reach across cultural and political lines to unite over a shared bottle of American soda.

SUNSHINE AND RAIN –Vish Vallabhaneni– Austin, TX
$2,500 cash for Distribution

SUNSHINE AND RAIN is a gritty narrative following Kayla, who is dead-set on going back to college and leaving the Dallas Housing Projects behind. However, after her mother’s release from rehab and her younger brother’s involvement with a rough crowd, Kayla faces the decision between her family and her future.

Documentary Shorts

LAVOYGER –Rachel Bardin– Austin, TX
$3,000 cash for Distribution

El Tule ranch is a private playground for Texas oil barons and powerful politicians but the manager, Lavoyger Durham has discovered over 20 bodies of people who died avoiding a nearby border patrol checkpoint. In this short documentary portrait, we follow Durham as he details his history with the ranch, Texas, and its people.

SKIP DAY –Patrick Xavier Bresnan and Ivete Lucas– Austin, TX
$4,000 cash for Post-Production

On the Monday after their prom, seniors at Pahokee High skip classes and race the roads through the fifty miles of agriculture that separate them from the costal economy. SKIP DAY is an observational film that follows students on the verge of graduation as they leave their rural African American community of Pahokee, FL to experience the unwelcoming beaches on the opposite side of Palm Beach County.

NATURALISM –Peter Bo Rappmund– Dallas, TX
$2,000 cash for Production
Kodak Film Award: $500 in film stock

NATURALISM is a short, experimental documentary that looks at how an environment comes to be defined through the stories we tell. Focusing on the peculiar structure of Enchanted Rock, Texas, the film uses two narrators to describe both the geologic description of the giant granite plutonic batholith, as well as the native account of the significance of the site. Naturalism is animated entirely from 35mm still frame photography and contains field recordings taken on location.

Animated Shorts

ENSUEÑO –José Luis Gonzalez– Austin, TX
$4,000 cash for Post-Production

ENSUEÑO centers around Ester Bolaños. Curious and intelligent, restless and slightly reckless, she is a teenager stuck in an isolated west Texas border town. Part of a larger narrative of Ester’s life and her family, ENSUEÑO captures the ways in which even the most mundane of activities can be overtaken by Ester’s vivid imagination.

TIGHTLY WOUND –Shelby Gaffney Hadden– Austin, TX
$5,000 cash for Production

A woman recounts her experience living with chronic pelvic pain – how health professionals have failed her, men have rejected her, and shame, anger, and hatred have plagued her body.

2016 International Documentary Association (IDA)/AFS Travel Grant Recipients

Deborah S. Esquenazi – Austin, TX
Getting Real IDA Conference

Keith Maitland – Austin, TX
Getting Real IDA Conference

PJ Raval – Austin, TX
Getting Real IDA Conference

Panelists

Our 2016 Panelists included:

• Dennis Lim
• Daniel Patrick Carbone
• Grace Lee

Feature Narrative

NAKOM – Kelly Daniela Norris and TW Pittman – Austin, TX

$9,000 for Post-Production

An intimate narrative from northern Ghana, NAKOM follows a talented medical student who must return to his home village after his father’s death, and fight for his family’s survival.

WOLVES – Paul Gordon – Austin, TX
AFS Powered by Dell Technology Grant (up to $7,500 value)
$5,000 for Production

Ashley, a young idealistic woman, takes in a homeless performance artist/chef couple–Brandi and Theo–after meeting Brandi at a therapeutic laughter class at the community center where she works.

BAGATELLE – Daniel Levin – Sugar Land, TX
AFS Kodak Film Award: $5,000 in film stock

While on tour in South Texas, a struggling Russian cellist ditches her musical career to attempt a marriage with a wealthy farmer. The story is inspired and is loosely based on “Count Nulin”, a poem by Alexander Pushkin.

JULES OF LIGHT AND DARK – Daniel Laabs – Dallas, TX
$2,000 for Production
MPS Camera and Lighting Award: $3,000 in camera package & equipment rentals

A mysterious car accident brings together two strangers who are struggling to reconcile dual lives in a rural Pennsylvania town.

Feature Documentaries

SOUTHWEST OF SALEM: THE STORY OF THE SAN ANTONIO FOUR – Deborah Esquenazi- Austin, TX
AFS Powered by Dell Cash Grant: $5,000 for Post-Production
$5,000 for Post-Production

SOUTHWEST OF SALEM excavates the nightmarish persecution of Elizabeth Ramirez, Cassandra Rivera, Kristie Mayhugh, and Anna Vasquez – four Latina lesbians wrongfully convicted of allegedly gang raping two little girls in San Antonio, TX. The film unravels the sinister interplay of mythology, homophobia, and prosecutorial fervor, which led to this modern day witch hunt during the ‘Satanic sexual abuse hysteria’ from the late-80’s and early-90’s in the U.S.

THE SENSITIVES – Drew Xanthopoulos – Austin, TX
$9,000 for Post-Production

A loving grandfather is struck down by a debilitating illness with mysterious, environmental origins, and faces an agonizing choice: an uncertain future with his family or the lure of an isolated, “safe” community built for “sensitives” like him.

STUMPED – Robin Berghaus – Austin, TX
$9,000 for Post-Production

When filmmaker Will Lautzenheiser loses his limbs to a bacterial infection, he turns to stand-up comedy as a new creative outlet. After three years of intense rehab and late-night comedy gigs, Will risks his life to undergo a rare double-arm transplantation in the hope of reclaiming his independence while advancing experimental medicine.

UNTITLED ROSEDALE PROJECT – Ben and Bo Powell – Austin, TX
AFS Powered by Dell Cash Grant: $5,000 for Production
AFS Powered by Dell Technology Grant (up to $7,500 value)
MPS Camera and Lighting Award: $5,000 in camera package & equipment rentals

The people of UNTITLED ROSEDALE PROJECT — they’re gonna show you this town. This tough old town in the Mississippi Delta, where the scars of slavery and segregation run deep. The “South’s South” – some people make it here, most people don’t, and that’s the way it’s always been. Who built this ghost town, and who are the ghosts? It depends who’s leading the tour.

GOOD OL’ GIRL – Sarah Kolb – Kenedy, TX
$5,000 for Production

GOOD OL’ GIRL chronicles the progressive stages of a ranch’s working life through three Texas women’s stories. Through Tanya (a single black mother of five), LeMoine (a young Southern Belle set to inherit one of the largest ranches in Texas), and Dillie (a seventy year-old widow navigating tense family battles and her own failing health), GOOD OL’ GIRL investigates a bevy of women’s issues through the lens of a niche industry that has historically been ruled by men.

JUSTICE FOR JENNIFER – PJ Raval – Austin, TX
$5,000 for Production

As U.S. military presence in the Philippines escalates, JUSTICE FOR JENNIFER captures national outrage over the murder of a young Filipina transgender woman by a U.S. marine. Challenging the terms of the Philippine-U.S. Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) through grassroots organizing and courtroom advocacy, a cast of unforgettable feminist and transgender activists tirelessly confronts homophobia and transphobia, as long-simmering postcolonial tensions rise to the surface.

LESLIE – Tracy Frazier – Austin, TX
$5,000 for Production

LESLIE (working title) is a hybrid documentary that reveals the inner and bizarre world of Albert Leslie Cochran, a rebellious, cross-dressing homeless man who became the most unlikely civic symbol of Austin, Texas. Told with unapologetic humor, the film chronicles the life and career of a misfit who becomes a cultural icon while searching for love and a true sense of home. LESLIE draws a parallel between one man’s efforts to preserve his identity with the collective struggle of a changing city.

MONUMENT TO CABEZA DE VACA – David Fenster – Marfa, TX
$5,000 for Production

In 1528, Alvar Nunez Cabeza De Vaca, a Spanish conquistador, was shipwrecked in Florida. Over the next 10 years he wandered, lost and naked, to West Texas and became a shaman along the way. De Vaca’s story is told through his own words and contemporary voices including: Asher Hartman, a transgender shaman; Paul Fenster, the filmmaker’s father, who exists in a space between life and death; and a talking cactus that claims to be inhabited by the spirit of De Vaca.

A THIN LINE – Scott Harris – Flower Mound, TX
$5,000 for Production

A filmmaker, haunted by a past of merciless schoolyard bullying, tries to distract himself from fears about his mental health, until he is eventually forced to confront them.

FUNNIEST – Katie Pengra and Dustin Svehlak, – Austin, TX
$2,000 for Post-Production

Outside of mainstays like New York and Los Angeles, Austin is the quickest developing stand up comedy scene in the nation. For 30 years, Capitol City Comedy Club has hosted the Funniest Person in Austin contest, which draws over 200 local contestants annually. After a grueling 7-week competition, only one comic can call themselves Funniest.

THE SONS OF JOSÉ BOLAÑOS – Juan Pablo Gonzalez – Austin, TX
$2,000 for Production

THE SONS OF JOSÉ BOLAÑOS is a meditative portrait of a Mexican rural family, its history with migration and how this contributed to the loss of their youngest son, Fernando. By observing the everyday life of the Bolanos family, and listening to their retelling of the last time each of them spoke to Fernando, The Sons of Jose Bolanos constructs a profound meditation on the mutability of memory as it poignantly depicts the present complexities of rural Mexico.

IN THE SHADOWS – Alvaro Torres-Crespo – Austin, TX
$1,000 for Production

IN THE SHADOWS follows a group of gold panners deep in Costa Rica’s jungle. For years they have panned the rivers and exchanged their gold for food and alcohol. Now, the government has decided to expel them all. This lyrical film captures the men’s struggle and questions Costa Rica’s conservation fame.

OUR VOICES MATTER – Krishnan Vasudevan – Austin, TX
$1,000 for Production

OUR VOICES MATTER follows the journey of young, minority creatives living in Austin, Texas. By creating socially provocative art, music, and films the characters are attempting to engage and rewrite commonly held narratives about race and racial identities in the US. By learning about their experiences, we gain a more nuanced and intimate understanding of the challenges minority youth face.

Shorts

PLANE PRETEND – Sharon Arteaga – Austin, TX
$5,000 for Post-Production

Pilar and her little brothers are ecstatic to take their first flight, but they must hide their excitement or risk revealing their undocumented status and being deported.

NEVER BEEN PIED – Lauren Pruitt – Austin, TX
$1,000 for Production
MPS Camera and Lighting Award: $2,000 in camera package & equipment rentals

Young and flirty Danni has her hopes set on being a plus-size model. Her naive mother Rita unknowingly puts her on a new prescription that will help her on the way to achieving her dream.

BOOBS – Colin Hyer and Bryce Worcester – Austin, TX
$1,000 for Post-Production

Two twelve-year-old boys go on an epic quest to reach the local nudie beach.

CARNE SECA – Jazmin Diaz – Fort Worth, TX
$1,000 for Distribution

Brothers David and Oscar Juarez have until sunset in rural Mexico to turn a profit on their father’s business, or face the consequences of his belligerence.

COMMUNITY CENTRAL – Karen Kocher – Austin, TX
$1,000 for Production

Through oral histories, rare still images, and artful recreations, this documentary recounts the “Golden Age” of Barton Springs; including the little-known, and surprising race history of Austin’s famed swimming hole.

FLORENCE – Caleb Kuntz – Austin, TX
$1,000 for Post-Production

Florence is a teenager enraptured by her unusual perception of the world. Socially unadapted, she is misdiagnosed and prescribed psychotropic medication.

Panelists

An independent panel determines the recipients of the AFS Grant.  2015 jurors include Alison Bagnall, the co-writer of BUFFALO ’66 and writer/director of SXSW selections FUNNY BUNNY and THE DISH & THE SPOON; Terence Nance, multimedia artist, musician and writer/director of Gotham Award Winner AN OVERSIMPLIFICATION OF HER BEAUTY; and curator Basil Tsiokos, Director of Programming at the Nantucket and DOC NYC Film Festivals, and Associate Programmer of documentaries at Sundance. The Grant team is led by AFS’s Associate Artistic Director Holly Herrick, with Artist Services Manager Iliana Sosa administering the process.

Feature Narratives

ALL THAT WE LOVE – Yen Tan – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $2,500
MPS Camera Award: $5,000

ANY ROUGH TIMES ARE NOW BEHIND YOU – Alex R. Johnson – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $5,000

BOOGER RED – Berndt Mader – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $10,000

JACKRABBIT – Carleton Ranney – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $2,500

LA BARRACUDA – Jason Cortlund & Julia Halperin – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $2,500

NAKOM – Travis Pittman & Kelly Daniela Norris – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $10,000

NEVER GOIN’ BACK – Augustine Frizzell – Dallas, TX
AFS Grant Award: $2,500
MPS Camera Award: $5,000

RESULTS – Andrew Bujalski – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $5,000

SLASH – Clay Liford – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $2,500

Feature Documentaries

ANTHROPOCENE – John Fiege – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $2,500

BOOM TOWN – Chelsea Hernandez – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $2,500

IN THE SHADOWS – Alvaro Torres-Crespo – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $10,000

SEADRIFT – Timothy Tsai – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $5,000

SON OF A BUG – Nicole Marie Tavares & Shams-Tabraiz Muzaffar – Richardson, TX
AFS Grant Award: $10,000

STUMPED – Robin Berghaus – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $2,500

TOWER – Keith Maitland – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $5,000

UNTITLED HIGHER EDUCATION PROJECT – Joe Bailey Jr. & Steve Mims – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $2,500

Shorts

BROKEN ARROW – Dustin Shroff – Austin, TX|
AFS Grant Award: $1,500

BURY ME IN THE DARK – Juan Pablo González – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $1,500

FLORENCE – Caleb Kuntz – Austin, TX
Kodak Film Award (film stock) : $2,000

HOUSEKEEPING – Catherine Licata – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $1,000

MIDDLE WITCH – Amanda Gotera – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $1,500

SKUNK – Annie Silverstein – Austin, TX
AFS Grant Award: $1,000

SLOW CREEP – Jim Hickcox – Austin, TX
Kodak Film Award (film stock) : $3,000

UNTITLED MEGALITH FILM – Jennifer Lane – Marfa, TX
AFS Grant Award: $1,000

Panelists

Tom Hall, Festival Director, Film Programmer, Journalist

Aaron Katz, Writer/Director
(LAND HO!, COLD WEATHER, QUIET CITY, DANCE PARTY U.S.A.)

Angela Tucker, Documentary Director & Producer
(THE NEW BLACK, PUSHING THE ELEPHANT, AFROPOP, (A)SEXUAL, BLACK FOLK DON’T)

AFS raises funds for filmmaker grants through the annual Texas Film Awards and major premieres such as the recent BOYHOOD and SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR events.

The grant, which started in 1996 and is awarded annually, has given $1.4 million in cash and $172,790 in goods and services to over 330 artists.  Filmmakers receiving the grants have completed films that go on to prestigious festivals and receive international recognition. Recent past winners include Andrew Bujalski’s Sundance Award-winning and critically acclaimed feature COMPUTER CHESS,  and Heather Courtney’s Emmy Award-winning documentary WHERE SOLDIERS COME FROM.

AFS Associate Artistic Director Holly Herrick administered the 2014 grant. Herrick was assisted by AFS Program Coordinator Aaron Malzahn.

Narrative Feature

HELLION
Kat Candler
When a motocross-obsessed teen’s delinquent behavior forces his little brother to be taken away, Jacob and his emotionally absent father must take responsibility for their destructive behavior to bring Wes home.
$5,700 for post-production

THE HONOR FARM
Karen Skloss
After all hell breaks loose at prom, Lucy’s new plans bring her deep into the woods, and on the ride of her life. 
$6,000 for production
$4,000 in MPS Camera Austin Services for production

PETTING ZOO
Micah Magee
PETTING ZOO is a 90 minute fiction feature about sex, love and teen pregnancy in San Antonio, Texas.
$10,000 for post-production

PIT STOP
Yen Tan
Two men. A small town. A love that isn’t quite out of reach.
$3,000 for distribution

SOME BEASTS 
Cameron Nelson
Soon after a young man moves to rural Virginia to escape the complications of modern life, he finds that life in the indifferent and harsh landscape of Appalachia can be even more savage than the world he left behind.
$5,000 for post-production

SWEET CHEEKS
Todd Rohal
Tyson & Tyler are 9-year-old brothers that find a man’s discarded rear-end inside an abandoned mailbox and give it to their Momma as a gift. She’s enraged. She didn’t raise no ass thieves! To make good, the brothers set out on a mission to return the rump to the mysterious man who somehow lost his backside. Along the way they run afoul of a slick reverend with strange ideas about love, steal a car from a dirty hobo, get chased by a 6-inch man in a balloon, and confront Jesus Christ in heaven.
$8,000 for production
$6,000 in MPS Camera Austin Services for production
$6,000 in Kodak Film Stock for production

Documentary Feature

ABOVE ALL ELSE
John Fiege
ABOVE ALL ELSE is a documentary film that tells the story of the Keystone XL pipeline project and of the landowners and activists who set out to stop it. 
$9,000 for production

BARGE
Ben Powell
BARGE is an experiential journey into the lives of people who navigate the Mississippi River. From lowly deckhands to seasoned mates, the characters throughout BARGE give insight into the social spectrum of the inland waterways. Through their experiences, we gain new perspectives throughout the film of how the river industry works. 
$4,000 for post-production

FORTY PANES: A PORTRAIT OF WENDELL BERRY
Laura Dunn
FORTY PANES is a portrait of the world lensed through the works of farmer, writer and activist Wendell Berry.
$12,000 for production

SEEKER (WORKING TITLE)
Michel Scott
“SEEKER” documents 3 families on a journey to live in the remote forests of northern Wisconsin for one full year, using only the natural resources at hand to survive.  These personal stories of survival provide a window into the struggle to balance environmental and emotional needs of individuals with the needs of the larger global community.
$5,500 for post-production

THE SENSITIVES
Drew Xanthopoulos
THE SENSITIVES is a feature-length, verite documentary taking the viewer deep into the fragile existence of those exiled from society by extreme environmental sensitivity. Set in remote edgelands, deserts and rural backwoods, THE SENSITIVES walks in the shoes of those with a complicated and often misunderstood illness that’s radically changed their lives forever.
$1,500 Production

STAR NATION 
Justin Agnew
STAR NATION is a character driven documentary following the most polarizing figure and most beloved in the midst of the emerging landscape of electronic sports.
$6,000 for production

UNTITLED
Jeffrey Peixoto
A feature documentary about religion in the 21st century.
$2,000 for production

Shorts

KING BLING
Lauren Kinsler
Rey, a spiritual crossing guard and electronic music enthusiast, gets help from a gothed-out girl in dealing with the death of his mother.
Narrative Short
$700 for post-production

HIGHER GROUND
Mary Magsamen & Stephan Hillerbrand
Building an Art Car style spaceship in their Houston backyard with cardboard boxes, home appliances and imagination power, the collaborative artist team of Hillerbrand+Magsamen and their two children embark on an adventure to construct and fly a rocket ship to the moon.
Experimental Short
$3,000 for production

PART-TIME JOBS
Zellner Bros.
A short film constructed in part from dozens of re-appropriated VHS home movies originally produced between 1984-1993. The films explores an adolescent’s interpretation of adult genre fare, predominantly focusing on horror, fantasy, action and adventure, all with absurdist, surrealistic overtones both intentional and unintentional. In-camera editing and VFX, creature creations, and cross-dressing child actors populate this fever-dream narrative.
Narrative Experimental Short
$4,100 for production

REHEARSAL
Thomas Rosenberg
A surreal study of a simulated terrorist attack in middle America. Composed frames observe the meticulous care taken to create a hyperreal terrorist event. Once the bomb goes off,  hundreds of volunteers deliver a convincing performance as stunned and mutilated blast victims.
Experimental Documentary Short
$1,500 for post-production

UNTITLED FREAKSHOW ANIMATION
Nidhi Reddy
In a fantastical Indian circus, a young boy delves into the world of freak shows and unexpectedly falls in love with The Wolf Girl. 
Animated Narrative Short
$3,000 for production

Panelists

Matthew Wolf, Filmmaker
(TEENAGE, WILD COMBINATION)

Jacqueline Lyanga, Festival Director & Programmer
(Director of AFI FEST)

Ry Russo-Young, Filmmaker
(NOBODY WALKS, YOU WON’T MISS ME)

The Austin Film Society is very proud to announce the recipients of its 2013 AFS Grant, which this year gave away $90,000 to 18 projects from emerging Texas filmmakers. In addition to cash grants of $90,000, AFS gave away $10,000 in goods and services from MPS Camera Austin and $6,000 worth of Kodak film stock.

AFS’s Travel Grant program also disbursed another $10,000 in cash in travel stipends to 12 Texas filmmakers, bringing AFS’s total grant amount to $116,000 for the 2012-2013 fiscal year.

AFS raised funds for the AFS Grant through the annual Texas Film Hall of Fame and major premieres like THE SCHOOL OF ROCK 10th Anniversay and BEFORE MIDNIGHT. AFS has now given out over $1.5 million to 385 film and video projects since the program began in 1996.

Narrative Feature

STAY WITH ME
Andy Irvine
Narrative Feature
$5,000 for production

Documentary Feature

A FORCE IN NATURE
Hayden Yates
$6,500 for production

ABOVE ALL ELSE
John Fiege
$6,000 in MPS Camera Austin Services for production

CANINE SOLDIERS
Nancy Schiesari
$10,000 for production

KALTAG, ALASKA
Daniel Levin
$6,000 for production
$3,000 in MPS Camera Austin Services for production

ROADMAN
Bennie Klain
$10,000 for production

THE SHOW MUST GO ON
Landry Gideon
$10,000 for production

UNTITLED GENTRIFICATION PROJECT
Monique Walton
$4,000 in Kodak Film Stock for production
$2,500 in Alphacine Awards for post-production

YAKONA
Anlo Sepulveda & Paul Collins
$5,500 for post-production

Shorts

ARVIND
Evan Roberts
Experimental Narrative Short
$12,000 for production

ASH
Nathan S. Duncan
Experimental Documentary
$2,000 for distribution

BLACK METAL
Kat Candler
Narrative Short
$3,000 for post-production; distribution

THE LONGEST SUN
Patrick Smith
Narrative Short
$1,000 for distribution

THE VULTURE PROJECT
Russell O. Bush
Documentary Short
$8,000 for post-production

TRACES
Scott Stark
Experimental Short
$2,000 in Kodak Film Stock for production
$2,500 in Alphacine Awards for post-production

UNTITLED JUMP SHOT PROJECT
Jacob Hamilton
Documentary Short
$15,000 for production

Panelists

Matthew Akers, Filmmaker
(MARINA ABRAMOVIC: THE ARTIST PRESENT)

Brent Hoff, Filmmaker
(Co-Founder of Wholfin DVD)

Paola Mendoza, Filmmaker
(LA TOMA, ENTRE NOS)

The Austin Film Society is very proud to announce the recipients of its 2012 AFS Grant, which this year gave away $89,500 to 16 projects from emerging Texas filmmakers. In addition to cash grants of $89,500, AFS gave away $10,000 in goods and services from MPS Camera Austin, $6,000 worth of Kodak film stock, and $5,000 in Alphacine awards.

AFS’s Texas Filmmakers’ Travel Grant program also disbursed another $10,500 in cash in travel stipends to 15 Texas filmmakers, bringing AFS’s total grant amount to $121,000 for the 2011-2012 fiscal year.

AFS raised funds for the AFS Grant through the annual Texas Film Hall of Fame and major premieres like BERNIE, KILLER JOE and EL MARIACHI 20^th Anniversary. AFS has now given out over $1.3 million to 344 film and video projects since the program began in 1996.