Our Festival
55th Festival April 25-27, 2013
Promo
MOAS Promo
Sessions
Thursday, April 25, 8pm

The Future
Venetia Taylor, Australia 8 min
(narrative/comedy/drama)
When you’re young and in love, the future seems bright… but then what?

Was du nicht siehst (I Spy with my Little Eye)
Gunda Aurich, Germany/Switzerland 15 min
(narrative/drama) German with English subtitles. It was supposed to be a nice weekend in the countryside…, but when an argument breaks out between Laura and her boyfriend Hans, she’s brought to question their getaway.

Idle Worship
Theo P. Stefanski, Los Angeles, CA USA 4min
(stop motion animation) The skeleton rises from a desert wasteland in search of an object of worship. After his long journey to the altar, he learns you shouldn’t kneel before just anything greater than oneself.

¿Cual es el precio? (What is the Price)
Sergio Yunta, Spain 8 min
(narrative/drama). Spanish with English subtitles. There are things in life that bring happiness…but at what cost?

BLACKWOOD
Natasha Johns-Messenger, Australia/USA 12 min
(narrative/drama) Lena faces some motherly instincts she didn’t know she had when she is forced to take care of Pippa, the daughter she has never known.

Foreign Language
Adam Kelly Morton, Canada 12 min
(narrative/drama) Multi-lingual with English subtitles. Foreign Language explores the words we use within the worlds we inhabit–from life and love, to death and despair…where the heart only speaks one language.

Elegy for a Revolutionary
Paul Van Zyl South Africa 22 min
(narrative/drama) Two friends against the apartheid–era government struggle to keep their friendship intact as they consider whether violence can be justified as a way of opposing tyranny.

Les cybernautes rêvent-ils d’amours digitales? (Do Cybernauts Dream of Digital Love?)
Gilles Bindy, France 28 min
(romance/partly animated) French with English subtitles. Mélanie and Farid realize that virtual relationships are a tempting escape to the imperfection of everyday life!
Sessions
Friday, April 26, 8pm

French Bread and Cheese
Woodlief and Merrillan Thomas, Rochester, NY USA. 7 min
(travelogue/documentary) Let’s travel in time and space to witness the making of French baguettes by the town “boulanger” and Roquefort blue cheese, captured by local film makers.

Zombi
David Moreno, Spain 12 min
(narrative/drama) Spanish with English subtitles.
A young boy tries to make sense of his aging grandfather.

A House, a Home
Daniel Fickle, Portland, OR USA
7 min
(narrative) Based on the song by Adam Shearer and Adam Selzer, this film tells us that love will develop in the most incongruous places!

Seven Minutes in the Warsaw Ghetto
Johan Oettinger, Denmark 8min
(animation) Puppets and the eyes of real actors are used to tell the story of Samek, an 8-year old Jewish boy, who lives in the Warsaw Ghetto with his family during the 2nd World War.

Stalled
Shannon Kohli, Canada 16min
(narrative/drama) Bathroom stalls talk but do we listen?

Desconexión
Yecid Benavides, Bolivia 18 min
(narrative/drama) Spanish with English subtitles.
A dishonest man, who will not return the cell phone he found, is not aware of the damage he really caused…

The Collegians
Bryan Lewis, Florida USA 18 min
(narrative/biography/drama) Erskine Hawkins, a young trumpet sensation with a big ego, must learns the hard way what it means to be a member of the Collegians, the Bama State College band.

This is Vanity
Oliver Goodrum, United Kingdom 23 min
(narrative/drama) A tiring mother struggles to protect both herself and her disabled teenage daughter from the continual attacks of local adolescents. Based on a true story.
Sessions
Saturday, April 27, 4pm

The Bard
Adam Carboni, AL USA 14 min
(narrative) After witnessing the drowning of his daughter, an old fisherman turns away from the sea and toward music, seeking solace from the guilt that plagues him.

The Last Marble
Manjari Makijany, India 8 min
(narrative) Sometimes children teach us what we can never learn from adults, that true happiness is when one can create joy in another’s life.

The Poker Lesson
Jim Thalman & Louis Pappas, NJ USA 15min
(narrative) Miami, 1985. Roger is a single dad and professional poker player forced to drag his young son along with him to his games.

Something Different: A Working Gristmill
Erin Murphy, Portland, ME USA 12 min
(documentary) Over the past half-century, local, water-powered, grain mills either converted to electric or shut down completely. In Union County, Pennsylvania, there is one remaining hold out.

Ema
Jean-Marc Simonneau, Chili 13 min
(narrative/drama) On a country road in Chiloe, a Chilean island in the South of the world, a procession of people dressed in black walks behind an old wooden cart pulled by a horse towards a small chapel…

Georgena Terry
Amanda Zackem, Syracuse, NY USA 6 min
(documentary) Georgena Terry revolutionized the women’s biking industry by designing the first bike frame for women and eventually starting the international bike company,Terry Bicycles.

خدا را شکر (Thank God)
Jamshid Ghodrati Kesheh, Iran 4 min
(narrative) The destiny of a pair of shoes…

Grantræet, (The Fir Tree)
Lars Henrik Ostenfeld, Denmark 26 min
(narrative) German with English Subtitles
As a cone the little fir tree is kidnapped by a mouse and must take root and grow up far away from its family. The tree is hopeful and has big ambitions but one day in December everything changes when a little boy falls in love with the fir tree…
Sessions
Saturday, April 27, 8pm

Le radar (The Radar)
Jan Rouiller & Nicky Marbot, France 18 min
(narrative/dark comedy) French with English subtitles. How do you get back the photos taken by a police radar? Don’t count on Fender, Baguette or José the Gypsy. As for the state police, they are probably too preoccupied with the crows!

Al otro lado (To the other side)
Alicia Albares, Spain 19 min
(narrative) Spanish with English subtitles.
Sara Sanabria, writer, and his lover, Adolfo Santolaya, lived their lives absorbed by just one obsession: the belief that, hidden in an abandoned mansion, there was a gate that ended in an unknown dimension.

HED
Jason & Jonathan Drago, Penfield, NY USA 8 min
(narrative/drama) A young man’s inexplicable affliction may impact his life and his marriage.

Free Kick
Bernabé Rico Herrara, Spain 12 min
(narrative/drama) Spanish with English subtitles.
Having turned 60, Adela is living a life she never wanted. She has no children, a husband who walks all over her and, worst of all, nothing to look forward to. Then one day she has the chance to win 300,000 Euros and leave her old life behind.

Our Rhineland
Faren Humes, FL USA 16 min
(narrative) German with English subtitles. In 1937, under the Third Reich, Germans of mixed race were located, identified and admitted into clinics. Hundreds were rendered sterile. Two sisters fought back.

The Op Shop
Lee Rogers, Australia 7 min
(narrative/comedy) A mysterious donation sends the sales clerks of a suburban op shop (thrift shop) on a journey of self-discovery.

The Unpardonable Night
Minji Kang, NY, NY USA/Korea 15 min
(narrative) One night, a young boy uncovers the darkest secret of his family: an unpardonable truth that will stay with him forever.

Les perruches (The Parakeets)
Julie Voisin, France 14 min
(narrative/drama/comedy) French with English subtitles. When Lili, a very ill young woman, is faced one morning with the sudden loss of her hair, her good friend Laura will resort to a radical make-over that will affect more than her outward appearance…
Mention
Honorable Mention
These films received acknowledgement but were not screened at the festival
Honorable Mention
- Doppelganger by Theo P. Stefanski
- El Mal Estado (The Discarded) by
Juan Antonio Delicato and David Delicato - Exit 7A by William M. Peters
- Farewell Jimmy by Sang Kim and Alvaro Bequero
- Mother of the Groom by Tsukasa Kishimoto
- Right There by Florence Buchanan
- Reverberation by Fernando Uson-Forniés
- Son of Man by John Ambros
- The Aerial Girl by Anna Simone Scott
- The Cold Heart by Hannes Rall
- The Eyes of Heaven by Grace Hendley
- The Last Mermaids by Nika Belianina
- The Hit by Jerald Fine
- Welcome to Leathermill by Russell England
- Winter Shower by Kyoungju Kim
Merit
Certificate of Merit
These films received acknowledgement but were not screened at the festival
Certificate of Merit
- Suivez la flèche by Marc Saez
- Better Than Wine by Charles Tashiro
- Eight Minute Deadline by Zina and Petros Papadapoulos
- Goose Family by Seung Yeob Lee
- Hope 2 by Daniele Pignatelle
- Like Ten by Jim Tierney
- Mr. Stokes’ Mission by Sam Hampton
- My Prologue by Demetri Panayotopoulos
- Retrocognition by Eric Patrick
- Retablo by Susana del Rio Kurolwa
- The Baltic Horse by Miles Harrison
Rochester
International
Film Festival
about Us
The Rochester International Film Festival is produced and presented by Movies On A Shoestring, Inc., offering four distinct screenings each year at George Eastman Museum’s famed Dryden Theatre in Rochester NY.
Films
3 Days. Dozens of Films. 1,000s of Film Lovers. See short films of ALL genres from filmmakers worldwide! Join us! All (4) distinct screenings are FREE to attend.