r/FilmFestivals

I currently have a rough cut of a short film that is about to start being worked by a professional editor. This is the first thing I've ever directed so I don't know much about festival submission rules but I've gotten strong feedback from folks in the film industry, including directors who have shown work at Sundance and Cannes. Unfortunately, most are split on if I should just submit the rough cut now and not miss the Sundance deadline or wait a year and try with the final film. I'm a little at a loss of what to do. Any thoughts or suggestions from other filmmakers would be helpful. Thanks!

That's the question.

It's almost that time of year again, when I have to write a lot of rejection emails for the festival I direct. It's the worst part of the job. I hate it. Because of the volume of submissions we receive, it's just not possible to provide personalized feedback to everyone.

What is the best rejection email you've received? Do you care about the submissions:accepted ratio? Is it best to keep it short? What can I say in the email that would encourage you to keep making films and to submit again next year to our fest?

I'm asking all of this in good faith. Thanks!

If I have submitted my film but another festival in the region/city has programmed it, thereby violating your premiere requirement, is it better to 1) quietly withdraw on Film Freeway, 2) send an email to ask first or 3) not say anything/not withdraw and see what happens? I assume the latter is unwelcome, but just don’t know. Never had this problem.

I recently made the final five in the TV category of the Save the Cat! Screenplay Competition, so naturally I’m now considering where else to donate my submission fees.

Which screenplay competitions have provided credible feedback, useful contacts or genuine industry attention? And which produced nothing beyond a handsome downloadable laurel?

What do you look for? Green flags, red flags?

I am an first time independent film maker without any hefty budget, going out of norms in my family and in process of making a feature film!

This is my best bet to take the story to the world. How should I approach as every festival submissions comes with an expensive tag?
What are the chances or authenticity going via Freeway or direct?

Please advise.

My inquiry is mostly what the headline says. Not going to say which festival but I submitted to a festival last month and the deadline was supposed to be about a week ago, but last week they emailed pushing the deadline to Friday and updated the date in filmfreeway.

It is now Tuesday, the status hasn’t changed, I never received any email, I sent a follow up and no response… is this normal? Has this happened to anyone else?

I’m a first time filmmaker so forgive me if this answer has been given already in this sub.

So... we run our film festival through FilmFreeway. And, as many of you likely know, you have to grant permission for festivals to download your film. However, for the first time ever, we have two people who have not given permission.

I have tried emailing them, sending messages through FilmFreeway, reaching out to at least one of them through Instagram. No response.

I'm at the point that if I don't get permission by end of week, they'll have to be dropped. Has anyone ever encountered this kind of issue? I feel bad, but I don't know what more I can do for these filmmakers.

Hi, I am a typical enviro filmmaker who has been submitting on the doc prestige or niche circuit for the last 10 years, I understand those programmers well and the majority looks for social issue or character driven docs that drive world issues etc. I now have a film about Saturday Night Live fans. Its short and charming and very well done but I'm worried that the usual suspects will just pass over it because it doesn't feel "important" etc. Trying to figure out my strategy and though I will focus heavily on mid-tier regional fests, I am trying to think laterally about what other fests might be interested. High production value and entertaining. Recommendations are welcome.

As a filmmaker myself, I’ve started noticing what feels like an unhealthy number of people trying to make a “festival film.” You probably know the type I’m talking about—handheld camera, slow pacing, and themes like a small ethnic community, LGBTQ+ issues, the hardships of a woman’s life, and so on.
I want to be clear: I have absolutely no problem with these stories, mostly I love such movies. They’re important and deserve to be told. But after studying at film school, I’ve started noticing a tendency that honestly makes me uncomfortable.
I’m from a very small ethnic group myself, and one day I’d love to make a film about my people when I feel ready. One of guys who also studying in a same film school approached me because he knew where I was from and said he wanted to make a film about my community. At first, I was genuinely happy to hear that.
I asked him what inspired him. He was surprisingly honest. He said he had heard about me, Googled my ethnic group, saw that there are only around 1.5–2 million of us, read about the conflict surrounding our people, and thought it would make a great festival film because it’s a culture that most audiences know very little about.
So I asked him another question: Do you actually want to tell this story because it means something to you, or because you think it’ll do well at festivals? He admitted that the festival potential was a big part of what motivated him.
I don’t even have a problem with his honesty. If he ends up making a great film that introduces more people to my culture, that’s a positive thing. What bothered me was the idea that someone might choose a story primarily because they believe it’s what festivals want, rather than because it’s a story they genuinely care about telling.
That’s where I start questioning the relationship between art and recognition. Of course, we all want validation. We all want our films to be seen, appreciated, and maybe even screened at great festivals. But shouldn’t art begin with something you personally care about? Shouldn’t the goal be to make the film you believe in and then share it with the world in a way, that other will believe too ?
It also feels like this has become more noticeable over the past few years. Major festivals seem to have become increasingly focused on representation and inclusion. Again, I support more diverse voices being heard. But sometimes it feels as though filmmakers start chasing subjects because they believe those topics have a better chance of being selected, rather than because those are the stories they genuinely want to tell.
Maybe that’s why so many festival films can start to feel similar. Handheld cinematography, a slow, minimalist style, a Muslim woman dealing with tragedy, or an LGBTQ+ character struggling with family acceptance. These are all meaningful stories when they come from a place of genuine passion. But when they’re treated as a formula for getting into festivals, something about that feels off to me.
I’m curious what other filmmakers think. Have festivals unintentionally encouraged certain trends in storytelling, or am I looking at this the wrong way?

The Deadline for Musicbed Challenge 2026 (a short-film competition run by the stock music company Musicbed) is 5pm UTC today, August 14, per their own terms and conditions. It’s currently morning UTC, well before that cutoff, but the submit button on my film’s page has been replaced with “voting opens soon.”

I have a finished film ready to go and no way to submit it. I’ve emailed Musicbed twice and messaged them on Instagram with no response yet.

If anyone from Musicbed sees this, or if anyone has run into the same thing and knows a workaround or alternate contact, I’d appreciate it. I don’t want to miss this over what looks like a site error.

Boris celebrates his 1 year anniversary with his girlfriend Katie but there's a problem, she's somehow transformed herself into an earthworm.

Hey guys, I wrote How Very Bronx and I am 41🔄

It’s kinda awful that when you pour your heart in you get nothing.

Has anyone experienced this before?

How’d you cope?

For anyone wondering I entered the Los Angeles First Time Filmmaker Showcase

this was the email-
Thank you for submitting your project to the Showcase. Unfortunately, we are not able to include it in our program this year. Your project was very close to selections which is why we have a little gift for you further down this email.

Please know that your project was carefully considered by our programming team, and the decision was incredibly difficult to say the least. Unfortunately, not all of the wonderful projects we consider can be included, and we are forced to make many difficult decisions each year.

This whole submissions game can get expensive. Please understand that we really dislike rejecting projects but we never ever reject filmmakers or screenwriters. Our city based festivals have bigger online capacities and networking events at their respective cities and we love networking with screenwriters!

I made an absolutely gorgeous micro-doc. Like just first class in terms of sound design, VO, gorgeous shots, great little story. Now I’m looking to submit to festivals. I’ve amassed a lot of alumni status at fests and am utilizing that but my question is…

Every fest has a Documentary Short category, do you all know of any fests with a micro documentary category?

Film is 3:30 for reference.

Thanks.

I have a 14min 30sec short that's a dark comedy with horror elements. I'm thinking I overshot at submitting mostly for the big genrefests (Fantastic, Beyond, Nightmares, SITGES) and am looking for suggestions of smaller festivals that might take a chance on a low budget film with emphasis on story/writing/performance rather than cinematography.

Have you seen other filmmakers and/or screenwriters attend your screenings, or other screenings, or do you find people pretty much only attend their own block? Most fests give comps to all the screenings, so just curious. 😊

Hello everyone! This will be my first time seeing a premiere at the NYFF and I am hoping to get tickets to the Godzilla Minus one world premiere while in New York.

I live in Arizona so I will be travelling a bit far for this premiere and I was curious if I were to purchase the Contributor Membership for FLC, would my chances of getting a ticket to this world premiere be pretty good? (Ticket presales for contributor are a day before general public for $150) I know there isn't a guarantee, but I am curious for a movie like this if anyone with a good history of attending has good advice regarding FLC memberships :)

I would love to make it out to New York for my first time ever and enjoy this experience and hoping to do it with the cheapest options yet more chance to secure a ticket while I am in town. Any and all advice would be much appreciated!!