New York Lift-Off Film Festival 2023 - Network Round Shorts
Wednesday 2nd August - Wednesday 9th August
1.
Azar
Dir. Fabián Palacios V.
Mexico
Logline: Julián, a Mexican teenage boy torn between pursuing his frustrated passion for music and helping out his single mother. He is faced with a decision to steal the trumpet of an old street performer to prove himself a man in front of his friends.
2.
Boomer
Dir. Nicholas Wolf
USA
Logline:Young man, Charlie, has made a hobby of being a boom mic operator and strives to be the greatest. However, his hobby turns out to be a passionate obsession.
3.
Assisted Living
Dir. Ken Kimura
Australia
Logline: An elderly woman wrestles with her deteriorating memory and her disdain for her support worker until a recollection evokes a change of heart.
4.
The Sky is Falling
Dir. Stephan Stelman
Israel
Logline: On the eve of Yom Kippur, the day of atonement in Judaism, fifteen-year-old Uri ignites a billboard while drunk with his friends. When the tragic outcome of his act is discovered, Uri and his friends are brought into police custody. When his father arrives to the rescue, Uri is confronted with questions regarding responsibility and status. He needs to decide whether to pin the blame on his underprivileged friend, Mark, whom everybody seems already to suspect is the culprit, or accept the consequences of his actions.
5.
90 Hours
Dir. Tim Shaughnessy Hansen
Denmark
Logline:
6.
Limbo
Dir. Alex Ramsey
USA
Logline: Edward, now 28, hasn't seen his family since he crossed the
US-Mexico border on foot 10 years ago. Trapped in the US by a
maddening waiting game for citizenship, he grapples with the
idea of leaving the life he built in New York behind forever in
exchange for a long overdue homecoming. Will Edward reunite
with his family or continue on in his self-imposed purgatory?
7.
Diving Deep
Dir. Malene Begtrup
Denmark
Logline: Kaia is 12 years old and has lost her father in a diving accident. While her mother tries to keep the family together, Kaia lies and sneaks away from the support group to go on diving adventures in the local swimming pool. Beneath the surface, Kaia searches for her father in a magical world under water, while trying to understand death without fear.
8.
Murph's Concerto (in G major)
Dir. Brandon Garcia
USA
Logline: A violinist finds himself trapped inside of a documentary about events in his life that haven't happened.
9.
A Place For Ashes
Dir. Brianne Neira, Melissa Ingle
USA
Logline: A Place for Ashes" is the story of two sisters; Phoebe, an anxiety-ridden college dropout with a guarded personality, and her younger sister Taylor, a bubbly micromanager with a sunny disposition. The two of them discover how they can rebuild their relationship and why it fell apart in the first place.
10.
DRAWBACK
Dir. Caroline Bevaart, Harald Swinkels
Netherlands
Logline: Simon is a lonely comic strip artist with an unattainable love: Rachel, a woman he sees regularly in the grand cafe where he works on his drawings. Whenever Rachel comes into the cafe, Simon feels an irrepressible urge to put his work aside and secretly sketch portraits of her.
One day, Simon is offered a pencil by a distinguished gentleman in the back of the cafe. Simon discovers that by drawing with this pencil he has the power to change the course of his life. He uses it to win Rachel over, but is genuine love makeable?
11.
To Be Honest
Dir. John Robert Hammerer
USA
Logline: Two exes attempt to reconnect, unaware they each have something to hide.
12.
Midwest Ice Age!
Dir. Douglas J. Corcoran
USA
Logline: A Midwest man faces challenges as he realizes his dream of creating an ice carving company that produces spectacular art while helping to bring communities closer together.
13.
Wolf
Dir. Kathleen Dorian
Canada
Logline: Wolf is a short that captures a new mother's experience of breastfeeding, being a parent for the first time and the rollercoaster of new identity.
14.
UNDECIDED
Dir. Sofia Kunz
USA
Logline: Inspired by Hemingway's short story, "Hills Like white Elephants," UNDECIDED follows three people deciding whether or not to keep a pregnancy as they explore how the idea of "motherhood" elicits questions around identity, relationships, and their futures.
15.
WHAT DOESN'T KILL (make's you ugly)
Dir. noam O vardi
Israel
Logline: An art house film about Dana, an anxious young woman who suffered from severe sexual trauma, she's raging and desperate to settle her mind and begin to train martial arts to become an unconquerable warrior, when her plans meets reality as she's being grounded like an unruly girl by her fighting coach she decides to take things more seriously to seek redemption, she unleashes her full power and that’s when things really gets out of hand.
16.
heaven w/o earth
Dir. Arthur Brux
Germany
Logline: Alwa, Emil, Karl and Ivan roam the mountains without a destination and break into strangers' huts. Again and again, they are confronted with their lack of support, until the first person disappears...
17.
MARICON
Dir. Christopher Lukas
USA
Logline: In this half-hour docu-drama, 88-year-old veteran director-writer-actor Christopher Lukas portrays legendary boxing journalist Bert Sugar.
The script by Patrick Lennon sets Sugar in Purgatory, where he is forced to ruminate about his life-long support of the violent sport. He wonders if he will go up, to Heaven, or down, to Hell, for his past deeds.
The key element in the drama is the fight between welterweights Emile Griffith and Benny “Kid” Paret in 1962, during which Griffith pummels Paret to death.
