SXSWclick Tagged Articles at Cinematical

We're well into August, and here in Austin it's hot and dry and the last thing most of us are thinking about is anything going on next March. But over at SXSW, they're ignoring the dog days of summer and preparing like crazy for next year's interactive, music, and (of course) film festival / conference. The 2009 South By Southwest Film Festival is scheduled for March 13-21, as you can see from the new site for next year's festivities, and you can start submitting your films now for consideration. You've got until December to get your short or feature film to the festival if you're dreaming of seeing your name in lights (or at least your film's title) at the Paramount next year.

A few films are already scheduled to be screened at the 2009 fest: the SXSWclick winners, which were recently announced. The Grand Jury award for the short-film contest went to Peter and Ben, by Pinny Grylls, which also won in the documentary shorts category. Little Pumpkin, directed by Tiffany Bartok, took home the Popularity Contest award. You can watch these films and the winning shorts from all categories on the SXSWclick site. In fact, you can watch all the finalists online if you like. So if you want to pretend it's March in Austin, crank up the air conditioning a bit, sit back in a comfy chair with a beer or milkshake (in tribute to Alamo Drafthouse, a favorite SXSW venue), and enjoy the SXSWclick shorts. Then hike a mile back to your car with Scott Weinberg or Will Goss next to you, scarfing down hot wings from a Sixth Street bar and speculating on how many screeners they can watch that night before they pass out from exhaustion. (Okay, maybe you do have to wait for March for that last experience.)

What do you get if you're a winner in the SXSWclick competition? Well, you get your short film screened at one of America's coolest film festivals ... and a bunch of editing software and other little prizes. But playing at the South By Southwest Film Festival? That's every indie filmmaker's "realistic" dream, isn't it? (The unrealistic one would be: Winning an Oscar, sleeping with Scarlett Johansson at Sundance and beating Spielberg out of a directing gig.) And why exactly should you care about short films? I mean, short films rarely feature big stars or talking dogs or giant robots ... so who gives a wet slap?

Good question. Try checking out the SXSWclick award winners and then tell me if you still feel the same way. For the record, the winners are: Don Brown's Pierre (Grand Jury Winner -and- Animate-it), Will Elliott's Peterson's Savings and Loan (Popularity Contest -and- Old School Shorts), David Serota's Ubutu (Really Real Shorts), Andrea Giacomini's Always Near (Sound Checks), and Tipper Newton's The Timebox Twins (What the F*#!?). Congrats to all the winners! And if your short happens to be playing in front of a gory horror movie at SXSW 2008, then I'll probably see it. (Feel free to browse through the winning shorts right here. Dang, you can even watch 'em on your phone. And in the bathroom!) Judges for the SXSWclick competition include filmmakers Bob Odenkirk, Kal Penn, AJ Schnack, Michael Tully, bloggers Agnes Varnum and Violet Blue, and Homestar Runner co-creator Craig Zobel.

Speaking of SXSW '08, consider this the starter's pistol: (Bang!) Filmmakers! Time to get your flicks into the SXSW offices if you want to be considered for next year's slate. True, the admission process runs until (almost) the end of the year, but why not be an early bird? Catch those programmers while they're still bubbly and pleasant! And as far as movie-watchers go, festival master chief Matt Dentler would like to extend a personal invitation to any and all Cinematical readers. Mention this article during SXSW '08 and get a free beer at the Austin bar of your choice! (Offer expires March 6, 2008)

I would normally follow the question "Got a short film you've made?" with the suggestion that you email a link to the short to Cinematical to include in the Eat My Shorts column. However, today I have an even better idea: Send your short film or video to the fourth annual SXSWclick! competition. If your short film is 10 minutes or shorter in length, you can submit it to SXSWclick in one of five categories: Old-School Shorts (for narratives), Really Real Shorts (for documentaries), Animate-it, Sound Checks (for music videos) and for everything else, the What the F*#!? category. The winning shorts in each category will screen at the 2008 SXSW Film Festival in Austin next March, and the Grand Jury Prize winner gets a MacPro Workstation and Apple Cinema Display. The deadline is June 15, which may be enough time to make a short film (quickly) and submit it if you're really lusting after the awards.

If you're more of an audience member than a filmmaker, you can watch all of the winning shorts from the 2006 competition -- and since I haven't quite finished my most recent Eat My Shorts column, consider SXSWclick your source for good short films online this week. I haven't yet watched all the 2006 winners myself, although I caught the Really Real Shorts winner art/work recently and found it very inspiring for creative people who also have day jobs. Also, keep an eye on the SXSWclick site in late June, when the 15 finalists will have their shorts available on the web for us to watch, as well as vote on the Audience Award.

The short film competition SXSWclick announced its finalists on Wednesday. Fifteen films are now in the running ... and the good news is that you can watch them all online and vote for the best ones yourself. The shorts are divided into narrative, documentary, animated, music video, and experimental categories. I love watching short films, so it's a pleasure to find a site where I can watch more than a dozen good ones on my computer.

SXSWclick grants two types of awards: the Popularity Contest for which anyone can vote, and the Jury Contest selected by esteemed filmmakers and critics (including Cinematical's editor emeritus Karina Longworth). You have until July 26 to watch and vote, and the winners of both types of awards will be announced on July 28. Winning films are automatically accepted into the 2007 SXSW Film Festival.

I love SXSW. It's by far the most favorite film festival to attend, in no small part because it's seemingly the last major film festival that cares about whether or not its audience is having fun. So when the people behind the acronym called and asked me to sit on the jury of their offshoot, SXSWclick, I jumped at the chance. SXSWclick, to quote the official website, "is a year-round initiative created to showcase short-form storytelling via mobile devices and the web." In other words, it's a festival specifically for shorts designed for digital, if not device-specific, distribution. There are five categories to submit work in, ranging from music videos to documentary, to "What the F*$!?" - or, the "Not sure we 'get it' -- but it's pretty cool" category. All work has to be under ten minutes, and it needs to arrive at the SXSW offices via VHS or DVD by June 12. Winners receive a passel of prizes, as well as a chance to screen their film for the ever-expanding crowds at the 2007 SXSW Film Festival, and all entrants will be seen by a panel of filmmakers and industry professionals, including Jason Reitman, Bob Sabiston, Kirby Dick, and, well, me. Wanna enter? Here's the link.