Sundance Shorts

95 minutes

Synopsis
The 2017 Sundance Film Festival Short Film Tour is a 95-minute theatrical program of seven short films selected from this year’s Festival, widely considered the premier showcase for short films and the launchpad for many now-prominent independent filmmakers for more than 30 years. Including fiction, documentary and animation from around the world, the 2017 program offers new audiences a taste of what the Festival offers, from laugh-out-loud comedy to contemplative reflections of the world we live in.
 
PROGRAM
5 Films About Technology
Written and directed by Peter Huang. 2016, Canada, 5 minutes. Take a satirical look at the dumber side of technology.
 
And The Whole Sky Fit In The Dead Cow’s Eye
Short Film Jury Award: International Fiction
Written and directed by Francisca Alegría. 2016, Chile, U.S.A., 19 minutes.
In Spanish with English subtitles
Emeteria is visited by the ghost of her ​patrón​, Teodoro. She believes he has come to take her to the afterlife—but he has more devastating news.
 
Come Swim
Written and directed by Kristen Stewart. 2017, U.S.A., 17 minutes.
This is a diptych of one man’s day, half impressionist and half realist portraits.
 
Lucia, Before and After
Short Film Jury Award: U.S. Fiction
Written and directed by Anu Valia. 2016, U.S.A., 14 minutes.
After traveling 200 miles, a young woman waits out Texas’s state-mandated 24-hour waiting period before her abortion can proceed.
 
Night Shift
Written and directed by Marshall Tyler. 2017, U.S.A., 15 minutes.
Get a glimpse into a day in the life of a bathroom attendant in a Los Angeles nightclub.
 
Pussy
Written and directed by Renata Gasiorowska. 2016, Poland, 9 minutes.
Alone at home one evening, a young girl decides to have a solo pleasure session—but not everything goes according to plan.
 
Ten Meter Tower
Directed by Maximilien Van Aertryck and Axel Danielson. 2016, Sweden, 16 minutes.
In Swedish with English subtitles
People who have never been up a 10-meter diving tower must choose whether to jump or climb down in this entertaining study of people in a vulnerable position.
 
DIRECTOR BIOS
5 Films About Technology:​P​eter Huang is an award-winning director and screenwriter based in Toronto, Ontario. A former creative executive, his work has appeared on many best-of lists and has received numerous awards and nominations, including recognition from the JUNO Awards, MuchMusic Video Awards, MTVU Woodies, and UK MVAs, as well as a 2013 Young Director Award from the Cannes Film Festival. In 2015, Huang was featured in the Toronto International Film Festival’s Emerging Directors Showcase.
 
And The Whole Sky Fit in A Dead Cow’s Eye:​ ​Francisca Alegría graduated from Columbia University’s film MFA program in screenwriting and directing with her thesis, ​And the Whole Sky Fit in the Dead Cow’s Eye​, under the mentorship of Eric Mendelsohn. The short film, produced by Birgit Gernboeck, received two Jury Selects and the Audience Award at the Columbia University Film Festival. Francisca is developing her feature script ​The Willow​ in association with Jirafa Films, scheduled for fall 2017.
 
Come Swim:​ ​Kristen Stewart is an American actress, writer and director. ​Come Swim​ is her directorial debut.
 
Lucia, Before and After:​ ​Anu Valia is an award-winning writer, director and actor who has produced videos for The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, MTV, IFC, CollegeHumor, Vox Media, Refinery29, Nylon magazine, Above Average and more. Her work at CollegeHumor has won a Bronze Telly Award and was nominated for a Webby Award.
 
Night Shift: ​​Marshall Tyler is an LA-based filmmaker. His first documentary, S​kid Row, followed Pras Michél as he was disguised as a homeless man on LA’s Skid Row. Tyler is in development on several narrative projects, including one based on a popular novel by legendary author, Iceberg Slim. Marshall’s latest project is ​Night Shift​, starring Tunde Adebimpe and executive produced by JuVee Productions. Tyler started his career as an assistant and videographer to his mentor, legendary filmmaker Michael Mann.
 
Pussy: ​Renata Gasiorowska was born in 1991 and is an animation student and cartoonist from Krakow, Poland. Currently, she is a fifth-year student of film animation and special effects at the Polish National Film School in Lodz.
 
Ten Meter Tower:​ Maximilien Van Aertryck was born in 1989 in Paris and Axel Danielson was born in 1976 in Vittskövle. They have collaborated at Plattform Produktion in Gothenburg since 2013, where they also work with Ruben Östlund. “Our interest lies in the potential of the moving image and our ambition is that the images we produce have a critical and humorous approach to the stream of images that surround us.”
 
About The Sundance Film Festival Shorts Program
The Sundance Film Festival has introduced global audiences to some of the most groundbreaking films of the past three decades, including ​Boyhood, Swiss Army Man, Manchester By the Sea, Brooklyn, Little Miss Sunshine, Napoleon Dynamite, 20 Feet From Stardom, Beasts of the Southern Wild​, ​Fruitvale Station​ and ​Sin Nombre.​ Each year the Festival receives more than 9,000 short film submissions and selects 70 to show. The Festival programs a collection of shorts from its most recent Festival for a theatrical tour of independent art houses in more than 70 cities throughout the U.S., Canada and Europe. It is one of very few theatrical releases of short films in the United States.
 
Fueled by artistic expression and limited only by their runtime, short films transcend traditional storytelling. They are a significant and popular way artists can connect with audiences. From documentary to animation, narrative to experimental, the abbreviated form is made for risk-taking. The Festival has always treated short films with the highest regard and gives a home to both established and new filmmakers with shorts for audiences to discover and celebrate.
 
The Festival’s Short Film Program has long been established as a place to discover talented directors, such as past alums Wes Anderson, Spike Jonze, Nicole Holofcener, Paul Thomas Anderson, David O. Russell, Debra Granik, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, Lake Bell, Jay and Mark Duplass, Alexander Payne, Todd Haynes, Lynne Ramsay, Andrea Arnold, and many others.
 
Recent short film discoveries at the Festival include Golden Globe Award winner Jill Soloway (​Afternoon Delight​, ​Transparent​) and Academy Award winner Damien Chazelle (​Whiplash, La La Land​).
 
The Festival is the centerpiece of the year-round public programs for the nonprofit Institute, which also hosts a number of residency labs and grants more than $3.5 million to independent artists each year.