Followed by a Q&A with directors and producers

A Poem in Bambu. Dir. Xufei Wu. 2019, 5 mins. 1920s, southern China. A young bridegroom is visiting his aunt, who lives alone in the distant mountains. Bamboo grows everywhere like an ocean. The mansion is beautiful, and his aunt seems kind. Yet, there is a strange noise and a locked room in the attic.

American Quartet. Dir. Jesca Prudencio. Prod. Adam Grannick. 2019, 9 mins. In a 2030s small town bitterly divided over who belongs, a young Muslim-American woman puts herself at risk when she shares her private, digitized memories with strangers, challenging the status quo in the hope that empathy will triumph over hate.

Eli. Dir. Nathaniel Milton. 2019, 15 mins. A 15-year-old musician believes he has an extra-terrestrial implant in his ear. The filmmaker describes his animated work as “a true story from the realms of high strangeness, magical thinking, and manic delusion.”

Hello World. Dir. Nathan Hong Fisher. Prod. Kristy Richman. 2019, 12 mins. Gayle and Bennett are at the end of their lives and make the decision to try and continue their existence together through technology.

The Memory Unit. Dir. Tim Hall. 2019, 15 mins. Unusual events surround the hospitalization of a father with Alzheimer’s disease.

Solstice. Dir. Lisandro Perez-Rey. Prods. Lisandro Perez-Rey, Cynthia Barrera, Laura Sweeney. 2019, 15 mins. During a brutal winter storm, a bartender befriends a homeless man and brings him home for a warm meal and an ancient ritual.

Vivir. Dir. Lewis Rapkin. 2019, 3 mins. In the not so distant future, Earth has become infertile and the struggle to grow food off-planet takes an unsuspecting turn when a scientist makes a peculiar discovery.

Insight. Dir. Jon K. Jones. 2019, 12 mins. Suspecting infidelity, an anxious wife uses simulation technology to safely practice confronting her husband in real life.

Unified Field. Dir. Christina Hibner. 2019, 5 mins. An experimental animation that follows two cosmic entities. The main character, Junior, is trying her best to learn about the nature of the universe from her teacher, Senior, who is a master of the universe. Junior experiences moments of enlightenment that transform the way she sees the world, literally opening her eyes to things she could not imagine.