{"id":16645,"date":"2021-02-12T19:44:20","date_gmt":"2021-02-12T19:44:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nashvillefilmfestival.org\/?page_id=16645"},"modified":"2022-02-16T20:59:35","modified_gmt":"2022-02-16T20:59:35","slug":"2021-festival","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/nashvillefilmfestival.org\/2021-festival\/","title":{"rendered":"2021 Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Our expanded 2021 festival plan included a full range of in-person screenings at venues throughout Nashville in addition to festival films, panels and Q&As securely online! The 52nd Nashville Film Festival extends our important goals to elevate and honor filmmakers, screenwriters, musicians and artists from around the world and here in Tennessee. The 2021 festival featured more than 150 films, Creators Conference panels, Q&As, the annual Music Program and other exclusive content in an engaging mix of in-person and online events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2021 FILM COMPETITION WINNERS<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Best Narrative Feature:\u00a0 Poser<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Ori Segev & Noah Dixon<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lennon Gates is a quiet and observant podcaster, but when she meets the charismatic musician Bobbi Kitten, her deceptive intentions surface. As their friendship forms, Lennon quickly spirals into obsession as she struggles with an unchecked search for creative identity.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Music Documentary Feature:  <\/strong>Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Brent Wilson<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road is a deeply personal documentary that explores the life and career of the legendary songwriter, composer and producer through a literal and metaphorical road trip exploring Brian\u2019s hometown. With Rolling Stone editor Jason Fine behind the wheel and Brian selecting the music, the two revisit many of the periods and locations integral in shaping Brian\u2019s life. The feature length film artfully weaves fascinating anecdotes throughout an impressionistic love letter to both Brian\u2019s music and Los Angeles.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Documentary Feature:  <\/strong>Socks on Fire<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Bo McGuire<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

SOCKS ON FIRE is Bo McGuire\u2019s lyrical testament to Southern women couched in the familial battle for his beloved grandmother\u2019s throne. Through a series of stylized reenactments spun in with family VHS footage, SOCKS ON FIRE documents the fluidity of identity, personality and performance in his hometown among his kin and the many women who\u2019ve been a force in Bo\u2019s life.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best New Directors Feature:  <\/strong>Clara Sola<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Nathalie Alvarez Mes\u00e9n<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CLARA, 40, is believed to have a special connection to God. As a \u00abhealer\u00bb, she sustains a family and a village in need of hope, while she finds solace in her relationship with the natural world. After years of being controlled by her mother\u2019s repressive care, Clara\u2019s sexual desires are stirred by her attraction to her niece\u2019s new boyfriend. This newly awakened force takes Clara to unexplored territory, allowing her to cross boundaries, both physical and mystical. Empowered by her self-discovery, Clara gradually frees herself from her role as \u201csaint\u201d and begins to heal herself.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Tennessee Feature:  <\/strong>Thistle<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by: Ryan Camp <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authentic and inspiring, \u201cThistle\u201d dives into the complexity of a Nashville, TN based recovery community for women survivors, as both individuals and the organization grapple to find hope and healing in the midst of change.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Graveyard Shift Feature:  <\/strong>Woodland Dark and Days Bewitched: A History of Folk Horror     <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by: Kier-La Janisse<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

WOODLANDS DARK AND DAYS BEWITCHED explores the folk horror phenomenon from its beginnings. Touching on over 200 films and featuring over 50 interviewees, WOODLANDS DARK AND DAYS BEWITCHED investigates the many ways that we alternately celebrate, conceal and manipulate our own histories in an attempt to find spiritual resonance in our surroundings.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Narrative Short:  <\/strong>Like The Ones I Used to Know<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by: Annie St-Pierre<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

December 24, 1983, 10:50 p.m.; Julie and her cousins ate too much sugar, Santa Claus is late and Denis, alone in his car, is anxious at the idea of setting foot in his ex-in-laws\u2019 house to pick up his children.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Documentary Short: \u00c1guilas<\/strong>\/ Eagles<\/em><\/strong> <\/strong> <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Kristy Guevara-Flanagan, Maite Zubiaurre<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Along the southern desert border in Arizona, it is estimated that only one out of every five missing migrants are ever found. \u00c1guilas is the story of one group of searchers, the Aguilas del Desierto. Once a month these volunteers\u2014construction workers, gardeners, domestic laborers by trade\u2014set out to recover the missing, reported to them by loved ones often thousands of miles away.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Animated Short:  <\/strong>Navozande, The Musician<\/em><\/strong> <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Reza Riahi<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

During a vicious attack, a young musician and the love of his life are brutally separated from one another. Fifty years later, the musician is summoned to play at the Mongol castle where his beloved has been held.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best \u201cThe Edge\u201d Short:  <\/strong>Point and Line to Plane<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by: Sofia Bohdanowicz<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Devastated after the death of a friend, a young woman (Deragh Campbell) attempts to extract meaning from this intense loss as she discovers signs in her daily life and through encounters with the art of Hilma af Klint and Wassily Kandinsky. Borrowing its title from Kandinsky\u2019s 1926 book, Point and Line to Plane portrays the phenomenon of magical thinking endured during an individual\u2019s journey to process, heal and document a period of mourning. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Graveyard Shift Short:  <\/strong>Stuffed<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Theo Rhys, Joss Holden-Rea<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stuffed is a short musical about a taxidermist who dreams of stuffing a human and the man she meets online, so afraid of aging he volunteers to be her specimen. An unexpected romantic spark between them complicates their plans.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Tennessee Short:  <\/strong>Carthage House of Beauty<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by: Allison Inman<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Styles change, but one generation of women still gets their hair done once a week. This poetic portrait captures an unhurried ritual that\u2019s as much about human connection as it is about looking your best for church on Sunday. It bottles a process that will pass with a generation.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Tennessee Student Short:  <\/strong>Muggy<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by: Phynley Joel<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Newly moved to the US from New Zealand, 12 year old Muggy struggles to feel truly at home in a place so different from what she\u2019s always known. She misses the land, the rugby, the trees \u2013 everything. Unbeknownst to her dad (who thinks she\u2019s in school) Muggy sets off into the snow-covered wilderness, experiencing winter as she never has, and finally is able to return \u2018home\u2019 with a new sense of belonging.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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NextGen Short:  <\/strong>Strike<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by: Olivier C\u00f4t\u00e9<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hoping to impress a group of rowdy classmates, 17-year-old Jules invites them to his family\u2019s bowling alley. But when the debauchery descends into chaos, he must find the courage to defy them.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Episodic Pilot:  <\/strong>Cary in Retrograde<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Priya & Philipp Yaw Domfeh<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cary In Retrograde is a musical dramedy that follows its titular character, Cary, as he trudges through a surrealist Los Angeles while coping with Millennial burnout, disappointment, and life in your 30s as a failed artist.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Episodic Series:  <\/strong>If I\u2019m Alive Next Week<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Created by Jennifer Morris, Robbie Sublett<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When a foul-mouthed, 80-year-old grandma gets dumped and booted from her boyfriend\u2019s brownstone, she\u2019s forced to return to the rent-stabilized apartment housing her broke-ass, ungrateful kids. Overnight she finds herself navigating preschool politics, negotiating roommate contracts, and bunking with a six-year-old all while staring down the barrel of her own mortality. A loosely autobiographical digital series that asks \u2014 can you really reimagine your life on the cusp of its twilight?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Best Virtual Reality Film:   <\/strong>A Promise Kept<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Ken Winikur, Director; Ariel Efron, Creative Director; Chris Healer, VR Director<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1944, during the Second World War, thirteen-year-old Fritzie Fritzshall, her mother, and her two younger brothers were arrested at gunpoint and deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau killing center. From her darkest memories to the sparks of humanity that allowed her and others to survive, it is a story that will captivate, move, and inspire you, ensuring Fritzie\u2019s promise is kept for generations to come.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Audience Choice Winner:  <\/strong>The Fable Of A Song<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directed by Andy Strohl<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where do songs come from? How does a song get written? Laurel Wright and Wes Lunsford are songwriters determined to make it big in Nashville, Tennessee alongside thousands of talented musicians. Manager Patryk Larney decides to shoot some footage of Laurel, Wes and cowriter Dean Fields to use for a short social media video and entrusts the editing process to good friend and filmmaker, Andy Strohl. Before one frame can be edited, Wes and Laurel\u2019s lives change in the blink of an eye.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three years later the entire tragic story is finally told by weaving the footage from the cowriting sessions, archival film and interviews with songwriters, musicians and thinkers. A song can become something much more different than the writer\u2019s intent. This is the story of The Young Fables and this is The Fable of a Song.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\nView 2021 Nashville Film Festival film guide.<\/a>