The 22nd Annual Emerson Film Festival will take place in the Bright Family Screening Room in the Paramount Center on March 22nd. Doors open at 5:30 pm. Screening begins at 6 pm. The screening will be followed by a live moderated conversation with student filmmakers, both in person and on Zoom. A reception will follow at the Liebergott Black Box Theatre from 8:30 to 10:00 pm.
There will be food, drinks and entertainment. We will also be announcing the winners of the audience award, the Social Impact Award and the Marcia Robbins Wilf women in film award.
For information about parking and directions, please follow the ArtsEmerson page.
RUN TIME : 99 MINUTES
Projectionist
Directed by Deniz Akyürek and Noah Matalon 5 minutes A portrait of Tom Welch, lead projectionist at the Coolidge Corner Theatre in Brookline, Massachusetts.
Together, Laughing
Directed by Claire Maske 4 minutes
Using 16mm imagery of wilt and decay and archival audio of sick or deceased members of my family, Together, Laughing is a meditation on transience, memory, and the failure of the archive to truly preserve anything at all.
Nancy
Directed by Carlo Ang 5 minutes
Told entirely through voicemail messages saved by her daughter over the span of ten-plus years, Nancy is a short story about a mother’s unconditional (and occasionally overbearing) love for her child—as showcased through the lens of one particularly unique matriarch.
Headlands
Directed by Cecelia Clare Meade 5 minutes
An old woman grieving the loss of her childhood visits the coast to complete her labyrinth. In the process, she is mesmerized by the waves and is greeted by her childhood within them. After this journey, she goes back to her home alone, knowing she can’t rewind time.
Dope
Directed by Kaveh Hodjat 4 minutes
A photographer attempts to make some friends.
Power of the HumanHeart
Directed by Sasha Garcia, Kuzco Gong, and Francisco Viana 8 minutes
A man’s harrowing journey to escape death.
The Entertainer
Demiah Crawford 5 min
This short horror dance film represents the struggles of being a black woman in the entertainment industry. The story explores the themes of stereotypes, exploitation and sacrificing one’s morals to entertain. As the main character goes on this journey, she meets a friend along the way.
Gund Kwok
Directed by Xudong Liu 19 minutes
The Lion Dance is a folk dance from Asia that was performed exclusively by men in the past. “Gund Kwok” is the first women’s Lion Dance troupe in the U.S. Founded by Cheng Imm Tan, she and fifteen Asian women strive to break lingering stereotypes about Asian women.
Prologue
Directed by Corey Zhengyang Tian 6 minutes
In a cold dystopian world, a lonely detective is caught in a mystery as he tries to uncover the truth about an unsolved case from the past.
Lying in Bed Alone, Breathing
Directed by Tris Arthur 10 minutes
A meditation on the internal and external worlds of gender dysphoria, as experienced by, shot by, and narrated by the subject at the film’s core. Audio description and open captions are implemented throughout the film to create a conversation between the typically unheard voices of the trans body and mind.
Vulpes
Directed by Laura Hoffheimer 7 minutes
After many years of conjuring the idea of ‘man’ and what it means to be human, a sly nimble fox spirit becomes a human to learn their ways.
Dollkind
Directed by ShuaiLiang Liu 13 minutes
A fairytale future where sentient dolls dominate the land, humans have become the property of state-run labor-camps. A lone escapee returns to rescue his family, concealing as a mascot in hopes of evading his ex-master. Fate however has something else in mind in a world where nobody is truly innocent.
Power of the Human Heart 
Lying in Bed Alone, Breathing 
