How to Host a Tiny Film Festival in Your Living Room

We watch a lot of short films. Like, a whole lot of short films. And every year or so, we get folks together in our living room to watch about 90 minutes of our favorite short films. We call these “tiny film festivals.” Here’s how we create tiny film festivals in our living room.

First, we find some films. I subscribe to the NoBudge newsletter that drops short films to my inbox and we also cruise through the Staff Picks on Vimeo.com. Also thanks to Chris with the big red beard because he shares a lot of films with us too.

So we watch a ton of short films to find ones that inspire us and that seem to work well together. This takes time. A lot of time. Ok, we found some films.

Here’s how we do our tiny film fest, and you can do yours how you want. Folks come over and we have a crockpot of vegan chili, snacks, and drinks–the more basic, the more fun. We’ve done this a couple of times where people bring food and drink to share which is another fun way to share an evening of food and films.

Once folks arrive, chat a little, and get some food, we move to the living room to watch three 30-ish minute sets of short films with short breaks between the sets for more food and conversation. We find that 30-ish minutes of short films at a time is a good length.

We actually moved everything out of our living room and rented chairs for our recent film fest and this allowed us to get more people into our living room which was kind of cool. The chairs were like $1.20 a piece to rent so really cheap.

And that’s it! If you’re interested to host your own tiny film festival in your living room, I’ve included links to all the films we watched at our recent tiny film fest. Hope you enjoy these. Oh, the descriptions were provided by the filmmakers who uploaded these on Vimeo and YouTube.

A Tiny Film Fest for Your Living Room

Part I (30:41)

1. Love is Blind (6:29) - When Alice’s husband arrives home to try and make amends it leaves her navigating a tricky situation. Written and Directed by Dan Hodgson.

2. Porcelain Unicorn (3:02) - Porcelain Unicorn is a three minute film about a German youth who befriends a Jewish girl in hiding during World War II. The film was carefully crafted around 5 fixed lines of dialogue as part of the Philips Parallel Lines international competition where it made it into the the top 10 semi-finalist round.

3. Make and Share - Shantell Martin by Casey Neistat (3:15) - One of my favourite photographs was taken when I was nine years old. I’m standing with my siblings in our apartment in Thamesmead estate, a public-housing complex in Southeast London. I have a little Afro and brown skin, and I’m wearing Michael Jackson-style shorts. I've know Casey for years now and we have wanted to make something since then.

4. Johanna (3:47) - Finnish freediver Johanna Nordblad holds the world record for a 50-meter dive under ice. She discovered her love for the sport through cold-water treatment while recovering from a downhill biking accident that almost took her leg. British director and photographer Ian Derry captures her taking a plunge under the Arctic ice. Shot in the wilderness of Finland at temperatures of minus 14 degrees.

5. Salam (13:38) - A female Lyft driver navigates the night shift in NYC while waiting to hear life or death news from Syria. Directed by Claire Fowler.

Part II (34:38)

1. OCTA (3:37) - Director and cinematography by Vincent De La Rue. Music by Guillaume Ferran and Mim. Produced by Ocurens.

2. Santa is a Psychedelic Mushroom (6:36) - It’s time to embrace the shamanistic side of Christmas. By Matthew Salton.

3. Anthophobia (5:24) - Film by Valentin Petit. Produced by Ocurens.

4. Handsy (3:28) - Directed by John Alan Thompson. Short of the week February 11, 2019.

5. Horn (14:54) - A young man’s encounter with a motorcycle-riding caretaker launches him on a hallucinatory, spiritual journey through the backlands of America. Written, produced, and directed by Hughes William Thompson. Winner - Grand Jury Prize, 2016 Nashville Film Festival.

Part III (27:17)

1. Split Screen: A Love Story (2:25) - Shot entirely on the Nokia N8 mobile phone. Directed by James W Griffiths. Winner of the Nokia Shorts competition 2011.

2. Different This Year (2:06) - After one hour of training, two elementary school teachers receive their government-issued firearms and are clearly now ready to take on any perpetrator, no matter how armed. Or maybe not. Written by Anna Hozian. Directed by Meghann Artes. Made with support from DePaul University's School of Cinematic Arts.

3. (unofficial) History of the National Parks (4:06) - National parks are hard… Made by Ryan Maxey. Made possible by Parks Project. Shout out to Bill Wurtz, he’s the OG of this kinda shit. Also shout out to Ken Burns and PBS.

4. Samsara (5:20) - Samsara is a central belief in Dharmic religions. It permeates all forms of life, as a cyclical and ceaseless power dictating a succession of earthly existence. This film was shot and edited by Kieran Mellor.

5. Musca (4:11) - Written and directed by Stefan Parker. Awards:

6. A Writer and Three Script Editors Walk Into A Bar (2:25) - Uploaded by the Director’s Group.

7. Cropped (5:57) - A short comedy/sci-fi film we made for this year's Homespun Yarns showcase. We hope you enjoy it! Cropped is about a group of UFO enthusiasts who clash with their cynical crop circle tour guide. When night falls the group have to set their differences aside when the mystery of the crop circles is revealed.