19 Oct 2020
Call for entries
31 May 2020
Festival closed
03 Oct 2020
Notification date
15 Oct 2020
19 Oct 2020
Festival start: 15 October 2020 Festival end: 19 October 2020
The Spirit of Independence film festival is a unique celebration of raw, passionate filmmakers who make films on a micro-budget. Our remit is that we only screen feature films made for under £150k (short films made for under £1k) providing a platform for fresh talent who work with small budgets to screen and celebrate their films.
Doesn't micro-budget mean it will look amateurish? Well no - if you look at some of the biggest talent working in Hollywood today they all started working with films made for less than £100k - Christopher Nolan's Following, Kevin Smith's Clerks and Darren Aronofsky's Pi to name a few.
Our goal is simple - to provide a platform for these films to get out there and to inspire filmmakers of the future to see what can be accomplished with little money.
Held at the beautiful Grade II listed art-deco theatre, the Abbeydale Picturehouse and funded locally we are working tirelessly to give you film the exposure it so rightly deserves.
It Cost How Much?? Best achievement for a feature film award
That looks awesome! Best achievement for a short film award
We'll be announcing the prizes soon - we are looking to work with local students to provide a uniquely designed trophy.
1. All feature films must have a budget of £150,000 or less - for films made in other currencies a reasonable exchange rate must be applied to demonstrate it is equivalent to £150K GBP e.g. $195K USD or € 175K EUR
2. All short films must have a budget if £1,000 or less - for films made in other currencies a reasonable exchange rate must be applied to demonstrate it is equivalent to £1000 GBP e.g. $1300 USD or €1200 EUR
3. Feature films for our purposes are determined by a running time of 60 minutes or more
4. Short films for our purposes are determined by a running time of under 10 minutes
5. All films must be made available by a digital download, DCP files are not required
6. All work must solely be that of the submitter or related party
7. All films not in the English language must have English subtitles provided
No Fee
Submissions deadline
31 May 20
We want your short films! Any genre from any country by anyone, our only requirement is that they are under 10 minutes long and cost under £1k (reasonable exchange rate must be applied for films made in a different currency)
No Fee
Submissions deadline
31 May 20
We want as much diversity as possible - any genre will do from anywhere in the world. Requirements are that the film must cost under £100k (reasonable exchange rate must be applied for films made in a different currency) and be over 60 minutes in length
