Lucia & Nicole, 10min., USA
Directed by Marlene Emilia Rios
On the cusp of adulthood Lucia finds her childhood friend Nicole living on the street. Houseless after coming out, Lucia’s mother Ximena invites her into their home. However, Nicole’s re-appearance into their lives raises questions about their own daughter’s identity and how to respond to Lucia and Nicole’s re-connection.

https://instagram.com/huelgamedia

Get to know the filmmaker:

1. What motivated you to make this film?

I wanted to make this film because growing up I had this idea of romance that came from my grandparents’ stories of how they met, their serenading—and I’d sit in my living room and watch ‘A Walk in the Clouds,’ and I’d dream of romance. As I grew older, I realized there were no depictions of this for queer love. There wasn’t a vision of the future to latch on to. It seemed to only exist to me in vague, whispered possibilities. Very rarely do we actually get to see romantic films about queer relationships. I wanted to make something that was an ode to those moments and those films I loved as a child, ‘A Walk in the Clouds,’ ‘Pride & Prejudice’ but that existed in a world that was grounded to me. And I knew I wanted to showcase the beautiful community of Albuquerque that had welcomed me as a student and seems to be in constant celebration of identity. I wanted to make the kind of story you could imagine your grandmothers or your cool old aunts telling you someday about how they met long ago, and how their romance blossomed over the years.

2. From the idea to the finished product, how long did it take for you to make this film?

Longer than I’d like, this film really pulled together through challenging moments in my life, as seems to be the case with most films. I wrote the first draft of this film back in my bedroom in New Jersey during the early intense social isolation days of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020. Back when we were all still afraid of our grocery bags, wiping everything down with sanitizing wipes as sirens blared down the suburban streets of New Jersey.

Then in 2023 we were finally able to shoot in Albuquerque for 2 days. Years in the making for days. It took a little over a year to complete post production, as I shot this film while I was employed full-time and finished it after I was laid off. Giving me the bittersweet gift of time to devote my full attention to finishing the film. It’s been a comfort to me through so many long cold moments of life—which I think is why it was always important to me that the film felt warm and I hope it does for others too.

3. How would you describe your film in two words!?

Queer joy.

4. What was the biggest obstacle you faced in completing this film?

Time, the most expensive luxury and the enduring enemy. We had only 2 days to shoot and we were producing remotely from Los Angeles, so it was very much a hit-the-ground-running sort of shoot. And the entire film takes place during the day with no dusk or dawn moments, so we had to be very organized. So much of making short films is an exercise in precision and being concise. We had to get the film there, arrange the camera, pick up the gear, find bicycles, source costumes, confirm our locations and so on and so on. I met most of the crew on the morning of, and only met the cast face to face then. It was definitely an interesting experiment in creating a sense of familiarity so quickly, which was definitely another obstacle for me as a director. I knew I was asking for vulnerability from everyone on board in some form or another so even though we were short on time it was important to me to gather everyone before our first shot and lay out my intent and what this story meant to me so we could all be on equal footing. I wanted everyone that worked on this film to truly feel like the valued and skilled collaborators they are.

5. What were your initial reactions when watching the audience talking about your film in the feedback video?

I was pleasantly surprised to see how people connected with the story, this film is a departure from my previous work, and I think of this film as coming from the more romantic and idealistic part’s of myself and I’m glad to see that recognized. I’d love to live in a world full of empathy and community care and I very consciously chose to reject certain narratives and stereotypes when writing and directing this project because I wanted to show that, and it’s really gratifying to see people appreciate that. It’s always meaningful to see when your intent comes through and when people are able to connect to a story that feels so personal to you. As storytellers we always strive to connect with people and stir an emotion within them, but with shorts, it’s often hard to gauge impact. Sometimes they live only in private screenings or online. Being able to hear from an audience is especially valuable in this sense.

6. When did you realize that you wanted to make films?

Truthfully, it happened in a conversation with my father when I was about 12. There’s an expression that you can’t be what you can’t see, or rather you don’t know what you don’t know. In my case, I grew up loving stories, listening to my grandfather pass down tall tales, reading whatever I could get from the library, picking the weekly rental my mom would allow me from Blockbuster—but I hadn’t realized there was actually a path for me there. I simply didn’t know that there were entire industries, careers in these fields. So I remember having this heart-to-heart about what I wanted to do when I get older. I liked writing, but I wanted more. And that was when my dad asked me why I didn’t think about making movies if I liked them so much? It felt at once like a light bulb moment and a realization that the writing was on the wall.

7. What film have you seen the most in your life?

It’s either Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2 or Joe Wright’s Pride & Prejudice.

8. What other elements of the festival experience can we and other festivals implement to satisfy you and help you further your filmmaking career?

More opportunities to connect with fellow filmmakers and demystify key career steps—funding a film, stepping up to a feature, breaking into TV.

9. You submitted to the festival via FilmFreeway. How has your experiences been working on the festival platform site?

I like how centralized everything is on FilmFreeway, it makes it incredibly easy to create and manage a festival strategy and get your work seen.

10. What is your favorite meal?

This is really a hardball question. I’m always open to tacos and a tamarind margarita.

11. What is next for you? A new film?

For sure, I don’t plan to stop. There’s so many stories I’d love to tell, lingering in my mind just waiting for the right moment. I’d love to do something else shot on film. Right now I’m exploring a few different ideas—either a queer relationship horror about losing yourself in the one you love or a sci-fi project about a sex robot tailor-made to fulfill our darkest fantasies. I’m always writing new things and experimenting with different styles. I’ve a 90-page road film centered around coping with the betrayal of a deceased spouse. And another short about cult-like Homeowners Association simmering on the backburner as well.

The Rich Kid Rules (Ep. 1: 362 Rules of a High School Dropout), 59min., USA
Directed by A.L. Pruitt, Makenna Perkal
A new kind of coming-of-age crime drama series with horses, dance, a dysfunctional family, and an upstairs/downstairs romance with a reverse Cinderella story twist.

http://therichkidrules.com/
https://www.instagram.com/therichkidrules

Get to know Writer/Producer Thomas Willoughby:

1. What motivated you to make this film?

I was a high school dropout, and over the years, I jotted down helpful “rules” that kind and tough mentors have taught me. I told my wife that I was thinking about writing a book (362 Rules of a High School Dropout), and I had already codified and created a draft manuscript, but she said, “Nobody will buy a book about High School Dropout Rules”). So I said, OK, I’ll shoot a documentary — she gave the same answer and said I had to shoot a TV Series or Film to get anyone to watch it. So the idea was formed.

2. From the idea to the finished product, how long did it take for you to make this film?

From the beginning of my writing down the rules, over 20 years. From my wife’s tough love advice, since 2018 (7 years approx.). One of my first steps was to go back to community college and sign up for film classes part-time (at age 25, with no high school degree, I had gone to community college, then UCLA, then UC Davis Law School), so it was a logical first step and I got my AA in 2025.

3. How would you describe your film in two words!?

Enlightening Paths

4. What was the biggest obstacle you faced in completing this film?

Communicating my vision for the project!

Everybody loved the script, but once we shot it, we were four steps in front of the audience instead of one or two steps ahead. We had to reshoot a softer intro to the modern universe of professional kids who don’t attend schools (e.g., varsity athletes used to be the best; now, kid pros competing on traveling teams are the best, and many don’t attend school). With the reshot soft intro to this universe, how these kids interacted with the crime drama made so much better sense, and the Pilot worked to set up multiple interesting storylines.

5. What were your initial reactions when watching the audience talking about your film in the feedback video?

We had a premiere a week before at Grauman’s (fka Manns, now TCL) Chinese Theatres in Hollywood, and there were over 150 in attendance. We had a great after-party with many not connected to the project, and the feedback there was so positive and specific. We wanted to see how that feedback matched the WILDsound feedback, and it turned out to be virtually identical, with many of the same issues discussed (e.g., 1st scene, some loved others, others didn’t).

The feedback from both was very positive. Everyone wanted to know what happens next to their favorite characters, and pretty much everyone was surprised at how the multiple physical universes somehow meshed: Dance, Horse Show Jumping, Stall Mucking, Big Business, and Crime. Not to mention the cast with Young and Old characters, all of whom had multi-layered characters; we honestly had no idea if it was going to work, and it did at the Premiere and in the Wildsound feedback.

6. When did you realize that you wanted to make films?

I started shooting on an 8mm (not even a Super 8) ski racing at Mt. Baldy Ski Lifts in SoCal/ in the early 1970s, and my wife is a horse trainer. Between ski racing and horses and all our kid’s sports, I have been shooting on film, then VHS, then the Nikon camera with an autozoom and autofocus long ago, and it has continued my whole life. We shot this film with my Red Komodo X with Zeiss lenses.

I shot a five-minute promo film for my wife’s stable, where our pilot was shot, and a short film in community college before this one. But, as for actually doing a real project like this (We got SAG AFTRA approval for the film and used SAG and Indie actors), that started when my wife told me to do a film not a book.

7. What film have you seen the most in your life?

Apocalypse Now

8. What other elements of the festival experience can we and other festivals implement to satisfy you and help you further your filmmaking career?

I loved having the Premiere at the Grauman’s (fka Manns now TCL) Chinese Theatres. What a great thing for the crew and actors, basically we used it as a focus group and a wrap party that we had never had. All but one of the cast made it, and lots of the crew.

The feedback video from Wildsound is hugely helpful. I worry whether they ever give bad reviews if they don’t like it; they were just so positive about ours.

9. You submitted to the festival via FilmFreeway. How has your experiences been working on the festival platform site?

It’s a great platform, no problems.

10. What is your favorite meal?

Anything Keto friendly — trying to eliminate processed foods.

11. What is next for you? A new film?

I would love to produce or coproduce the rest of the series (or even host another production company shooting the series at our farm/stable). We are open to any and all ideas.

Seconds in Eternity, 42min., Estonia/Germany
Directed by Christian Schu
An elegant woman in her later years feels the relentless march of time as she mourns her lost youth and missed chances. Alone in a dimly lit room, her life seems to fade with each cigarette she smokes. She observes a vibrant young woman, envying her youth and vitality. Through her introspections, we explore her deep desires and regrets. The narrative, rich with poetry and flashbacks, takes a dramatic turn with a potential murder, leading to a surprising twist. Despite its dark beginnings as a Film Noir, the film transforms into a celebration of life, ending on a hopeful, life-affirming note.

https://secondsineternity.com/
https://instagram.com/christian_schu_film

Get to know the filmmaker:

1. What motivated you to make this film?
Marina Welsch, the main actress contacted me in 2022, having this film idea and some sort of script. I loved the idea behind, added my own value and took it from there.
I loved the idea of showing that, to be able to heal, we have to unite with ourselves first. Our past is an important part of us and we must accept it, to come further in life, to reach the next level.

2. From the idea to the finished product, how long did it take for you to make this film?
October 2022 til February 2025 – 2 years and 4 months.

3. How would you describe your film in two words!?
Worth watching.

4. What was the biggest obstacle you faced in completing this film?
The biggest obstacle was surely creating this film on a very low budget, while everyone of us had other projects simultaneously. But the whole crew was amazing and we’ve made it work out.

5. What were your initial reactions when watching the audience talking about your film in the feedback video?
I honestly had goosebumps from listening to the audience talking about Seconds in Eternity. I’ve been thrilled to get such a positive feedback.

6. When did you realize that you wanted to make films?
I’ve been around 8 years old, playing with LEGO bricks. But instead of building fire stations and police stations, I’ve been building TV studios and movie sets.

7. What film have you seen the most in your life?
That’s a very good question, as there are many that I like to rewatch. Surely many Christopher Noland and Wes Anderson movies, such as The Grand Budapest Hotel, Interstellar, Tenet or Memento.

8. What other elements of the festival experience can we and other festivals implement to satisfy you and help you further your filmmaking career?
I believe that Wildsound is already performing extremely well as a film festival. I truly enjoyed the process and still enjoying it.

9. You submitted to the festival via FilmFreeway. How has your experiences been working on the festival platform site?
I know Filmfreeway since a few years already and to me, it’s working well. What I always do before submitting is, I’m checking the festival thoroughly. I don’t like film festivals that just exist to make money from filmmakers. We all need to live, I understand that, but there can be a big difference between a winner of a film festival and a winner of a film festival. Sometimes everybody’s winning, no matter how terrible the movie is and that’s what I really don’t like.-

10. What is your favorite meal?
Seriously too much to mention…
However, if I need to choose, I’ll choose a grass fed beef steak.

11. What is next for you? A new film?
I’m currently in development of the next film, this time a 90 minutes feature film, again with Marina Welsch as a producer and writer, maybe this time not in the lead cast. But we’ll see – it’s still in its early stage.

Jake & Pete’s Christmas Special, 20min., UK
Directed by Luke Marley
When the spirit of Christmas seems to have left a small town in Gloucestershire, Jake and Pete must find a way to restore it in time for Christmas.

https://www.instagram.com/jakeandpeteshortfilm/

Get to know the filmmaker:

1. What motivated you to make this film?

So, I did my first short using this art style Henry VIII and it was brutal and I swore to never do stop motion again, then eventually I thought about doing something that really felt character driven, and it had been a few years since Taylor and I have worked together on a project. So I asked if he wanted to work on something and we came up with a Christmas film.

2. From the idea to the finished product, how long did it take for you to make this film?

I had expected for it to take about 6 months, but it took about a year to complete the whole film.

3. How would you describe your film in two words!?

Honestly, I think very honest.

4. What was the biggest obstacle you faced in completing this film?

I would probably say, when animating not bumping the table or anything.

5. What were your initial reactions when watching the audience talking about your film in the feedback video?

So, we were thrilled. I think before hand we hadn’t really seen any thoughts on the film or anything. So we’re not sure if people liked the plot or the joke landed. So I think it was great to know that it all worked out in the end.

6. When did you realize that you wanted to make films?

I think it was very gradual, when I was in college I was studying computing in my first year then I transferred to media for my 2nd/3rd. So on my media course is how I got into a lot of those aspects but it’s also how I got into voice acting.

7. What film have you seen the most in your life?

I would say Plains, Trains and Automobiles.

8. What other elements of the festival experience can we and other festivals implement to satisfy you and help you further your filmmaking career?

At the moment judging by the experiences I’ve had so far, I can’t think of anything. The festivals all seem to have been great so far. I really do wish I had something to say though.

9. You submitted to the festival via FilmFreeway. How has your experiences been working on the festival platform site?

It’s been great! Before I started using it I thought that I would have to reach out using all different ways. But having one site makes everything easy and streamlined.

10. What is your favorite meal?

Honestly, probably not the best to have. So I live in the UK. My favourite meal is when I go over to the U.S and have the famous bowl at KFC. We don’t have that over here.

11. What is next for you? A new film?

Well, there’s stuff in the works. So we will have to see.