You can follow a French drag queen’s first foray into performing, sit in on the lives of an Eritrean family living in Australia, and watch a woman confront the monster in her closet from her childhood, online or in person at this year’s Loft Short Film Fest.
The Loft Cinema is showing shorts tapped from festivals like Sundance, Tribeca and SXSW this year in lieu of its popular Loft Film Festival, which is on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Starting Wednesday, Nov. 18, and running through Nov. 22, guests are invited to attend five nights of programming as part of The Loft’s outdoor, open-air cinema. Its three indoor auditoriums have been closed to public screenings since March.
Screening sessions are divided into different genres. Live action shorts will take place Nov. 18 and 20 starting at 6 p.m.; documentaries on Nov. 19 and 21 (6 p.m.); animated shorts on Nov. 20 (9 p.m.); and edgier, late-night films on Nov. 21 (9 p.m.)
Each session will be available to stream online the next day for those who still aren’t comfortable leaving the house for a night out.
The festival will screen more than 40 shorts in all, chosen by the independent theater’s programming team in collaboration with filmmaker Ernie Quiroz, according to press materials.
Among the films on the schedule is “All Cats are Grey in the Dark,” a Swiss documentary about a man who goes to great lengths to see his cat Marmelade achieve pregnancy.
“Wally Wenda” tracks a woman on a solo trip across the Atlantic Ocean as she comes dangerously close to starving to death.
And “Eli,” an animated short, sees a young musician who believes he might have an extraterrestrial implant in his ear.
In-person screenings are $15 general admission per session and $12 for Loft members. Virtual cinema badges for all online screenings can be purchased for $50 ($40 for Loft members). Individual tickets for each individual online session are $12 ($10 for Loft members).
For a full schedule and more information, visit loftcinema.org.
