BIFF Shorts: Homefronts

Stories about home, and the politics and poetics of place. Shorts from Canada, Indonesia, Iran, Venezuela and United States.  103 minutes.

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"The Steak"

Kiarash Dadgar Mohebi (Dir), 9 minutes, Iran, New York Premiere

Director Kiarash Dadgar Mohebi in attendance.

Preparations for a birthday ceremony are brutally interrupted.

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"Unthinkable Conversations"

Emma Richardson (Dir), 10 minutes, UK, Western New York Premiere

Director Emma Richardson in attendance.

Almost a year into a lawless war Amy and Jack have given up hope of anyone coming to help them. Hiding in their once beautiful home with their three young children, they are now starving . The violence rages around them and in the brutal world outside there is no value in anything except the lives of children. Bought and sold as cattle Amy and Jack begin to face up to the reality that the only way to save two of their children is to sell one.

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"Al Lado Del Camino" / "On The Roadside"

Ricardo Chetuan (Dir), 15 minutes, Brazil /Venezuela, North American Premiere

In Spanish w/ English subtitles.

Clara seeks to change her unhappy life by running away with a young man who falls in love with her, but she is a married woman with children and in the end she realises that her lover offers her the same life she wants to escape from.

Clara busca cambiar su vida infeliz escapándose con un joven que la enamora, pero es una mujer casada y con hijos y al final entiende que su enamorado le ofrece la misma vida de la que ella quiere escapar.

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"El Funeral" / "The Funeral"

Sofía Blanco (Dir), 20 minutes, Venezuela/USA, New York Premiere

Director Sofía Blanco in attendance.

In Spanish w/ English subtitles.

Two Venezuelan-American siblings residing in New York are unable to physically attend their grandfather's funeral due to the collapse of their home country, so they decide to attend online.

A dos hermanos venezolano-americanos residentes en Nueva York les resulta imposible acudir al funeral de su abuelo debido al colapso de su país originario, por lo que deciden asistir de forma online.

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"Coming Home"

Jesse McCracken, (Dir), 16 minutes, Canada, Western New York Premiere

Director Jesse McCracken in attendance.

In this short reflexive nonfiction meditation on small town Canada, filmmaker Jesse McCracken returns to his rural hometown of Markdale, Ontario to document his old friend's attempt at opening a restaurant on a farm in a struggling, conservative leaning community.

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"Na Żywo" / "Live"

Mara Tamkovich (Dir), 13 minutes, Poland, New York Premiere

In Polish w/ English subtitles.

A peaceful demonstration in Minsk in memory of Raman Bandarenka, a young man who was beaten to death, is brutally put down by the police. The world learns about it through the live coverage provided by two female journalists from an independent Belarusian TV station, who are the only ones reporting live on the unfolding events.

For safety reasons, they report from the windows of a nearby apartment. When the police start shooting at the protesters and the women are spotted by a police drone, they have little time to decide whether to continue their mission despite the risk.

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"Riwayat Ceti"/"What Ceti Does"

Azalia Muchransyah (Dir), 21 minutes, Indonesia, North American Premiere

In Indonesian w/ English subtitles.

Ceti is a woman from Bogor who is experiencing financial difficulties during the COVID-19 pandemic. Her clothing kiosk in Bogor Market was forced to close. Her husband, who works as an online loan debt collector, cannot collect debts from people who had lost their jobs, and her son asks for a smartphone to go to online school. Inadvertently, she finds a solution to her problems when she collects a debt from the family of someone who recently died.