AFI FEST 2014 presented by Audi officially announced its dates and call for entries today. The American Film Institute’s annual celebration of artistic excellence, AFI FEST brings Hollywood icons, emerging artists and audiences together to experience global cinema in the movie capital of the world. The film festival is the only one of its stature that is free to the public, and is the only festival in North America with a market partner, the AFM (American Film Market). The 28th edition of AFI FEST will take place November 6 through 13 in Hollywood, California.
Submissions are now open and filmmakers are invited to submit narrative, documentary, experimental, animated and short films at AFI.com/AFIFEST or through Withoutabox.com.
This year AFI FEST will have two deadlines – early and final submission dates for both short films (under 30 minutes) and feature films.
- June 27 – the early submission deadline for both features and shorts;
- August 8 – the final submission deadline for both features and shorts. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences recognizes AFI FEST as a qualifying festival for the Short Films category of the annual Academy Awards®.
AFI FEST mixes nightly red carpet galas of Hollywood films with award-winning and highly anticipated new auteur works from filmmakers around the world. The festival has paid tribute to numerous influential filmmakers and artists over the years, including Pedro Almodóvar, Bernardo Bertolucci, David Lynch and Agnès Varda as Guest Artistic Directors.
The 2013 festival opened with the North American Premiere of SAVING MR. BANKS, closed with INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS and featured the World Premieres of LONE SURVIVOR and OUT OF THE FURNACE. Tributes to David O. Russell and Bruce Dern, and conversations on the craft of directing, with Steve McQueen, and acting, with Annette Bening, rounded out the programming. Guests at the festival included George Clooney, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen, Steve Coogan, Idris Elba, Ralph Fiennes, Tom Hanks, Woody Harrelson, Oscar Isaac, Spize Jonze, Errol Morris, Alexander Payne, Zoe Saldana, Ben Stiller, Emma Thompson, Mark Wahlberg, Forest Whitaker and Kristen Wiig.
AFI FEST 2013 brought filmmakers from all over the world to Los Angeles, including Hany Abu-Assad (OMAR, Palestine), Yuval Adler (BETHLEHEM, Israel), Biyi Bandele (HALF OF A YELLOW SUN, Nigeria), Clio Barnard (THE SELFISH GIANT, UK), Amat Escalante (HELI, Mexico), Asghar Farhadi (THE PAST, Iran/France), Hirokazu Kore-eda (LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON, Japan), Sebastián Lelio (GLORIA, Chile), Călin Peter Netzer (CHILD’s POSE, Romania), Rithy Panh (THE MISSING PICTURE, Cambodia/France) and director Paulo Sorrentino’s whose Italian film THE GREAT BEAUTY, won the Oscar® for Best Foreign Language Film.
