Voiceless - Cindy Di Xin (Pasadena, California) - An international high school girl is trapped in a trauma nightmare that she has never experienced before. In Chinese and English, subtitled. 2022; 15 min.
Bean and the Babysitter – Jason Michael Roberts (Santa Monica, California) - Pat, a young woman with big city ambitions takes an overnight babysitting job at a rural midwestern farmhouse. But when the parents don’t return, she finds herself solely responsible for the safety and survival of an unpredictable ten-year-old Bean. Miles from civilization, with no way to call for help and resources running scarce, she’ll need both the ingenuity of an entrepreneur and the compassion of a mother to unravel the mystery and save the boy. 2022; 20 min.
It is Quiet Here - Olena Podolianko and Novruz Hikmet (Kyiv, Ukraine) - A young couple is torn from the world for one long night in a hotel room in a town near the border. That night they agreed not to talk about the war. Completely lost in each other' s small world, they don't realize when the morning comes and force them to go back to reality. 2022; 13 min.
Duplicitous Minds - Robert Rippberger (Toronto, Canada) - This film is a crime thriller/drama about the mysterious world of magic, a journey of hypnotism, heists, illusions and fun with many thrilling twists and turns. The entire film is structured like a long form magic trick with hidden clues, symbols and meanings. The theme of the movie is the choice between love (The Queen of Hearts) and power (The Ace). The dichotomy of one man’s lust for power (Ace of Spades) and one man’s loyalty to love (Queen of Hearts) propels our lead into a labyrinth of traversing a heart torn in two. It's a battle between traditional magic vs digital magic as a Magician and the Artist (a crooked businessman) team up for a heist that turns into a magic trick and an illusion onto itself. 2022; 18 min.
First Girl – Ellie Konn (Miami, Florida) - First times are terrifying. 2022; 8 min.
The Button Game – Drake Woodall (Brooklyn, New York) - A brutal display of life in isolation. 2022; 7 min.
The Makin Waves Song of the Week is "ICE SS" by the Central Jersey punk act Sally Draper.
