The 45th Bi-Annual New Jersey Film Festival will be taking place between September 4-October 4, 2026. The Festival will be a hybrid as we will be presenting it online as well as doing select in-person screenings at Rutgers University. Almost all the films will be available virtually via Video on Demand for 24 hours on their show date. VOD start times are at 12 Midnight Eastern USA. Each General Admission Ticket or Festival Pass purchased is good for both the virtual and the in-person shows when both are offered. This program is only available Online for 24 hours on this show date!
Godzilla’s Day Off - Myra Sito Velasquez (New York, New York)
Even monsters need to chillax! 2025; 3 min. Director: Myra Sito Velasquez; Animators:Jaime Sunwoo, Shayna Strype
Sonia and Lisa on Mushrooms – Vincent Turturro (New York, New York)
Besties Sonia and Lisa get together on Sonia's weekly day off as a single mom. In a valiant attempt to help her friend "be more present", Lisa extols the prevailing virtues of microdosing. When micro inadvertently goes macro, Sonia and Lisa must rely on the bond of their lifelong friendship to brave a trip more intense than they bargained for. 2025; 43 min. Director: Vincent Turturro; Cast: Taylor Lhamon, Lauren Pike, Tammi Cubilette
35 Days – Heidi Kumao (Ann Arbor, Michigan)
35 Days is an experimental, stop motion animation about what happens when a coalition of strangers answers the call to locate a missing cat during the pandemic lockdown of 2020. Created frame-by-frame using fabric cutouts and thread. 2025; 7 min. Director: Heidi Kumao; Animator: Heidi Kumao
Dustsceawung – Mateus Luna (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil)
A frustrated and heartbroken writer discovers that his robot vacuum shredded his rejected book into his own poetry, dedicated to the house’s Alexa. Fascinated, the man feeds the new author with the classics, but claims the work as his own, sparking a surreal clash between authorship, love, and cleaning. In Portuguese, subtitled. 2025; 21 min. Director: Mateus Lana; Cast: Enrique Diaz, Ana Frango Elétrico, Clarissa Pinheiro
