00:00Sunderland Shorts Film Festival is expanding beyond the UK, with a new collaboration that'll
00:05see its films screened in Germany. The partnership with the Snowdance Film Festival in Essen
00:10brings together two established events, offering filmmakers from the northeast the
00:15chance to reach new audiences and strengthen links between the two regions.
00:21So Sunderland Shorts Film Festival started back in 2015, so this is our 11th edition of the film
00:28festival. It originally started through the city partnership with Washington DC, so Sunderland's
00:34twin city. The festival director of DC Shorts at the time came over and kind of replicated their model
00:40and since then we've had a film festival. But it's grown to be its own unique thing, still focusing
00:48on short films. We have a lot of films from across the UK but we really like shining the spotlight
00:54on
00:54local stuff too, and really championing what's going on here in the region for filmmaking.
01:00Our film festival has the privilege of being rated in the top 100 worldwide on Film Freeway, a big site
01:07for filmmakers submitting their films to film festivals. So it's a real privilege for us to be
01:11recognized on that list. One of the other festivals also on that list was Snowdance in Essen in Germany,
01:17which is also one of the other twin cities of Sunderland. So yeah, we reached out to them at the
01:22end of last year and basically offered a bit of an exchange program, I suppose. So where we brought
01:28over some films from here by filmmakers in the North East and showed them on the big screen in
01:34Germany. And it was really well received back in February when we did that screening. And we're very
01:39glad to have some of the films that they showed at Snowdance this year, part of our international
01:43screenings this year at Sunderland. We're qualifying for several years now, so we get some really high
01:48calibre stuff in. We recently got Grace in qualifying status, which is an award within the sort of
01:55documentary world. So being recognized for that kind of work that we are showcasing is really rewarding.
02:03Something that's lost in the age of stream and often we're actually watching a film as part of a
02:09community as a group of like-minded people who want to see, be it a series of great drama films
02:15or
02:15sci-fi films, to know that you're with people who are like-minded is such a great experience. And to
02:23feel that buzz in a comedy screen and having everyone laugh along at the same moments, you know,
02:29this is such a rewarding thing. And then having the opportunity to meet those filmmakers at the end
02:34from some of those films and hear their stories and, you know, that behind the scenes experience.
02:39We'd really love people to come along and get involved and be part of the action at this year's
02:44Sunderland Shorts Film Festival. Attention has now turned back to Wearside where this year's Sunderland
02:49Shorts Film Festival is scheduled to run from the 11th to the 17th of May with a full program ready
02:55to
02:56excite all viewers.
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