This post marks the start of our annual Short Awards. For the rest of this week (15th-18th Feb) we will be celebrating the best short films to feature on Short of the Week in 2021. Join us, and prepare to have your thoughts provoked and your emotions stirred by these outstanding works, as we honor the craft of short film and highlight the emerging creative talents who are shaping filmmaking now.
Today we kick-off our awards coverage by launching the Audience Choice vote (open for 48hrs until 10am EST on Thursday 17th Feb), where you can pick your favorite from the 12 Most Viewed films featured in our regular Best of the Month articles. In the past, we left this purely down to analytics to select our champion, but in more recent years we've veered away from this impersonal touch, to get you, our audience, more involved.
Tomorrow (Wednesday 16th Feb) will see the reveal of our Short Award Category honorees – 14 films across seven categories, chosen by the S/W Editorial Team. We'll follow up on Thursday (17th Feb) with a playlist of previous winners before announcing [insert fanfare here] our Jury Selection for Short of the Year and the Audience Choice winner on Friday (18th Feb).
Voting for the Audience Award is open below. Under that is an introduction to our 2022 jury members, Opal Hope Bennett, Graham Parkes, and Scott Glassgold. We thank them for their efforts, as well as all the filmmakers whose passion and artistry make our work so pleasurable. Finally, we want to thank you, our Short of the Week fans. Enjoy!
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The Audience Choice Vote
Watch the Films
You can watch the full version of Joe Buffalo here
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Meet the Jury
Introducing our Short Awards Jury, who will have the pleasure of picking our Short of the Year, which will be announced on Friday 18th Feb.
Graham Parkes
A screenwriter, director, and narrative designer from Los Angeles, Parkes' film The Voice In Your Head was the 2021 Short Awards Jury Winner. A 3-time S/W alum, Parkes has worked as a screenwriter for Paramount Pictures, EKO, Crypt TV, and Pulse Films. He currently works as the lead writer and creative director at Goodbye World Games, which released its debut title, Before Your Eyes, in 2021.
Opal Hope Bennett
A Programmer since 2014, Opal joined the festival circuit as a volunteer for the first Sundance London Film Festival and now curates year-round. On the programming teams for Aspen Shortsfest, Athena, Nantucket, and Tribeca Film Festivals, Opal is a Program Consultant for The March on Washington Film Festival. After becoming the first Director of Filmmaker Development at DOC NYC, she joined American Documentary's POV as Shorts Producer in January 2020.
Scott Glassgold
The founder of Ground Control, a leading entertainment platform focusing on management, production and Web3 endeavors. Scott has produced such feature films as Prospect and Hurricane Season. Currently, Ground Control is shepherding numerous high-profile projects including We Used To Live Here at Netflix with Blake Lively and Harrison Query's Delilah at Sony's Screen Gems. Always maintaining an emphasis on emerging filmmakers, Ground Control oversees the UCP Film Lab for Universal Studios Group and the Scream Gems Horror Lab for Sony Pictures.
