Short Film Festival of Los Angeles

Here are the awards for the 2009 edition of the Short Film Festival of Los Angeles.

Special Prize to the Best Short Film
BECOMING ROMAN by NATHAN J MORSE - United States
Becoming Roman is a classic tale of the struggle of power to escape seemingly preordained roles and the fragile reality of an existential being. Life, Death, Comedy, Tragedy, War and Peace, told in one act.

Awarded Category: Direction
SERIAL KILLER by BAUDOUIN DU BOIS - Belgium / New-Zealand
The Gerards arrives in New-Zealand. Pierre, Marie and David, amazed by the beautiful landscape, drive to Uncle Thomas's house. But when the car breaks down in the middle of nowhere, panic replaces enthusiasm.

Awarded Category: Screenplay
FRIZON by JAN-EJE FERLING - Sweden
A married, respected vicar is exposed as a transvestite and forced to stop his behavior and burn his female accessories. He becomes depressed, but his wife supports him. He is forgiven by the church, but life becomes solemn and less playful for the vicar.

Awarded Category: Integral Realization
FINE CORSA by ALESSANDRO CELLI - Italy
Four adolescent boys take the train in to the city for an evening out. In an escalation of intolerance and violence, the ride quickly degenerates.

Actress Performance: Silvia Defrance
CANDY DARLING by SILVIA DEFRANCE - Belgium
"Candy Darling" is almost like a fun park ride, but for adults --- a sort of Freudian "Alice in Wonderland," but the landscape is a bit more ominous. A phantasmagoria of images that are at once unsettling, stimulating and darkly comical.

Actor Performance: Yuri Stepanov
THE CLEANER by NOEL KEARNS - U.K.
The Cleaner is a gripping drama about a deeply religious man who finds himself in an unlikely situation, where he is faced with an impossible decision to help save a brutal killer's life or kill him.

Art Direction: Edwin A. Francis
EMILIA GALOTTI by ALESSANDRO BERDINI - Italy
Sixteen-year-old Emilia is in a coma due to an overdose. Her distressed father recalls her tragic story; a story of catwalks and magazine covers, of seduction, desire, anger and revenge.

Photography: Michael Alba
LIMINAL by STEPHEN KEEP MILLS - United States
A woman, her body, and the destructive voice that controls her. A psychological fight to the finish as INA wages war to get her power back from JOY, her shadow. This intense and raw confrontation is shot in 35mm, in B&W, with both players naked, allowing the audience to feel the characters' primitive vulnerability.

Editing: Octavi Espuga Gine
PANTOMIME by HECTOR SUNOL BERT - Spain
TIKO, a mime, wants to discover which is his place in this complicate puzzle that is life. The mime through his performances wants to reveal the parody in which we are living.

Special Mentions 

ILLEGAL by ROBERT CAMBRINUS - U.K.
Economic migrant Andrej strikes up a friendship with the much younger Chechen refugee Moya. For a fleeting moment Moya may dream of a normal life; Andrej already knows it's an illusion.

L'AMORE NON ESISTE by MASSIMILIANO CAMAITI - Italy
Solo is convinced to possess a terrible power: wherever he goes, love fades.

NIGHTCLUB STORY by JEFFREY P. NESKER - Canada
While waiting outside in the line for a hot new Nightclub, James, 26, meets Annie, 21. He's about finished with the scene, and she's just getting started. As they move up the line, they share a hyper-accelerated, ridiculously post-modern relationship, from stolen glances to looks of disgust.