GeekFest Year 13 Official Selections

Penelope (Directed by Fiona Rene, 13 mins, CA) Penelope is a darkly comedic short about an undead misfit with “female Beetlejuice” energy who wakes up on her 666th day with one job: build an army of the undead to make her father proud. But after sleeping through most of her mission, she scrambles to recruit anyone she can—an angry neighbor, a pair of stoners, and a morose boy next door she just might have a crush on. When her father arrives, unimpressed with her ragtag recruits, Penelope is forced to face the crushing weight of his expectations. Equal parts creepy and coming of age, Penelope explores the absurd lengths we go to for approval—and the universal struggle of never feeling good enough.

2 Sided Die (Directed by Tim Russ, 14 mins, CA) A romantic comedy web-series about a group of friends that play a fictionalized Dungeons & Dragons type game directed by Tim Russ (Tuvok from Star Trek: Voyager) with Special Guest Stars Andrew Robinson (Garak from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) and Kitty Swink (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine).

You’re Not Safe (Directed by Sam Balcomb, 8 mins, CA) Madalyn wakes up to find a wedding ring on her finger and a stranger’s belongings in her home. Something is very wrong, and as her world spirals around her on the Fourth of July, Madalyn discovers that no one is safe.

The Last Draft (Directed by Nicholas Guilak, 12 mins, CA) Trapped in his isolated Hollywood Hills penthouse, acclaimed novelist James Harper wrestles with a crushing deadline and a crippling case of writer’s block. But as the pages remain blank, eerie knocks echo through the walls, whispers haunt the silence, and his own reflection begins to disobey him.

Deathahedron (Directed by Owen Dennis, 8 mins, CA) In this web series pilot, Billy B. Dumpquat finds himself transported to a giant space prison called the Deathahedron for a crime he committed in 1997: commenting on someone else’s food when he wasn’t even the one eating it.

Blindsided (Directed by P Patrick Hogan, 8 mins, CA) A blind schoolteacher struggles to survive through a nightmarish night when an alien spaceship crashes and unleashes a monstrous predator. This unique horror short film features an all low-vision cast and places the audience in the POV of a blind protagonist who is only able to hear what happens around her.

White Meat Appetizer (Directed by David Dylan Thomas, 12 mins, PA) True story, beneath Washington Square, an urban park in Philadelphia, lie buried the bodies of hundreds of enslaved people. What if, one night, they all came back as zombies, but they only ate white people?

Living in the World (Directed by Hessam Javaheri, 5 mins, NV) Living In The World is about a powerful robot politician that dies as he experiences humanity.

You Shall Not Pass (Directed by Cary Tusan, 7 mins, OR) When a nerdy college student invokes a Gandalf figurine to appear in real life to help her with a problem, Gandalf makes her life worse with each “solution.”

Come Out Wherever You Are (Directed by Caitlin Presberg, 30 mins, IL) Vernon Parrish, a retired mayor of a large suburb just outside of Chicago, had moved to the small town of Livingston, Montana, for peace and solitude and to get out of the public eye. After six years, Verne’s past returns to haunt him, driving him into a self-imposed exile at his cabin in the woods, hoping to ride out the media storm. While he is away, a storm of a different form rolls in, drastically changing the world as he knew it, culminating in a tale of a man who is both a victim and a beneficiary of circumstance.