Sherman Oaks Film Festival

2026 Official Selection: Short Film – Horror

You have to do what it says… or else.

Screening date & tickets — to be announced

• Director(s): Mike Robinson
• Writer(s): Mike Robinson
• Producer(s): Kat Hartman Rocco, Sean Cruser, Mike Robinson
• Key Cast: Kunjue Li, Matthew Burnside, Kevin Toomey, Jenny Castro, Ryan Featherston
• Editor(s): Kevin Toomey
• Cinematographer(s): Sean Cruser
• Production Designer(s): Alexander Cantrell
• Sound Designer(s): Jérémy Ben Ammar
• Composer(s): David Bauer & Nick Sudar

Language: English

Runtime: 13m

Country: United States

Synopsis: A woman is terrorized by a mysterious orange circle who intimidates her into attacking people with a pair of garden shears.

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2026 Official Selection: Short Film – Horror

Make America taste great again!

Screening date & tickets — to be announced

• Director(s): David Dylan Thomas
• Writer(s): David Dylan Thomas
• Producer(s): Stephanie Malson, Maurice Gaston
• Key Cast: Davon Cochran, Walt DeShields
• Editor(s): Raquel Davis
• Cinematographer(s): Jalen Ramseur-Williams
• Production Designer(s): Jai Monee
• Sound Designer(s): Timothy Day
• Composer(s): Gangstagrass

Language: English

Runtime: 11m

Country: United States

Synopsis: 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?

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2026 Official Selection: Featurette – SciFi

Screening date & tickets — to be announced

• Director(s): Peter Thomas Ruocco
• Writer(s): Peter Thomas Ruocco
• Producer(s): Tuba Asena Ugurlu
• Key Cast: Zac Jaffee, Erica Mae McNeal
• Editor(s): Peter Thomas Ruocco
• Cinematographer(s): Cliff Traiman
• Production Designer(s): Jacquelyn Scott
• Sound Designer(s): David Sandwisch
• Composer(s): Chris Houston

Language: English

Runtime: 32m

Country: United States

World Premiere

Synopsis: In a future where a godlike super-intelligence optimizes every citizen’s path to happiness and purpose, Henry P. Jones is an anomaly. A stubborn, struggling writer, Henry has spent his life rejecting the System’s guidance in pursuit of an authentic life. When his well-being score drops below zero, he is summoned to the Department of Life Navigation for a mandatory consultation. What begins as a routine evaluation soon becomes a ruthless examination of Henry’s life, dreams,

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2026 Official Selection: Short Film – Drama

Screening date & tickets — to be announced

• Director(s): Sagi Kahane-Rapport
• Writer(s): Sagi Kahane-Rapport
• Producer(s): James Edward Stewart, Leandro Amorim-Downie
• Key Cast: Susanne Wuest, Patrick Guldenberg, Elmar Gutmann
• Editor(s): Sagi Kahane-Rapport
• Cinematographer(s): Adam Madrzyk
• Production Designer(s): Hope Little
• Sound Designer(s): Bret Killoran
• Composer(s): Isaac Mailach

Language: English

Runtime: 15m

Country: Canada

Los Angeles Premiere

Synopsis: When camera pioneer Ernst Leitz’s defiance of the Nazi regime is discovered by the Gestapo, his daughter Elsie must navigate a high-stakes battle of the wits with a Gestapo detective to save her father’s life.

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2026 Official Selection: Short Film – Drama

A renowned event host tries to reconnect with his inspirational grandfather, a revered singer of the 1970s now living with Alzheimer’s dementia, upon discovering he can still sing.

Screening date & tickets — to be announced

• Director(s): Derry Shillitto
• Writer(s): Kieran Hardcastle
• Producer(s): Chloe Elizabeth Martin
• Key Cast: Nicholas Lumley, Kieran Hardcastle
• Editor(s): Luke Radford
• Cinematographer(s): Will J Carman
• Sound Designer(s): Alex Stroud

Language: English

Runtime: 17m

Country: United Kingdom

Los Angeles Premiere

Synopsis: Peter (NICHOLAS LUMLEY – ‘Paddington 2’, ‘Lady Macbeth’) a popular singer/stand-up entertainer of the seventies and eighties, resides in a care home in Nottingham as a result of Alzheimer’s dementia.
Kezz (KIERAN HARDCASTLE – ‘This Is England’, ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’) his naturally-gifted event host of a grandson, assumed he was all but lost to the condition, until… during a routine visit, he’s suddenly shocked and astonished to learn that due to the remarkable effects of

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2026 Official Selection: Screenplay – Screenplay – Feature Film

Ceremony date & tickets — to be announced

A comedy about grief. Yes.

• Writer(s): Mary Rose Almasi

Language: English

Country: USA

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Meg lives a carefully ordered life, built on routine and restraint following the loss of her 18-year-old daughter, Gabby. Practical and disciplined, she approaches grief with structure.

Gabby, meanwhile, is navigating a chaotic afterlife that feels like an unfinished teenage bedroom. Convinced her mother’s pain is her responsibility, she tries to help through bumbling interventions—until she realizes some things can’t be fixed, and she must learn when to let go.

2026 Official Selection: Music Video

It’s common courtesy to wait…

Screening date & tickets — to be announced

• Director(s): Tague MB Zachary, Nathan M Reiland-Smith
• Writer(s): Tague MB Zachary
• Producer(s): Nathan M Reiland-Smith, Tague MB Zachary
• Key Cast: Tague MB Zachary, Cristopher B Zachary, Dr. Chocolate
• Editor(s): Nathan M Reiland-Smith, Tague MB Zachary
• Cinematographer(s): Nathan M Reiland-Smith
• Production Designer(s): Ashley Villa
• Composer(s): Tague MB Zachary

Language: English

Runtime: 6m

Country: United States

Synopsis: A young man faces adversity when he is asked to wait until everyone has food on their plate. This musical comedy explores familial tensions and godlike restraint.

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2026 Official Selection: Featurette – Documentary

Turn Off the Machines follows Ethan Hughes, a radical homesteader in mid-coast Maine who lives entirely without electricity, global supply chains, or modern technological comforts.

Screening date & tickets — to be announced

• Director(s): Joseph El-Khoury, Muhammad Yusuf Khattak
• Producer(s): Joseph El-Khoury, Muhammad Yusuf Khattak, Jack Ruefli
• Key Cast: Ethan Hughes

Language: English

Runtime: 42m

Country: United States

Synopsis: Turn Off the Machines follows Ethan Hughes, a radical homesteader in mid-coast Maine who lives entirely without electricity, global supply chains, or modern technological comforts. Raised in Gloucester to working class parents, an early tragedy shattered a happy childhood and set him on a path of radical resistance. Living deliberately below the poverty line, Ethan’s life is not a retreat but a protest against capitalism, war, and ecological collapse. The film explores his convictions, his family’s daily rhythms, and the tensions that arise when belief meets the demands of life.

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2026 Official Selection: Featurette – Drama

Some decisions don’t arrive as a single moment – they arrive as a flood of everything you’ve ever been.

Screening date & tickets — to be announced

• Director(s): Grace Sims
• Writer(s): Grace Sims
• Producer(s): Grace Sims, Don Ohmer, Jonathan Bowles
• Key Cast: Sydney Cole Alexander, Bates Wilder, Jerah Milligan, Taylor Rose, Dee Freeman, Jake Ryan, Savannah Rose Wells
• Editor(s): Natalie Hill
• Cinematographer(s): Riede Dervay
• Production Designer(s): Brittany Ingram
• Sound Designer(s): Alex Bologna
• Composer(s): Lilliana Villines

Runtime: 20m

Country: United States

Synopsis: In a kaleidoscope of memories Maxine (Sydney Cole Alexander; Severance, Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning) must navigate the surreal and transformative decision of terminating a pregnancy; questioning the very fabric of her identity and future.

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2026 Official Selection: Screenplay – Screenplay – Feature Film

Ceremony date & tickets — to be announced

It takes a village — or at least one very questionable hockey team.

• Writer(s): Lesley Hoyt-Croft

Language: English

Country: Not Specified

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A hockey-playing single mom is threatened with having her daughter taken away by her sister and her sleazy filmmaker boyfriend, She must enlist the aid of her lesbian teammates, a church choir and some “Angry Coochies” to try and stop them.