Winter Film Festival Film Festival

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About festival

Winter Film Festival

New York City's Winter Film Festival (WFF) is a volunteer-run and operated celebration of the diversity of local and international film-making. We showcase creative fresh voices from emerging filmmakers worldwide in all genres and lengths – feature length and shorts, narrative fiction, documentary, animation, horror, web series and music videos.\n\nOur mission is to promote diversity, bridge the opportunity divide and provide a platform for under-represented artists and a variety of genres, viewpoints and approaches. We believe that only by seeing others’ stories can we understand each other and only via an open door can the underrepresented artist enter the room.\n\nWe pride ourselves on our diverse collection of Festival selections, allowing our audience to enjoy films they normally wouldn’t think to seek out. For the 2025 Festival, 87 films from 20 countries were screened, half of the films were created by women, half were created by or about people of color.\n\nWorks of all genres, forms, and lengths are considered. All selected films are screened at LOOK Cinemas in New York City on Screen 4 (70 seats) or Screen 5 (130 seats). For additional information about Winter Film Festival, our selection process and what we look for, visit https://winterfilmfest.org/about-us/faq/\n\nThe Festival includes film screenings with director Q&A, educational panels, professional development workshops and industry networking after-parties, and concludes with a glittering awards ceremony .\n\nOutstanding work will be awarded for each category, along with Best Director, Best Student Film and Best NYC Film.\n\nWinter Film Festival is thrilled to be included in Film Festival Alliance’s Film Festival Directory, a comprehensive list of more than one hundred reputable film festivals committed to upholding the newly established best practices for professional film festivals. Explore the directory to read through our profile and learn more about our fellow member festivals, their programming philosophies, and more here: https://bit.ly/FFADirectory\n\nWFF is a minority- and women-owned registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization. We work with all local NYC film schools, colleges, arts high schools and many cultural societies.

Festival Amenities

Filmmaker EventsTravel StipendsFilmmaker LoungeAfter PartiesAll Access BadgesComplimentary TicketsIndustry PanelsQ&A SessionsSwag BagsFestival CatalogSocial Media Spotlight

Festival Rules

All selected films must be provided via DCP:

Our cinema is DCP-only -- all films selected films must be available on DCP and sent to Simple DCP. We have some very limited grants available to help filmmakers get DCPs created.

Film completion Date:

All films must have been completed not earlier than January 1, 2023.

English Language or English subtitles:

All films submitted to Winter Film Festival must be in English or have English Subtitles.

Screening Fees:

Winter Film Festival is a non-profit organization and we are not able to pay Screening Fees

Premiere status not required:

New York City is a big place. Winter Film Festival does not have premiere requirements, but appreciates if you notify us if you are either a World Premiere, International Premiere (your first premiere outside your country of origin), North American Premiere or New York Premiere.

Refunds:

Submission fees are not refundable

Distribution & Online:

With the exception of Web Series and Music Videos, films that are publicly available online, or are available to the public through a distribution service, are ineligible for submission.

Acceptance:

Submitting filmmakers/individuals will be notified by e-mail on or before January 5 2025. Winter Film Festival does not send physical mail — please make sure the email address in your entry form is accurate. Changes of email address can be sent to submissions@winterfilmawards.com. Winter Film Festival is not liable for emails delayed by spam filters, server rejections, outdated email addresses or any other technical or human error.\n\nAfter being invited to the festival, filmmakers will have 3 weeks to accept or reject their screening. Once filmmakers accept, they may not remove their film from the official lineup. \n\nFilms with incomplete materials by the deadline will forfeit their ability to screen in the festival. Winter Film Festival, its members, directors, employees, and volunteers are not responsible for lost, unplayable, misplaced, and undelivered film and media.

Copyrights:

The submitting filmmaker must own the copyright to the work. In the case of any legal dispute involving the film, Winter Film Festival will immediately remove the work from our schedule.

Winter Film Festival rights:

By submitting to Winter Film Festival, filmmakers agree to all rules, terms, and conditions.\n\nBy submitting your film, Winter Film Festival is granted the right to utilize an excerpt from any film submitted and accepted for exhibition at the Festival for promotional purposes. The individual or corporation submitting the film hereby warrants that it is authorized to commit the film for screening, and understands and accepts these requirements and regulations.\n\nThe Festival reserves the right to remove a film from the festival program for any reason or for no reason and shall not be liable for any refund or claims of any kind arising out of such removal.\n\nYou agree to indemnify and hold harmless Winter Film Festival from and against any and all claims, liabilities, losses, damages, and expenses (including but not limited to attorney's fees, and costs of the court) which may be incurred by reason of any claim involving copyright, trademark, credits, publicity, screening, and loss of or damage to the screening videos entered.

Winter Film Festival

Deadlines

About festival