Film festival returns for 21st season

For the past 21 years, Boulder City has hosted the Dam Short Film Festival, which year after year has been ranked as one of the top 100 such festivals in the world.

With more than 150 films on tap, organizers are beginning to put the final touches on this year’s event, which will take place Feb. 12-17 at the Elaine K. Smith Building.

“Everything is really coming together this year,” said Hava Brown, director of events and activities. “We are very excited for our 21st year. I can’t even express how amazing the DSFF staff is and how they have all stepped up to make our 21st year an incredible year.

“This is a year-long process. We start on March 1 and don’t stop until the end of the festival. It takes a board of four to six members, a staff of eight, and dozens of volunteers working throughout the year.”

The festival will be made up of 30 carefully selected thematic 60- to 90-minute program blocks in categories including animation, comedy, documentary, drama, horror, international, science fiction, Nevada, love and romance, and underground. Entries are not limited to the United States as countries including France, Netherlands, Ireland, China, Mexico, Japan, Brazil, Switzerland, Poland, and many more will be represented. Each short film will be screened via state-of-the-art digital projection at the Smith building.

“We are thrilled to celebrate 21 years of presenting excellent and diverse programming to short-film fans and the community,” Brown said. “We are honored to provide filmmakers a platform to share their creative work and an opportunity for the filmmaking art to be appreciated in our community — we especially enjoy seeing the Nevada state category growing. We’ll have an entire Nevada State University block and high school student block this year.”

So, what’s kept movie-goers turning out for the past two decades? Brown said it comes down to one key element.

“We have stuck by the mission statement that was created by our founders at the very beginning: ‘To seek out original, unusual, and entertaining short films from around the world and make them available to the general public via the annual Dam Short Film Festival, while honoring and appreciating the filmmakers,” she said. “This, along with the amazing support of Boulder City, has allowed us to maintain a top 1% rating out of over 12,000 film festivals in the world.”

In addition to the screenings and filmmakers Q&A during each category block, the festival will feature a filmmaker meet-n-greet, coffee with filmmakers, and a mixer giving audience members and filmmakers the opportunity to learn more about the process and stories behind the films.

Throughout its 21 years, Dam Short Film Festival has screened more than 2,500 films – giving local, state, national, and international filmmakers a platform to showcase their films, and audiences the access to these unique and original stories, Brown said.

She mentioned the importance of the volunteer staff, many of whom have been doing it for years.

“We love our volunteers,” she said. “We could not put this festival on without them. Their love and passion for this festival helps us maintain that top 1% rating and the love the filmmakers have for our festival. Every year we have filmmakers tell us that their favorite part of the festival is how well they are treated. Our volunteers are a big part of that.”

For more information, pricing and schedule, visit damshortfilm.org.