Mavka, a water nymph, loves Lukash, a country youth. Their brief happiness ends when Lukash is forced to marry the shrewish Kilina. The Spirit of the Forest turns Lukash into a wolf as punishment for his infidelity. The strength of Mavka's love breaks the spell, but Kilina curses the nymph, transforming her into a weeping willow. This beautiful and tragic story is based on a play written in 1912 by Lesya Ukrainka, a Ukrainian poet, writer and political, civil and female activist, and includes mythological characters taken from Ukrainian folklore.
When a young Dutch tourist gets stranded at the start of his US vacation, he finds help from an unlikely stranger.
An Irish anti-homophobic and transphobic bullying advertisement, created as part of BeLonG To Youth Services annual Stand Up! LGBT Awareness Week.
A cut-out of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev sails over newspaper articles as they take place. Combines live photography and collage animation in one film.
The dramatic short, Little Wings, explores the trauma of child abuse through the eyes of a ten-year-old boy named Thomas. In this emotional tale, Thomas learns about the Legend of the Butterfly from his mother, Emily. The Legend states that if you whisper a wish to a butterfly and then set it free, the butterfly will carry the wish off to the heavens to be granted. Thomas loves butterflies and seeks the escape he needs in the pages of his favorite butterfly book. Butterflies are his only true happiness while growing up on a farm with his abusive father. After Thomas saves a butterfly from a spider's web, a stranger arrives at the farmhouse. As the tale continues, Thomas ultimately finds his freedom and steps into the unknown world of "Joy".
Stranded on the Moon and thought to be alone, a determined robot finds an eager helper to assist him in repairing a rocket to take him back home to Earth.
Danny has a rare skin condition that prevents him from being in the sun and a desire to be a regular teenager.
Two men in adjoining duplexes, good friends, are enchanted by the song of a bird. One buys a small harmonica and learns to play it; he keeps his neighbor awake. The neighbor buys a larger harmonica, and an arms race ensues; the instruments get larger, until it's a piano vs. a pipe organ, and then they start bringing in larger groups of friends until an entire orchestra is playing the 1812 Overture. The houses collapse from all this, atop the dueling orchestras, and on their way up to heaven, the man puts his small harmonica up for sale.
Sippy takes Leander on a hike over the woods to a big tree to show Dre that she's responsible.
A teenage girl navigates sexuality and intimacy via a dating app.
Jose is an obsolete man who owns an obsolete business. His store, a technical reparation center that made him feel alive when he was young, it is going to close very soon. One of his last work days, Jose receives the visit of a strange customer.
A curator at a high-profile art gallery finds herself drawn to a young, polyamorous artist who introduces her to a lifestyle that reflects a part of herself she had once abandoned.
A young British Chinese woman goes for dim sum with her family. Unable to speak the same language as much of her family, she both participates in, and observes, the action.
A resilient 75-year-old woman, haunted by a clock counting down in her dreams since childhood, confronts her mortality during a home invasion, sparking an unexpected conversation with a her neighbor that blurs the line between fate and free will as midnight approaches.
A boy with a special talent discovers that he may never grow up. Those with power are devouring people's dreams and everyone is destined to be a slave. Can he break the rules and free the people or will people still blindly follow the rule?
Daydream Therapy is set to Nina Simone’s haunting rendition of “Pirate Jenny” and concludes with Archie Shepp’s “Things Have Got to Change.” Filmed in Burton Chace Park in Marina del Rey by activist-turned-filmmaker Bernard Nicolas as his first project at UCLA, this short film poetically envisions the fantasy life of a hotel worker whose daydreams provide an escape from workplace indignities. —Allyson Nadia Field
A tender portrait of childhood’s first encounter with love, loss, and the memories that remain.
Alice and Julius the cat are riding an elephant through the jungle. Julius falls and is nearly eaten by crocodiles but manages to escape nevertheless. Meanwhile, two elephant children are having fun at a watering hole and a monkey barber has his barber pole eaten by a hippo, who mistakes it for a candy cane. Julius tries to remedy the latter injustice by starching up a tiger's striped tail and knocking it off, using it as a replacement pole. Alice hunts a lion who proves to be too much for her to handle, but Julius bravely comes to the rescue.
Following the defeat of Majin Buu, Son Goku and friends travel to Mr. Satan's newly-opened hotel for an all-you-can-eat banquet, when they are paid a visit by Vegeta's younger brother Tarble. They are informed by Tarble that the terrible brother duo of Abo and Cado have terrorized his planet and are on their way to Earth.
A first-generation American high school student describes what she and her mom learn about people when cleaning their homes.