CATALINA FILM INSTITUTE - Revised October, 2024
All films must have a completion date NO GREATER than 2 years before the first day of this film festival (with the exception of our Documentary and Conservation category). Once already exhibited and/or tracked online, re-edits and/or changes of title do not count as a new completion date for your project. Feature Film Screenplays do not have a completion date restriction unless the project was produced into a film NO GREATER than 2 years before the first day of this festival.
LENGTH:
These running times must be inclusive of all titles and credits:
Short Films: 1-40 minutes (Under 25 minutes preferred for programming needs)
Feature Films: 50-180 minutes
Short Films Length (& Festival Programming Pains Explained):
The Catalina Film Institute believes "short" films should be... SHORT (25 minutes and under are preferred). We believe this is a reasonable industry standard for any film festival's programming needs when programming 120 minute programming blocks (90 minute film program, filmmakers' Q and A, venue load-in/ load-out). Longer short films will be considered, and have been accepted in the past, but we believe they push the envelope of what is considered an industry featurette, they take up a greater portion of the film block; keeping our judges from highlighting 2-5 more great short films (usually 5-20 minutes long) that would need to be rejected to accept longer films. We recognize The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences accepts films 40 Minutes or less, as do we, but CFF also has the additional hurdle of programming 200+ films within all our 2 hour film blocks. Please know your chances of getting in are exponentially greater the shorter your "short" film is in length.
FEATURE FILMS:
World, North American, USA, West Coast, California and Los Angeles Premieres are preferred, but not required. We won't hold your film hostage to force you to premiere with us while losing other opportunities on the festival circuit. Beware of those festivals, especially if they're not in Los Angeles County and trying to restrict your premiere with us for their personal bragging rights. WITH THAT SAID, for eligibility; other LOS ANGELES PREMIERES / SCREENINGS should not be within 30 days before or during our festival within Los Angeles County. You do not qualify for our festival if you are screening/premiering in Los Angeles County within 30 days from our event so your audience doesn't get invite fatigue. Films that have been exhibited theatrically outside of the festival circuit, broadcast on TV, the Internet, released to the public via any home video or other distribution platform including, but not limited to, pre-sales for DVD, Blu-ray or video on demand (outside of the Festival Circuit) are not eligible for the Festival. Films with distribution deals that are only traveling the festival circuit, and are not being publicly exhibited or displayed, are still eligible for competition.
STUDENT FILMMAKERS (Any aged person with proof of attending a film school, institute, academy, or program that their project is a result of):
Please indicate the ages of the film's writer, director, and producer in your submission. Student filmmakers have the right to submit their film into any of the non-student film categories. If so, you will have to pay the full price for that category and agree to compete against professional filmmakers within that respective category.
FILMMAKERS UNDER 18 YEARS OLD:
You must have a parent or legal guardian submit the film on your behalf to qualify.
DEADLINES: Deadlines are firm, so please send us your project within 14 days of submission and payment. Please contact us if this is a problem and/or you need extra time. If submitting to our very Last Deadline for entries, you must send your project within 7 days of payment (without any possible extensions) or it will run the risk of not being reviewed or considered by our screening judges.
SUBMISSION FORMAT:
Please submit your project digitally through this site or some other acceptable secure online screening format with your submission.
This film festival is used to help the Catalina Film Institute’s non-profit mission sustain and thrive to help foster the growth of filmmakers all year long. CFI WILL NOT PAY to ship any print, exhibition copy, or print materials back to you.
SUBTITLES:
All non-English language films must be subtitled or dubbed in English. Please make sure they are embedded into your film, not separate or optional subtitle files on a menu; they sometimes do not carry over to the digital film you've submitted.
ENTRY FEES:
Non-refundable. We DO NOT give refunds on submission fees, so please do not ask. Once your film is submitted we have 3 film-industry screening professionals look over and grade each project.
PLEASE SUBMIT A DIGITAL PRESS KIT ON FilmFreeway.com. DO NOT SEND PRINTED PRESS MATERIALS, BIOS AND OTHER PROMOTIONAL ITEMS.
AFTER SUBMISSION ACCEPTANCE:
In order for your title to be included in the Festival, you must agree to provide the following materials to CFF within 7 days of acceptance:
1. For film, at least one to three production and/or screen shots of your project (not behind the scenes production shots). Format requirements will be sent to you upon acceptance.
2. A trailer of the film uploaded to us (we will send you an upload link) with the required format we need to promote your project to the world, media, and throughout the festival on our projection screens, website and social media channels (advantageous for short films as well).
3. Exhibition format of your project will depend on the venue we program your film into, delivered no later than 14 days after acceptance (various digital formats can be used in all venues, but DCP is only used in select venues we exhibit within).
4. Copies of digital press releases and additional press materials after acceptance ONLY, please do not send printed materials with submissions before you're accepted, it fills up the office with a lot of paper and product we end up having to recycle or throw away.
5. If you are available to attend the festival with crew and/or talent, please let us know in your cover letter. Once accepted into the festival, we will also send you an online form asking you who will be attending and how you are getting to the festival and the island.
CFF prefers HD digital formats for exhibiting High-Definition Films, or DCP ONLY if you're placed in a venue that can support DCP. Because our festival is partly on an island without tech resources readily available like mainland events, a finalized and QC'd Blu-Ray backup copy is also required in case digital media fails for any reason (this has happened in previous years).
MAKE SURE YOUR EXHIBITION FILM (OR BACKUP COPY) DOES NOT HAVE A WATERMARK ON IT WHEN YOU SEND IT LIKE “Property of XYZ Films” - THIS COULD END UP BEING IN FRONT OF OUR AUDIENCE if you can't send us another in time. Your films are safe with us, we have a long history of protecting filmmakers intellectual property.
Participants agree that their film, clips from it and/or all other material related to their project may be used and/or published in the event program, on CFF's website, social media, and/or our media partners as well as for any other promotional purposes which CFF deems appropriate for the festival. CFF can use up to 10% or 3 minutes of your project for promotional use (whichever is less).
CFF holds no responsibility for lost or damaged media files. While the utmost care is taken with regard to your exhibition media, it is solely up to the filmmaker to take full responsibility (i.e. insurance). The cost of delivery and pick-up of all materials is the responsibility of the filmmaker. CFF WILL NOT PAY FOR MEDIA TO BE RETURNED, as that would be very costly for our non-profit organization with over 100 films accepted and exhibited annually.
If selected, all commercial/private property including all trademark/copyrighted materials shown or recorded on the project is the responsibility of the filmmaker. By submitting you agree to indemnify the Catalina Film Institute and all its subsidiaries, AKA’s, employee’s, directors, assigns, staff and volunteers from any wrongdoing involving the exhibition of your project. CFI will NOT take responsibility for any infringement of copy written materials and reserves the right to reject your project if found it doesn't have clearance.
ONLINE FILM ACCEPTANCE:
Participation with our online component of the film festival is only to the advantage of our officially selected filmmakers. ONLINE FILMS have all the same perks as filmmakers exhibiting in LIVE venues. They qualify for all our same awards and even walk our famous red carpet. The only difference is their film venue is online when they tell the press on the red carpet or other film enthusiasts at the festival. We established this component before the Covid-19 pandemic. CFI uses an encrypted password protected and established online film viewing service that will only be available to our film festival enthusiasts around the festival dates (this enables us to have online award-winning voting in addition to live festival awards). Filmmakers will benefit from worldwide industry exposure that the Catalina Film Festival garners for our films year after year. Accepting to have your film a part of this live and online component is safe and keeps your film within the festival circuit, still keeping it qualified for other festivals. We do not require Premiere Status for online selections, as we consider them Spotlight screenings.
All the same rules in this document still apply and are agreed to if you later elect to be a part of the online component of our film festival. Filmmakers in our online competition get all the same access, passes, perks (red carpet interviews with media) and experiences as our filmmakers programmed in physical festival venues, but actually have greater exposure to those audience members that can't physically see your film in one of our venues (attendees, press, distributors or industry members we supply access to).
You are still eligible if you have a festival distribution deal or release after our dates, but no film project with at-large theatrical distribution and/or release dates before or during the festival's programmed dates will be eligible for submission, acceptance and/or exhibition at or during the event. This rule applies to all, but two of our categories, including at-large free public viewing (IE: Amazon, Netflix, Youtube, Vimeo, etc...) or at-large paid release dates (theatrical, DVD/Blu-Ray, VOD, etc..), including, but not limited to, advertised pre-sales for your films DVD, Blu-Ray or VOD (As a non-profit company, we can not help you promote for-profit sales to your film as selectee to our festival). Our ONLY TWO categories that are allowed to be previously released and/or viewed online are our High School Student and Conservation Film competition categories. Projects with distribution deals and release dates AFTER the festival dates are still eligible for submission and/or exhibition. Although we diligently track your film and do our own research, it is your responsibility to inform CFF/CFI if the project's release date(s) have changed and are in conflict with this rule, as it will either be eliminated from our program and/or taken out of competition at our discretion.
AGREEMENT:
You, as the submitter, have read and agree to the festival submission and participation guidelines and certify that you are authorized to submit this work to the Catalina Film Institute (CFI) and its subsidiaries. Any copyrighted materials included in the work have been legally cleared for use, and CFI is not responsible for any copyright infringement resulting from public screenings. By submitting you agree to indemnify the Catalina Film Institute and all its subsidiaries, AKA’s, employee’s, directors, assigns, staff and volunteers from any wrongdoing involving the exhibition of your project. CFI will NOT take responsibility for any infringement of copy written materials and reserves the right to reject your project if found it doesn't have clearance.
You, as submitter, hereby grant and assign to CFI and its successors and licensees the right to copy the entry in its entirety to facilitate technical operations of the festival, in and through any and all media formats now known or hereafter devised. All submissions will be retained by the Catalina Film Institute for pre-selection, film festival archives and — following written permission from the rights holder — event exhibition or a possible private exhibition with the Catalina Film Institute and/or Catalina Film Society.
You, as submitter, acknowledge and agree that all matters not covered by these regulations, and questions arising from them, will be decided by Festival organizers or programmers at their sole discretion.
