Highland Park Independent Film Festival

Highland Park Independent Film Festival were friendly, gracious and lovely hosts. Our team and I had the best weekend and we left feeling inspired and on a real high. We really appreciated the filmmaker meet and greet and got to connect with other wonderful filmmakers. Thanks for having us HPIFF!!

Amazing festival! The world premiere of my student animated film IN THE SHADOWS took place at HPIFF, and I couldn't be happier. Highland Park is a cool historic location with a great area to explore. The day before the festival they held a meet and greet for filmmakers, and everyone there was friendly and great to network with. As shy as I am, the vibe was welcoming and plenty of people came over to talk. I met so many people I'm keeping in touch with and would be thrilled to work with in the future.

After introductions at the meet and greet, it was easy to talk to everyone again at the festival. The lineup of films was some of the best I've seen—I am ecstatic to have premiered alongside them. I thought I'd only want to stick around for my own film block, but we ended up trying to see as many as possible, and I'm glad we did.

The communication has been great, and the organizers are all incredible. They do a wonderful job of celebrating everyone, from their own hardworking staff to the graphic designer behind the awesome posters and to, of course, the filmmakers. After each block, they called up any filmmakers in the audience for a short Q&A. This was a fantastic feature that made the event feel personal, and opened up the door to further networking.

For any other animators out there, I will say that the majority of films were live action. I did see at least one animation other than mine. I still highly recommend submitting here due to the insanely high quality of the event, especially in comparison to the low entry fee, but it's something to keep in mind.

Thanks again HPIFF for including me in your wonderful festival. Hope we meet again soon!

This festival was really well programmed, with great parties and hospitality. My screening was well-attended, and I met a lot of interesting filmmakers. Such a pleasure to screen here.

HPIFF is the real deal; a wonderful and well-planned festival with great events and programming. We were honored that Stunner was included and won Best Cinematography. Thank you and see you next year!

The Highland Park Independent Film Festival what a delight to be a part of.