Independent Shorts Awards

Independent Shorts Awards is a LA-based international short film festival, with monthly editions that qualify for the Annual Awards. Besides the monthly awards and the annual event, Independent Shorts Awards occasionally holds special screenings and Q&As with cast and crews.

In the last annual event, which gathered over 700 attendees from 15 countries, we were honored to welcome and award, among others, actor and member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Arthur Roberts and Academy Award nominee filmmaker Andrew Chesworth.

Emerging projects booster
During the last 7 years, Independent Shorts Awards has been boosting several projects such as Academy Award nominee "One Small Step" (USA), Oscar-longlisted animated short “Umbrella” (Brazil), Oscar-longlisted documentary short “After Skid Row” (USA), Oscar-longlisted live action short "Cognition" (UK), BAFTA award winner "The Inescapable Arrival of Lazlo Petushki" (UK), “One Last Last Heist” (Canada) acquired by Sony, and Student Academy Awards winner "A Dream Called Khushi, Happiness" (India).

Among the big of the film industry
One of the world-leading LA-based international indie short film festivals, Independent Shorts Awards is proud of having among its previous winners Academy Award winners Joel Harlow, Laura Dern, Nick Vallelonga, Rayka Zehtabchi, Robert Zemeckis, and Ross Kauffman, Academy Award nominees Andrew Chesworth, Bill Nighy, Bobby Pontillas, Chazz Palminteri, Diane Ladd, Eric Roberts, Janet McTeer, Michael Shannon, Paul Giamatti, and Thomas Floutz, BAFTA award winners Andrea Morricone and Sven Werner, BAFTA award nominees Aidan Gillen, Mia McKenna-Bruce and Ralph Ineson, Primetime Emmy Award winners Anna Calder-Marshall, Kyra Sedgwick, Loretta Devine, and Sascha Schneider, Student Academy Awards winner Rishabh Raj Jain, Primetime Emmy Award nominees Joe Mantegna, Kevin Bacon and Mindy Sterling, Screen Actors Guild Awards winners Donny Carrington, Jwaundace Candece, Matt Peters, and Roger Bart, and Screen Actors Guild Awards nominees Bruce Greenwood, Jennifer Morrison, Keith Jardine, Tara Fitzgerald, and Wayne Knight, Daytime Emmy Awards nominee Leven Rambin, César Award nominee Maruschka Detmers, Hollywood Critics Association Television Awards winner Sue Ann Pien, Sundance Special jury Award winner Masha Ko, People Choice's Awards nominee Michael Raymond-James, as other notable such as Allisyn Snyder, Arthur Roberts, Bonnie McKee, C. Thomas Howell, Carys Douglas, Chad Michael Collins, Charlene Tilton, Danny Trejo, David Hayman, David Pevsner, Debbie Pollack, Franco Nero, Frank Noon, Gary Nohealii, Geoff Bell, Harald Zwart, James Phelps, Jeff Blyth, Jonathan Firth, Katy Manning, Kevin Smith, Lance E. Nichols, Lee Arenberg, Madison Wolfe, Maria Maegdefrau, Martin Klebba, Michael Madsen, Patrick Gorman, and William Baldwin.

Diversity and inclusion
IMDb qualifier Independent Shorts Awards is looking for independent projects from all genres, particularly low or no-budget ones, as well as from all countries, especially from those traditionally underrepresented in the global film industry.

Monthly competitions
Each monthly season, the submitted projects are judged by a random team of invited experts from academia and film industry, against a high standard of merit. The monthly award winners are considered for the annual nominations. All nominees are screened at the annual event.

So, EVERY MONTH, Independent Shorts Awards establishes a comprehensive hierarchy of the most important films in the festival circuit, awarding a considerable number of projects in several different categories. A monthly breakdown, listed by IMDb, that allows you to be, at the same time, in a TRADITIONAL ANNUAL FESTIVAL competing for a spot among the world’s best short films of the year to be screened in Los Angeles.

Annual international stage
Our annual stage, showcasing some of the best independent short films curated from around the world (in average 70/80 films from a pool of about 3500 to 4000 submissions), provides a platform for emerging directors, writers, and actors from different countries, and attracts a diverse audience of film aficionados, passionate storytellers, and filmmaking executives of every stripe to downtown Los Angeles. Most of the films have their cast and crews at Regal LA Live, coming from different countries and states of US.