We are a Multi-City Film Festival with semi-final screenings in New York and Los Angeles. The Festival Finals will take place at the College of the Desert, Palm Desert Campus located in the Coachella Valley, CA.

SUBMISSIONS ARE NOW CLOSED
Visit our Calendar for more Details: http://officiallatino.com/schedule/

The 5th Annual Official Latino Film and Arts Festival will take place this year in the City of Palm Desert, California for Dia De Los Muertos Weekend. This year dates are October 31 to November 3rd, 2019.

Filmmaker Danny Hastings www.dannyhastings.com created the Festival in 2015 in response to the lack of Latino representation in Hollywood films and TV shows. Our mission is to showcase, nurture, and support the emerging creative Latino and Latina filmmaker that produces, directs or writes their films and videos in the United States. We also support films and filmmakers that showcase our true American Diversity in their films, so we accept Non-Latino Films that showcase Diversity – Black, White, Asian, Native American, All Genders, LGBTQ+….All – You are all invited to submit.

This year we are going to highlight our Native Indigenous Spirit, by showcasing films about Natives from this continent.

This year’s theme is “Stereotypes End Here”. For many years Latinx Filmmakers and Filmmakers of Color have been writing, directing, producing short films here in the U.S.A., and for whatever reason we still struggle to get any type of proper representation. Our actors usually get the one or two lines and most of them just get the supporting roles to the supporting actors in a film. We wait no longer for “the powers that be” to tell our stories.

We want to see the Female Hero, The Latina Doctor, The Latino Family Man, African American Excellence, Native American Stories, we want our actors to portray different types of characters, not just the same stereotypical roles that have been plaguing Hollywood for years. It’s 2019 are we are not having that non-sense any longer. We want to see films that change the narrative.

Another big important detail is that we take films that have been produced from January 1, 2017 to July 2019. So if you have a film that started collecting dust, for a year or two, send it our way, it might have a chance to still get in.

Awards & Prizes

TOP AWARDS:
BEST OFFICIAL LATINO SHORT AWARD = $ 2,000.00
BEST INTERNATIONAL = $ 1,000.00
AMERICAN DIVERSITY AWARD = $ 1,000.00

NEW 2019 AWARD:
NATIVE SPIRIT AWARD = $ 1,000.00

ADDITIONAL CATEGORIES AND AWARDS FOR U.S. SHORTS
BEST DRAMA AWARD
BEST COMEDY AWARD
BEST DOCUMENTARY AWARD
EXCEPTIONAL ARTISTRY AWARD (Animation/Stop Motion/Experimental)
BEST MUSIC VIDEO AWARD
BEST Webisode
BEST Sketch Comedy
BEST VIDEO BLOG
BEST OUT OF THIS WORLD AWARD (Horros and SCI-FI)

BEST ACTRESS
BEST ACTOR
BEST LATINO VIDEO BLOGGER
BEST LATINA VIDEO BLOGGER

BEST IG QUICKIE

Rules & Terms

All films created in the United States written, directed OR produce by a Latina or Latino including Latino Cast member or members should submit to the following categories: U.S. DRAMA, U.S. COMEDY, U.S. DOCUMENTARY, U.S. EXCEPTIONAL ARTISTRY (Animation/Stop Motion/Experimental), U.S. MUSIC VIDEO, U.S. WEBISODE, U.S. SKETCH COMEDY, U.S. VIDEO BLOG AND U.S. OUT OF THIS WORLD AWARD (Horros and SCI-FI). All of these films will compete for the GRAND PRIZE of $ 2,000.00 for Best Official Latino Short Film.

All Films produced outside of the United States can only submit for the "CORTOMETRAJE INTERNACIONAL" Category.

Non-Latino films should submit for the "AMERICAN DIVERSITY" category. These films must be created in the United States and should be written, directed or produced by filmmakers of any race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identification, people over 40 and/or individuals with disabilities and should reflect a cast from a diverse background.

Films showcasing Native and Indigenous Content from North, Central and South America, including the Caribbean should submit under the Our Native Spirit category. These films could be Documentaries, Narratives, Drama, Comedy, Music Videos and/or Experimental Videos.

SUBMISSIONS

The short films submitted should be recorded and edited on 1080 HD format. The length of the films should be no shorter than 3 minutes and no longer than 30 minutes. Short films must have been produced between January 1, 2017 and July 4, 2019.

If you've previously submitted a short film to our festival, you can submit it again this year. Filmmakers can submit multiple entries throughout the Festival's various categories.

Previous winners of the Official Latino Short Film Festival cannot re-submit the same 'winning' films, but can submit new work.

We are only accepting online submissions trough FilmFreeway. WE WILL NOT ACCEPT DVD's so please do not send them as they will NOT BE VIEWED.

Submitting your short films does not guarantee screening or acceptance. A notification of acceptance will be sent by written email from the Official Latino Office. Submission fee is non-refundable.

AGE REQUIREMENTS:
U.S. filmmakers must be 14 and older. All U.S. filmmakers under the age of 18 must include the contact information for a parent/guardian. Filmmakers outside of the U.S. submitting short films for the International category must be 18 and older.

80 Reviews
Overall Rating
Quality
Value
Communication
Hospitality
Networking
  • Beto Cruz

    I can just say that this film festival loves Latinos and Film makers... thanks for all the love given to our crew of La EntreViú... more to come.

    March 2019
    Helpful
  • Sonalii Castillo

    Thank you for having MAMBA be a part of your festival and for being so welcoming.

    January 2019
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  • Genaro Dominguez

    A quality festival and great at communicating with filmmakers. Was so happy they branched out the semi finals into New York.

    January 2019
    Helpful
  • Gabriela Lopez de Dennis

    Keep up the great work of supporting Latino content!

    January 2019
    Helpful
  • Melissa De Leon

    I loved this festival! This was one of the festivals that I hoped my film would show at and was super excited when I got in. The festival director was good with communication and kept us posted on what was going on. I liked the selection of films. They had different stories and were diverse. They had blocks like Las Jefas, LGBT, Horror, etc. What I also loved was that it was a festival catered to Latinos which was awesome and it felt great to watch films from people who look like me. It was empowering.

    December 2018
    Helpful