The 4th Annual San Diego Film Week is a 10-day-long celebration of film in America's Finest City. Over 100 local, national and international films will be showcased along with workshops, parties and panels. Showcasing a variety of local films as well as "best-of" selections from San Diego's diverse film festivals. It is being held in April of 2020 in various venues locations across San Diego County.

The fourth annual San Diego Film Week will include special screenings from film communities around the pacific southwest including California, Arizona and Nevada. Filmmakers from California (outside of San Diego), Nevada and Arizona are invited to participate in San Diego Film Week 2020. Of special consideration are independent films made by independent filmmakers in those regions.

San Diego Film Week accepts short and feature narrative and documentary films, webisodes, music videos and commercials from student and professional/independent filmmakers.

The 2020 San Diego Film Week culminates with the 7th Annual San Diego Film Awards.

San Diego Film Week highlights:

Screenings from local film festivals
Over 100 films produced in San Diego's Film Industry
Workshops and Panels
"Emerging Filmmakers Exhibition"
"Film Market" featuring workshops, investors and distributors looking for feature film and television content.
Preview Night and Opening Red Carpet Gala featuring A- List Acting Awards and Emerging Actors Awards.

San Diego Film Awards Highlights:

Academy Awards Style Awards Show
Red Carpet and Interviews
VIP Reception
Guest Stars and Presenters
27 Awards in 4 categories for Film Awards eligible films
Televised on local station

SUBMISSION CATEGORIES

INDEPENDENT/PROFESSIONAL
Narrative Shorts (under 45 minutes)
Documentary Shorts (under 45 minutes)
Documentary Features (over 45 minutes)
Narrative Features (over 45 minutes)
Commercials (30 or 60 seconds)
PSA's (30 or 60 seconds)
Music Videos (under 5 minutes)
Art/Experimental Films (under 45 minutes)
Trailers (under 3 minutes)
Webisodes (any length)
TV Shows (under 60 minutes)
Animation (any length)
Binational films (films made entirely or partially in Tijuana Mexico)
*Reunion Films (any length)- an old film you made where you'd like to have a chance to watch it again on the big screen with your cast and crew. Films made prior to 2005 are encouraged.

STUDENT
Narrative Shorts (under 45 minutes)
Documentary Shorts (under 45 minutes)
Commercials (30 or 60 seconds)
PSA's (30 or 60 seconds)
Music Videos (under 5 minutes)

Awards & Prizes

AWARDS:
We love recognizing and awarding talent! We have various opportunities to win awards and be recognized for your work.

SAN DIEGO FILM WEEK TENTATIVE AWARDS:

A-List Acting Awards
Emerging Actor's Awards
Best Short Documentary
Best Music Video
Best PSA/Commercial
Best Trailer
Audience Choice Awards
Best Sketch Comedy/Webisode

SAN DIEGO FILM AWARDS TENTATIVE AWARDS (local only)

Narrative Short Film
Best Narrative Short
Best Direction
Best Original Screenplay
Best Editing
Best Cinematography
Best Sound Design
Best Musical Score
Best Costume Design
Best Makeup and Hair
Best Visual Effects
Best Production Design
Best Stunt Choreography
Spirit of San Diego
Best Actor (in a leading role)
Best Actress (in a leading role)
Best Actor (in a supporting role)
Best Actress (in a supporting role)
Best Ensemble Cast
Best Narrative Student film

Feature Film
Best Narrative Feature
Best Documentary Feature

Genre Awards
Best Horror/ Sci Fi/ Late Night Short
Best Drama Short
Best Comedy Short

Honorary Awards
Women in Film
Diversity in Film
Lifetime Achievement
Binational Award
Trailblazer Award
California Best Film
Nevada Best Film
Arizona Best Film

PLEASE NOTE: Each category must have a minimum of 3 submissions in order to remain as an award category. If a category is cancelled the film will be eligible for the following year's awards. Films from cancelled categories will not be refunded. We reserve the right to cancel any award category for any reason.

A-LIST ACTOR AWARDS
The A-List Actors Awards is for more established actors that are continuing to build their career with San Diego based productions.

ELIGIBILITY
A-List Acting Awards* for actors with at least 2 lead or supporting roles in films screened as part of San Diego Film Week AND who have previously been honored with an Acting Award through the Film Consortium. Actors must have at least 4 on screen lines to qualify.

*Keep in mind that the films’ director submits the actors for the A-List Actor Award consideration. Actors are allowed to submit themselves.

EMERGING ACTOR
The Emerging Actors award is for up and coming actors that are starting their career or just starting to work more in San Diego based productions.

ELIGIBILITY
Emerging Actors Awards for actors with at least 2 lead or supporting roles in films screened as part of San Diego Film Week. Actors must have at least 4 on screen lines to qualify.

Note: The person who entered the film into San Diego Film Week will receive an email to submit the actors for the Emerging Actor Award consideration. Actors are allowed to submit themselves. Emerging Actors must not have won an Emerging Actor Award or an A-List Actor Award in any previous years.

Rules & Terms

GENERAL ELIGIBILITY:
Films produced after January 1, 2016 are eligible for inclusion in San Diego Film Week.
Locally produced films released between January 1, 2018 and December 1st 2018 are ALSO eligible for the San Diego Film Awards.
*All submitted films must be 80% produced in San Diego County (not including Binational, Nevada, California, Arizona special screening submissions)
*Submissions to the Oldie but Goodie and My First Film categories are exempt from the January 1, 2015 release date requirement.
*Film Consortium San Diego reserves the right to disqualify any films at any time in the awards process for violations of misconduct, plagiarism, etc.

DETAILED ELIGIBILITY:

SAN DIEGO FILM WEEK ELIGIBILITY: Films released after January 1, 2015 and produced in San Diego county utilizing 80% cast, crew and locations from San Diego are eligible for the 2020 San Diego Film Week. For 2020, Film produced in Nevada, California and Arizona utilizing cast, crew and locations from those regions are eligible for 2018 San Diego Film Week.

SAN DIEGO FILM AWARDS ELIGIBILITY: Films released between January 1, 2019 and December 31, 2019 and produced in San Diego County utilizing 80% cast, crew and locations from San Diego are eligible for the local 2018 San Diego Film Awards in both student and professional categories. All films screened during San Diego Film Week are eligible for San Diego Film Week Awards and the genre awards at San Diego Film Awards.

STUDENT FILMS ELIGIBILITY: Student films must have been produced for an official college level or high school level class or workshop in order to be eligible for awards in student category.

JUDGING:
Our judging model is a hybrid of community and professional voting. No individual votes on a film they were a part of in any way.

INITIAL REVIEW:

An internal advisory team reviews all the submissions and scores them based on three criteria:

Sound Quality, Production Value and Story/Script.

Films with the highest scores are selected for screenings until all time slots are filled during San Diego Film Week. Films screened during the San Diego Film Week that meet all criteria for the San Diego Film Awards remain eligible for Round 1 of Judging for the San Diego Film Awards.

Additional films may remain in consideration at the discretion of the Advisory team even if there is not time to screen the film at San Diego Film Week. After this round, about 60% of submitted films have historically remained under consideration for the San Diego Film Awards.

Round 1 of SDFA judging: December 2017

COMMUNITY JUDGING ROUND

The community judging round is invaluable as it allows our film community to be the judge of what the "best" films are in our own community. Nominations for the film awards are decided during this round. This year, former film award winners and nominees will be the judges for our community judging round. They will determine the nominees that move on to our jury. No more than 5 films will be announced as nominees for any one award.

Round 2 of judging: September 2019- January 220

PROFESSIONAL JUDGING ROUND

Once the community has brought forward their nominees, it's time to decide the winners.
Judges include film festival programmers, film educators and professors, film critics and experienced film producers. Multiple judges watch the nominated films and vote on the winners. The films with the most votes for their respective categories will win the award. Ties are not allowed. In the case where the scores are tied, the film will be passed on to additional judges to break the tie.

REFUNDS
All submission fees are NON-REFUNDABLE.

MEDIA
We cannot guarantee that media provided for the festival will be returned unless specific requests are made.

For questions please email filmconsd@gmail.com

8 Reviews
Overall Rating
Quality
Value
Communication
Hospitality
Networking
  • jeff arballo

    This was our first experience with San Diego Film Week and San Diego Film Awards and we have to say that we were so impressed with the attention to detail and organization of all of the different screening and events. The Organizers of San Diego Film Week kept in contact with us as our film was being screened and provided more than enough staff to accommodate ticketing, answer questions and support the screening. I would highly recommend this event to anyone who is showcasing their film. IT is among the Best of the Best!

    July 2019
    Helpful
  • Anthony Grimm

    Great Festival! We were nominated for a San Diego Film Award and enjoyed the showing.

    July 2019
    Helpful
  • Ace Davis

    I had a great time, the people were great and the experience was amazing. Can't wait for next year!

    May 2019
    Helpful
  • Rich Varville

    San Diego Film Week is quickly becoming THE premiere filmmaker's event to be part of in San Diego.

    April 2019
    Helpful
  • david bobrow

    Very well run festival. A great opportunity to network with other filmmakers. Helpful workshops and screenings. High quality, nice venues, friendly people.

    April 2019
    Helpful