Scumdance is a celebration of the best of underground film. ​We champion punks, weirdos, mutants, misfits, metalheads & maniacs from around the globe.

We specialize in horror, comedy, horror-comedy, sci-fi, avant-garde, music based, and experimental films. Though really, we're just looking for good, weird movies.

Awards & Prizes

Awards Categories:
Best Short
Best Feature
Best Score/Soundtrack
Best Performance
Best Animation/stop-motion
Best Directing
Best Cinematography
Audience Favorite Short
Audience Favorite Feature
The Travis Calvert Scumdancitarian Award (for the film that truly embrace the ethos of Scumdance)

2023 Winners:
Best Performance: Micheline Chartier - Red Tiles
Best Cinematography: Jakob Bilinski - Real Cool Time
Best Music/Sound: Logan Felber - Annihilator
Best Animated Film: Duban Pinzon - Lete
Best Director: Dustin Shea - Untitled.mov
Best Short: Now Is Not The Time
Best Feature: INTO THE SHED
Audience Award Best Short: Annihilator
Audience Award Best Feature: Kim's Video
The Travis Calvert Scumdancitarian Award: (TIE)
Microdosing directed by Patrick Adam Peña
and
Motomarine directed by Gabriel Auclair-Doucet

Rules & Terms

Send us your most entertaining live action, stop motion, and animated movies. Any submissions that are deemed to be overtly racist, sexist, homophobic, featuring animal or child abuse, or otherwise just plain outside the bounds of bad taste will be flatly rejected.
Shorts - 30 min or less
Features - 30 min or more

Please note: selection into Scumdance does not guarantee that your film will be screened at our live event.
32 Reviews
Overall Rating
Quality
Value
Communication
Hospitality
Networking
  • Brandon Scullion

    Awesome fest and so honored to have Haunted Cursed Anxious Hateful play!

    October 2024
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  • Christopher Crampton

    Great fest. Very fun. Highly recommend.

    October 2024
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  • Patrick Adam Peña

    Scumdance was the only festival to accept my artistically radical film, Microdosing. I was very happy to welcomed into the weird world of Scumdance, and will continue to support them in the future! I was not able to attend but I'm happy with the way it went!

    January 2024
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  • Kyle Mangione-Smith

    One of the few festivals I've been involved with that can authentically claim to be about underground filmmaking. If you're a genuine weirdo filmmaker and want your work seen by a crowd that's going to appreciate sleaze, grime, low budget experimentation, fringe work that's too rough or weird or crazy for most quote unquote underground festivals - look no further. George and the rest of the Scumdance crew are some of the realest and kindest people I've met playing festivals, they were genuinely excited to get to play my work in a way you don't usually get.

    October 2023
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  • Serkan Aktaş

    I was honored to participate in this year's Scumdance with "Resurrection under the Ocean" short film! - 😃😃😃🙏🙏🙏👏👏👏

    October 2023
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