The Short Com International Film Festival takes place in Edinburgh during the world's largest cultural arts festival, the Edinburgh Fringe and International Festival in August, where world class talent and comedy eager audiences descend.

Short Com is a short comedy film festival that has grown from strength to strength from humble beginnings back in 2011, where it started in Manchester.

Short Com prides itself on the quality of its programme and the range of comedy stylings it has screened. The most emphatic thing we look for in a film is its ability to make an audience laugh or smile, thus we consider ourselves the most competitive comedy short film festival in Europe. Short Com has screened films from BAFTA nominated films and multiple award winners to simple home made films that have warmed and vastly amused audiences.

Short Com has screened during the Edinburgh International Fringe Festival, in London and for the first time in Bristol and finished its run and closed with its award ceremony at the Glasgow Short Film Festival. One of the largest short film festivals in the UK.

Why submit to Short Com? Short Com prides itself on the quality of its programme. There is a great deal of honour to selected filmmakers who make it to the annual best of screenings. Plus it will be taking place during the world's largest arts and culture festival. In the past we have been sponsored by Blackmagic Design, Final Draft and Festival Formula all donating fantastic prizes for winning films in our category awards section. We will be looking to work with new brands to continue this tradition and bring some excellent prizes.

Please find the selected films from 2016 and 2019 below.

http://www.shortcom.co.uk/short-com-festival/short-com-2016-best-of-programme/

2019 Programme https://issuu.com/theweeshort/docs/short_com_teaser_brochure__2_

Check out our trailer on youtube https://youtu.be/WY6S1t9svvY

Awards & Prizes

$500 for the funniest film voted by a panel of judges.

Consultancy from film festival strategy experts Festival Formula.

Digital certificate awarded to those screened at the awards ceremony.

More prizes and awards to be announced. Previous prizes in the past have been camera and software equipment from Black Magic Cinema, screenwriting software from Final Draft and consultancy prize from Festival Formula.

Rules & Terms

Films ideally should be no longer than twenty minutes for extended narrative based shorts. Do be warned though, usually the shorter the film the better. Our audiences are used to shorter films and it would have to be something exceptional to keep an audiences’ attention if a long short. There is no set minimum length and we have shown shorts under a minute.

Sketch vs. Narrative. We are a fan of both and this year we will be creating two separate programmes. We have a tendency at Short Com for putting funny content before production values and we aim to continue that. But we will also running a ‘Vision Category’ that focuses on directorial vision in comedy.

Films must be released after March 2019. Try to be honest please.

Foreign language entries must contain English subtitles.

Content must not be offensive to minorities or portray racism. Politically incorrect is okay but try to know your boundaries.

The filmmaker gives permission for Short Com to use images and footage of their film for the purposes of promoting Short Com events.

Submitting your film to Short Com does not mean your film will be selected for screening at Short Com events. Only selected films are screened in the Short Com programme.

A final disclaimer. You have the right to submit the film and are responsible for any copyrighted material within your film. Short Com cannot be held responsible for the promotion and distribution of materials that contain footage or music that does not have the required legal permissions. Basically we’re not having our arse sued because you’ve been a bit lazy. Short Com is under no obligation to screen films that do not satisfy the criteria set above.

For Film schools or individuals who would like to submit several films, get in touch regarding a discount for packaged submissions.