​The Unmentionables Film Festival is an annual theme-based program that investigates a different “taboo” topic each year.

The inaugural edition, "Vol. I: Menstruation," will be presented in partnership with Maysles Cinema, an independent film house in Manhattan, and will celebrate all things menstrual.

Through the lens of filmmakers from around the globe, the festival will shift the conversation around the much-maligned and rarely publicly embraced subject, by exploring the spectrum of realities and experiences that exists from the first menstrual flow through menopause.

Audiences will also enjoy thought-provoking presentations of visual and performing artworks, readings, panels, post-screening discussions, and receptions as well as numerous other special events and the Red Tent Marketplace.

Open to everyone of all ages, sexes, and genders, the festival promises to provide an unconventional exploration of an everyday occurrence that will be enlightening, entertaining, and quite possibly mind-blowing.​

Rules & Terms

The Unmentionables Film Festival seeks the submission of short and feature-length narrative, documentary, experimental, and animated films and videos on the subject of menstruation.

1. Entries must be original and created and owned by entrant. The entrant must have all rights necessary to submit the entry.

2. All entries (online and hardcopy) must be accompanied with a completed submission form.

3. Rough cuts and works-in-progress are eligible for submission, if an exhibition copy will be available by May 15, 2015. Please indicate if it is either next to the title of the work.

4. Films must be available in BluRay or DVD for exhibition.
NOTE: Do not send master tapes or film prints until you have been notified that you have been selected to have your work featured in the festival. At that point, you will be provided instructions on when and how to get your screener to us and how we will return it to you.

5. By submitting your work to The Unmentionables Film Festival, you grant the festival a nonexclusive license to use an excerpt of your submission tape of up to two minutes in length, for promotional purposes only, including but not limited to internet and television broadcast.

6. If you are sending work from outside the USA, please indicate on the outside of the package “FOR FESTIVAL PREVIEW ONLY, NO COMMERCIAL VALUE” or risk paying customs duties. Also, Declare less than $20 value on the package.

7. All preview copies will be added to The Unmentionables Film Festival archives.

8. The festival is not responsible for any lost, stolen or damaged entries.

9. Submission of a film constitutes acceptance of the festival's rules and terms.