The Sydney Indie Film Festival has been created to showcase both local and international, new and creative works by emerging and established artists who are passionate about story telling via the art of film making.

2015: 1st year of the Sydney Indie Film Festival's events:
8 days, 62 films from 20 countries!

2016: 90 films! 13 days of events, including our very first “Outdoor Cinema Day” as part of the Gladesville Eats&Flicks massive open air Family Event!

2017: The Biggest Indie Films Show in Australia! 137 Films, 11 days, 2 locations including Event Cinemas George Street inaugural Festival Space & the newly renovated gorgeous ubber modern Woollahra Library at Double Bay!

2018: Continues as The Biggest Indie Films Show in Australia! 146 Films, 11 days, 2 locations including Event Cinemas George Street inaugural Festival Space & the beautiful Lane Cove Library’s Screening Room!

We aim to share great stories with the audience, while supporting independent filmmakers. Whether you made a film with $100 or $100K budget, what will really captivate the audience is the story!

Together with various communities supporting the event, we aim to bring entertainment, inspiration and culture to the communities by showing stories from around the world and utilizing the impact great cinema can have upon an audience or issue.

Follow @sydneyindiefest

AWARDS

In 2015 we gave away 42 Awards between Feature Films and Short Films.

In 2016 we gave away 50 Awards between Feature Films and Short Films.

In 2017 we gave away 50 Awards between Feature Films and Short Films.

In 2018 we gave away 48 Awards between Feature Films and Short Films.

Awards included Best Film, Best Screenplay, Best Director, Best Lead Actor, Best Lead Actress, Best Support Actor, Best Support Actress, Best Cinematography, Best Music Score, Best Editing, Best Production Design, Best Special Effects, Best Drama, Best Comedy, Best Thriller, Best Science Fiction, Best Romantic Comedy, Best Animation, Best Documentary, Best Feel Good Film, Best Family Film, Best True Story Film, Indie Spirit Award, Extra Mile Award, Best Australian Film, Best Made in Sydney Film,
Made in Sydney Extra Mile, Made in Sydney Indie Spirit.

We also launched the “Best Trailer Award” for Short Films and Feature Films, to encourage filmmakers to have one of their best marketing tools ready and fierce out there in the world!

MISSION

The Mission of the Sydney Indie Film Festival is to bring opportunities for independent filmmakers and great cultural entertainment to the community by showing stories from around the world, uniting the power of great cinema and the joy of fantastic food, to bring friends and families together in an inspiring experience, to celebrate life, stimulate great talks with old friends, and make new ones.

DIVERSITY

The Sydney Indie Film Festival accepts all genres to be included in the festival program:
Drama, Comedy, Adventure, Sci-Fi, Thriller, Horror, Documentaries, Animation, Student Films.

The Festival accepts entries from around the world.

All films must be in English or have subtitles in English.

PUBLICITY

We know that Film Festivals are great marketing vehicle, and with our incredible media team, we aim to give maximum publicity to all selected films, online and offline.

The festival is very passionate about promoting the work of all officially selected films before, during and after the festival. With continuous posts sharing to its thousands of followers around the world where their next screenings are, so more people know about the films, continuing to build up a large audience worldwide for everybody involved even after the events.

We also just launched the “Now Showing” session on our website, to continue to support the official selections, by sharing with our audience via Social Media and Newsletters the news when the filmmakers release the films online after completing their festival's season.

Check out our “Now Showing” session at our official website and start enjoying some great indie films from our past Official Selections Programs!

NETWOKING

People in the industry had the chance to network with active professionals, who are making some of the best independent films.

The festival events included upcoming filmmakers with some great first films which makes us wonder how amazing things will keep going for them, to more established filmmakers who have lots of experience in the most commercial side of the film industry, while producing their indie films telling the stories they really want to tell, and literally conquering the film festival circuits worldwide.

SUBMISSIONS:

Online Submissions accepted exclusively via FilmFreeway.

SCREENERS:

We only accept “Secure Online Screener” via FilmFreeway.

Additional tips:
Usually Screeners streaming via FilmFreeway play better than the ones streaming via Vimeo.

**ADDITIONAL IMPORTANT NOTES:**

TRAILERS:

Mandatory for Features in the Official Selection Program.

Highly recommended for Shorts in the Official Selection Program.

SUBTITLES:

Please make sure subtitles are legible.

For all films in the Official Selection Program, please remember that the entire audience from all seats positions must be able to read the subtitles.

MAKE SURE YOU RECEIVE IMPORTANT NOTIFICATIONS:

Please make sure you check your email and spam mail folder for the FilmFreeway notifications emails during the notifications period.

If your film is “Accepted” as Official Selection, please search your mailbox for emails from “filmsubmissions@sydneyindiefilmfestival.com” or “mail@sydneyindiefilmfestival.com” so you can follow up on all instructions for deliverables.

Please make sure you have your best Contact Number in your FilmFreeway Film Page.

Once our judges complete the official selections, we really like to stick with the program that we carefully selected. We had cases in which filmmakers never received ours or the FilmFreeway notification emails, so we just called them to make sure they received the exciting news, then after the phone call they finally found the notifications in the spam folder.

If your film gets selected, it is very important that we can reach you.

Please read “Rules & Terms” for more information.

Follow @sydneyindiefest

Best Film - Feature Film
Best Screenplay - Feature Film
Best Director - Feature Film
Best Lead Male Actor - Feature Film
Best Lead Female Actor - Feature Film
Best Cinematography - Feature Film
Best Music Score - Feature Film
Best Editing - Feature Film
Best Production Design - Feature Film
Best Special Effects - Feature Film

Best Film - Short Film
Best Screenplay - Short Film
Best Director - Short Film
Best Lead Male Actor - Short Film
Best Lead Female Actor - Short Film
Best Cinematography - Short Film
Best Music Score - Short Film
Best Editing - Short Film
Best Production Design - Short Film
Best Special Effects - Short Film

Additional awards categories to be announced every year.

In 2015 we gave away 42 Awards between Feature Films and Short Films.

In 2016 we gave away 50 Awards between Feature Films and Short Films.

In 2017 we gave away 50 Awards between Feature Films and Short Films.

In 2018 we gave away 48 Awards between Feature Films and Short Films.

Awards included Best Film, Best Screenplay, Best Director, Best Lead Actor, Best Lead Actress, Best Support Actor, Best Support Actress, Best Cinematography, Best Music Score, Best Editing, Best Production Design, Best Special Effects, Best Drama, Best Comedy, Best Thriller, Best Science Fiction, Best Romantic Comedy, Best Animation, Best Documentary, Best Feel Good Film, Best Family Film, Best True Story Film, Indie Spirit Award, Extra Mile Award, Best Australian Film, Best Made in Sydney Film,
Made in Sydney Extra Mile, Made in Sydney Indie Spirit.

BEST TRAILER AWARD
We also launched the “Best Trailer Award” for Short Films and Feature Films, to encourage filmmakers to have one of their best marketing tools ready and fierce out there in the world!

Please check list of all awards nominations and winners at our official website.

IMPORTANT NOTE:

From 2017, it will be mandatory for all Official Selections Feature Films to have a teaser trailer.

Trailers are not mandatory for Official Selections Short Films, but short films selections with trailers are also competing for the Best Trailer Award in the Short Films category.

We accept all genre in any language, from around the world.

All films must be in English or have subtitles in English.

Preference will be given to films that are not yet published online.

Online Submissions accepted exclusively via FilmFreeway.

All entry fees are in U.S. Dollars, per film and non-refundable.

The festival does not grant submission waiver. We believe in equal opportunity and we just don’t think it is fair for a project to equally compete entering with a submission waiver, with the filmmakers who made an effort to pay the submission fee.

Entries must be submitted no later than the deadline listed.

You must be over 18 years of age to qualify to enter the festival.

You are the copyright owner or producer.

You have the right to enter the movie in the festival.

The movie does not infringe upon the copyrights, trademarks, contract rights, or any other intellectual property rights of any third person or entity, or violate any person’s rights of privacy or publicity.

The festival does not pay for mailing/shipping costs.

The festival does not pay screening fees.

The festival does not return DVD copies and/or any other materials (such as stills, media kits or posters).

If your film is selected, we request the “Festival Screener File” to be sent via DropBox or other File Transfer Method. It is safer and faster than mailing packages.

If you prefer to send a Blu-Ray copy, these are the instructions:

Disk must be screen-ready and in English OR with English subtitles.

Disk specifications: PAL compatible, All Regions.

Disk must be labelled with:
Film Title
Running Time
Director’s name
Contact

Please do not put adhesive labels on the disk. Use a permanent marker to write the information on the disk or have it printed in the actual disk when using printable disk.

The submission and/or screener Disks must be sent to the Festival with the following statement: “without commercial value, for cultural purposes only”. In order to facilitate customs clearance, please indicate a maximum value of AU$10 or less.

The cost of shipping all entries and films to the festival must be paid by the entrant. The festival will not pay the cost of shipping the film back to the filmmaker. The festival will not be responsible for expedited or overnight shipping charges to other organizations. All international entries must be sent to the Sydney Indie Film Festival with all transportation charges, duties, and taxes prepaid by the shipper.
The festival will not pay any customs' duties that could be incurred if you are mailing your disks via courier service. If you are using a courier service, make sure to mark that all customs' duties are paid by 'Sender' in order to avoid having your package returned to you.

After a film has been an official selection, the filmmaker will be notified, and the film will be listed on the festival's website under official selections.

If selected, the festival will require an Electronic Press Kit to include high-resolution production stills, key art, bio and filmography of the director, production notes and full cast and crew credits.

Once a film has been selected it cannot be withdrawn from the festival program.

Participation in the festival implies that the participants and winners in all sections will use in all publicity (posters, announcements, etc.) the name and the logo of the Sydney Indie Film Festival and the Awards.

Although every possible care will be taken with disks, drives and files while in our possession, we cannot accept responsibility for loss or damage. Do not send originals or master prints, tapes, files or drives.

Please keep the festival notified of any address/phone number changes.

The festival is hereby granted the rights to utilize excerpts from any film submitted for promotional purposes of the festival. The individual or corporation submitting the film hereby warrants that it is authorized to commit the film for screening, and understands and accepts these requirements, rules and regulations.

The festival reserves the right to use any promotional materials you send us (such as stills, posters, trailers, reviews, interviews, etc.) for marketing, publishing and broadcast purposes of the festival.

You agree to participate in related publicity and to the use of your name and participation images for the purposes of advertising, promotion and publicity for the festival.

The festival promotes the schedule of screenings via online and offline media. The festival encourages filmmakers to help promote their films by promoting their screenings to industry professionals, distributors, the press and the general public.

The festival assumes no responsibility for any incorrect, inaccurate or incomplete information, whether caused by website users or by any of the equipment or programming associated with or utilized in the competition, and the festival assumes no responsibility for technical, hardware or software failure of any kind, for lost network connections, garbled computer transmissions, other problems or technical malfunctions with regard to the competition. The festival assumes no responsibility for any error, omission, corruption, interruption, deletion, defect, delay in operation or transmission, communications line failure, theft or destruction or unauthorized access to or alteration of entries. The festival is not responsible for any problems or technical malfunction of any telephone network or lines, computer on-line systems, servers, computer equipment, software, failure of any e-mail addressed to the festival on account of technical problems, human error or traffic congestion on the internet or any website, or any combination thereof, including any injury or damage to your or any other person's computer related to or resulting from participation or downloading any materials in the competition. If for any reason a contestant’s work cannot be viewed or is not capable of running as planned, including infection by computer viruses, bugs, tampering, unauthorized intervention, fraud or technical failures, the festival assumes no responsibility.

In no event will the festival, its members, event partners or its officers, directors, employees, be responsible or liable for any damages or losses of any kind, including direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, special or punitive damages arising out of any contestant’s access to and use of the website and participation in the competition.

You accept responsibility for obtaining any and all clearances necessary to exhibit your film at the festival, warrant that you have the rights necessary to exhibit your film at the festival, indemnify and hold harmless Sydney Indie Film Festival and its affiliates against any claim arising out of submission and/or exhibition of your film at Sydney Indie Film Festival.

By entering the competition you hereby accept these competition rules.

Overall Rating
Quality
Value
Communication
Hospitality
Networking
  • Great event and a wonderful crew. On the top of that high level movies. Looking forward for the Sydney Indie Film Festival 2020 !

    December 2019
  • Mark Cade

    This festival was amazing! Well worth flying half way around the world. The festival director (Shailla) and her team were superb. They kept things running smoothly and were incredibly organized. Before my arrival to Australia they even helped me find a good area in Sydney to stay while I was in town. Lastly, their social media posting before, during and after the festival was the best I've ever seen. If you are fortunate enough to have your film selected by this festival, you should definitely attend!

    November 2019
  • Stefen Harris

    Fabulous festival! We were proud to screen amoung a really exciting programme of films from all over the world. I wish we could have made the journey but next time we will for sure.

    November 2019
  • Alif Sankey

    I wasn't able to attend the Festival, but it felt like I was there. The entire team was so supportive, and made sure to share aspect of the festival experience via email and social media. Thank you so much for the Directors Nomination and Musical Score win for 'Woman of Life'. I highly recommend Sydney Indie Film Festival!

    November 2019
  • Titas Petrikis

    This was a wonderful experience. The festival team is extremely supportive and friendly. Our film team was truly happy to be a part of this event, and it is absolutely worth it! Good luck to Sydney Indie Film Festival in the future!

    November 2019