Back again is the NSF version of our long running monthly series Music Driven. This year’s edition continues to push boundries musically and visually. It also serves as another reminder that we’re in a new golden age of the music video. The selection is diverse as always and features more group and full band efforts then in years past. Sincerity is a real common thread with this year’s selection and we’re grateful to be able to share these with you on the big screen.

Post-Screening Q&A moderated by John Woods, Nitehawk Cinema

BRIGHT EYES’ “MARIANA TRENCH”
Art Camp / U.S. / 2020 / 4 min. / English
Composed of 2,200 hand-illustrated ink paintings based on original 3D animation and archival, this is a story about imagining that everything could be new.

MITSKI’S “STAY SOFT”
Maegan Houang / U.S. / 2021 / 4 min. / English
Inspired by Romanticism and artwork from the Victorian era, violence lurks beneath the surface in this fabricated world.

RUBBLEBUCKET’S “GEMOETRY”
Haoyan of America / U.S. / 2022 / 5 min. / English
“Geometry” is the final single from Rubblebucket’s new album, EARTH WORSHIP.

BIG THREE
Julian Turner / U.S. / 2022 / 18 min. / English
In the early 1960s, a budding soul music label brings in a savvy group of local teenage musicians to offer feedback and inspiration to its early signees.

SU LEE’S “SUPPER HAPPY”
Bettina Campomanes / U.S. / 2022 / 3 min. / English, Korean, Spanish
S dreams of a happiness outside the confines of her mind.

HANG OUT 2DAY
Sam Grinberg / U.S. / 2022 / 0.5 min.
Wake, Hang, Repeat / An entire suburban summer experience packed into 30 seconds for your viewing and re-viewing pleasure.

GERRY & THE MANDERS “HOW DOES ANYBODY SLEEP?”
Jim Lopezzo / U.S. / 2022 / 3 min. / English
A music video for the director’s “band”, HDAS? was shot, performed, and edited entirely by the director in his apartment in Jersey City for a budget of $125.

LUSH’S “BIG OAK TREE”
Allison Radomski / U.S. / 2022 / 5 min. / English
The official music video for “Big Oak Tree” by Lush

FREE NOIR PAPILLON
Lev Omelchenko, PhaeMonae / U.S. / 2020 / 11 min. / English
A short dance film about a mother’s relationship to her pregnancy, as she deals with fear and hope about bringing a black baby boy into the world in 2020.

FOREVER HONEY’S “SATELLITE”
Liv Price / U.S. / 2021 / 5 min. / English
A group of misfits, who have recently fixated on being the first rock band to complete a space expedition, debut a new song…and, more importantly, new identity.

SECTIONTOO’S “BLACK THING”
William Breen / U.S. / 2022 / 3 min. / English
The official video for sectiontoo’s “Black Thing” off his new album “Heaven Only Knows.”

NYC.LIVE’s “ROMEO + JULIET”
Joseph Robert Redl / U.S. / 2022 / 3 min. / English
5:29AM – somewhere in nyc.

RECORD SHOP
Mario Rubén Carrión / U.S. / 2022 / 14 min. / English
Two NYC DJs at a record shop search for a rare salsa record, where a clerk shares their love of Caribbean music. As the day unfolds, dynamics begin to surface.

JABOUKIE’S “BBC”
Jaboukie Young-White / U.S. / 2022 / 3 min. / English
Jaboukie’s debut single, BBC.

RARE: THE BOY WHO CRIED SWAG
King She / U.S. / 2022 / 5 min. / English
In the aftermath of BLM, the self-reflective, depressive Rico Sanche, brother of Raphael Briscoe, contemplates the tragic death and summons the will to live.

TOVE LO’S “GRAPEFRUIT”
Lisette Donkersloot / U.S. / 2022 / 4 min. / English
In the powerfully personal ‘Grapefruit’, Tove Lo confronts the eating disorder she suffered as a teenager for the first time.

THE SILICON
Ricardo Villavicencio / U.S. / 2022 / 5 min. / English
Humans uploaded their brains to the cloud and left their bodies behind; a generation of headless ones must learn to live without the mind to begin a new world.

If spooky, sensual, and surreal is what you seek, look no further than our Midnite shorts program! This fun, weird, and every once in a while, gross variety pack of shorts shows just how unique Midnite films can be. From atmospheric and unnerving work to wild dark comedies and everything in between, you thankfully don’t have to stay up too late to enjoy what these dynamic shorts have to offer.

Post-Screening Q&A moderated by Desmond Thorne, Nitehawk Cinema

BUZZKILL
Peter Ahern / U.S. / 2022 / 5 min. / English
Tune in to the blind date woes of Rick and Becky.

GUSSY
Chris Osborn / U.S. / 2022 / 18 min. / English
As children, Miles and Rocky hunted a monster they thought they saw in the woods. 20 years later, they’re still searching.

LOLLYGAG
Tij D’oyen / U.S. / 2022 / 10 min. / Greek
A woman recounts her sensual yet macabre childhood memory about the boy next door.

CROW GOD
Katia Koziara / U.S. / 2021 / 16 min. / English
Kay is surprised when a crow she feeds begins delivering her $100 bills. But what are the crow’s intentions and where is the money coming from?

BELLY OF THE BEAST
Stephen Sues / U.S. / 2022 / 2 min.
A small, ambitious creature in a strange world goes to dangerous lengths to steal a precious item.

IN THE FLESH
Daphne Gardner / U.S. / 2022 / 13 min. / English
Tracey is trying to jerk off with her bathtub faucet like normal when some memories dredge themselves up, the pipes explode, and she starts leaking black goo.

CANAL
Will Rahilly / U.S. / 2022 / 16 min.
A woman finds herself falling into the dusk of her unconscious through a rift in a river. There she is pursued by masked ghosts who aim to unravel her life.

BETTE
Mary Dauterman / U.S. / 2022 / 2 min. / English
Bette gets a new job.

MICKEY DOGFACE
Zach Fleming / U.S. / 2022 / 10 min. / English
Halloween night, three friends high in a van, and an urban legend surrounding a cult singer’s mysterious death in a fire – what could go wrong?

Even when you’re in a seemingly familiar situation life is frequently unpredictable. Different situations affect people in unique ways and can dramatically alter your perception of what you took for granted as a permanent consistency. The way we react and find a way forward becomes more urgent in these times. While all of this certainly applies to real life, some of the filmmakers in this program have taken the same notions and will challenge the way you might think of subject matter and genres in film.

Post-Screening Q&A moderated by Cristina Cacioppo, Nitehawk Cinema

D AS IN DO NOT
Rachel Wolther / U.S. / 2022 / 16 min. / English
A stand up comedian, Jenny (Joey Ally), deals with her mom’s (Annie Golden) continual hints that she’s planning to end it all.

MOIDA SHE ‘DUNNIT!
Tess Paras, Tyler Davis / U.S. / 2021, 2022 / 3 min. / English
In this Film Noir spoof, Beatrice McMoidara turns herself in for a homicide but has trouble convincing the male detectives that she was, in fact, the murderer.

NIGHT
Ahmad Saleh / Germany, Qatar, Palestine, Jordan / 2021 / 16 min. / Arabic
Night has to trick the mother of a missing child into sleeping in order to save her soul.

BILL & BETTY BUILD A PYRAMID
Alex Wroten / U.S. / 2022 / 15 min. / English
Bill and Betty are thrilled to be attending an exclusive work party, but things get weird when their hosts offer them an opportunity to multiply their success.

BALIKBAYAN
Rebecca Rajadnya / U.S. / 2022 / 18 min. / English, Tagalog
A Filipina immigrant grapples with the physical distance from the family she left behind and the cultural disconnect from her daughters in the United States.

REST STOP
Crystal Kayiza / U.S. / 2022 / 12 min. / English, Luganda
On a bus ride from New York to Oklahoma, Meyi, a Ugandan American girl, realizes her place in the world through her Mother’s efforts to reunite their family.

OPÉRATION CARCAJOU
Nicolas Krief / Canada / 2021 / 18 min. / French
A police search disturbs the peace and quiet of a suburban family and arouses suspicions in Nicolas about his father, a secret man with suspicious activities.

NoBudge is excited to be a part of the Nitehawk Shorts Festival and co-present a program of new work from a group of emerging indie filmmakers. These nine short films are an inventive mix of narrative and experimental filmmaking, lightly funny at times, occasionally challenging, and always intriguing.

Post-Screening Q&A moderated by Kentucker Audley, NoBudge

SINKING SUN
Kayo Gorden / U.S. / 2022 / 12 min. / English
Tamiko goes home to the family farm to deal with the death of her mother and the ghosts of the past.

“I FELL IN LOVE WITH THE WORLD”
Theodore Schaefer / U.S. / 2022 / 13 min. / English
A series of surreal vignettes at an American Diner.

CONGRATULATIONS
Emma Hall-Martin / U.S. / 2021 / 10 min. / English
On the day of her mother’s wedding, 15-year-old Delia grapples with a strange moment that happened the night before with her soon-to-be stepfather.

WITH THE FISHES
Libe Barer / U.S. / 2021 / 13 min. / English
Amidst global collapse, a struggling comedian is locked away in her apartment and becomes consumed with paranoid delusions that the mob is trying to kill her.

THE PROMOTION
A.K. Espada, Phil Cheney / U.S. / 2021 / 4 min. / English
Two office drones work late into the night, competing for a truly killer promotion.

URIAH PLAYS THE ALIEN
Stephen Wardell / U.S. / 2018 / 9 min. / English
An alien comes to Earth landing in an ordinary American backyard. Or so goes the game of imagination that a group of siblings think up and play out.

SHARLENE’S PROBLEM:
YuHan Tsai / Taiwan, U.S. / 2022 / 13 min. / English
Sharlene hopes that moving into an apartment with her boyfriend might restart their exhausting and sexually unsatisfying relationship.

BOWLING 4 EVA
Aelfie Oudghiri / U.S. / 2022 / 14 min. / English
A troubled teen girl spends her time trolling men online and bowling with her grandfather while becoming increasingly medicated by her psychiatrist.

MOULDED
Ahmad Bakrin / U.S. / 2022 / 12 min. / English
Growing disconnected from friends, family, and the world around her, a young artist finds inspiration in strangers as she slips from reality.

Starring: Eden Dambrine, Gustav De Waele, Émilie Dequenne, Léa Drucker, Kevin Janssens

Leo and Remi are two thirteen-year-old best friends, whose seemingly unbreakable bond is suddenly, tragically torn apart. Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, Lukas Dhont’s second film is an emotionally transformative and unforgettable portrait of the intersection of friendship and love, identity and independence, and heartbreak and healing.

Starring: Michael Boland, Helena Richards, Tony Spinelli, Bryan Wade

Direct from the tranquil suburbs of late 1980s New Jersey comes an obscure Shot-On-Video love story of teased hair, acid washed jeans and brutal slaughter. Stoic serial killer ‘Big Al’ has been racking up quite a resume lately, until he stumbles upon the gum-cracking Bunny, an equally cold-blooded copycat killer. It’s bloodlust at first sight as these two twisted monsters team up to embark on a perverse spree of slayings – but they will both learn the price of sadistic love on the seedy streets of the Garden State.

Hosted by Matt Desiderio of Horror Boobs with free giveaways of Blu-rays, DVDs and collectibles. Followed by an after party in Lo-Res where Desiderio will DJ an all-vinyl set.

Starring: Tang Wei, Park Hae-il, Go Kyung-Pyo

Park Chan-wook’s critically acclaimed Decision to Leave will return to cinemas for one night only, accompanied by a new pre-recorded conversation between Park Chan-wook and Academy Award-winner Bong Joon Ho (Parasite), exclusive to cinemas.

What happens when an object of suspicion becomes a case of obsession?

Winner of Cannes Best Director in 2022, Park Chan-wook (Oldboy, The Handmaiden) returns with a seductive romantic thriller that takes his renowned stylistic flair to dizzying new heights. When detective Hae-joon (Park Hae-il) arrives at a murder scene, he begins to suspect the dead man’s wife Seo-rae (Tang Wei) may know more than she initially lets on. But as he digs deeper into the investigation, Hae-joon finds himself trapped in a web of deception and desire, proving that the darkest mysteries lurk inside the human heart.

Starring: Eddie Murphy, Arsenio Hall, John Amos, James Earl Jones, Shari Headley, Madge Sinclair, Eriq La Salle, Louie Anderson

Prince Akeem (Eddie Murphy) is the prince of a wealthy African country and wants for nothing, except a wife who will love him in spite of his title. To escape an arranged marriage, Akeem flees to America accompanied by his persnickety sidekick, Semmi (Arsenio Hall), to find his queen. Disguised as a foreign student working in fast food, he romances Lisa (Shari Headley), but struggles with revealing his true identity to her and his marital intentions to his king father (James Earl Jones).

Starring: Jodie Foster, Matthew McConaughey, James Woods, John Hurt, Tom Skerritt

Comedian Chris Gethard hosts a popular podcast called Beautiful/Anonymous where he receives calls from random humans. He tweets out a phone number. One person gets through. They never say their name. He isn’t allowed to hang up for an hour.

Over the podcast’s 200 episodes, multiple callers have scolded Chris because he has never seen the 1997 Jodie Foster feature film Contact. Kicking off his Beautiful/CONonymous Festival, Chris Gethard hosts a screening of the film followed by a 30 minute Q+A between Chris Gethard and the caller from past episode “Whirlpool Galaxy.”

Will Chris like the film? How does the astrophysics presented in the film match up with real life science? We’ll answer all these not so important questions and more! This special event is part of a weekend event celebrating the Beautiful/Anonymous Podcast–aptly titled Beautiful/CONonymous.

For more information about all of the weekend’s events, please visit www.beautifulcononymous.com

Starring: Sandra Drzymalska, Isabelle Huppert, Lorenzo Zurzolo

The world is a mysterious place when seen through the eyes of an animal. EO, a grey donkey with melancholic eyes, meets good and bad people on his life’s path, experiences joy and pain, endures the wheel of fortune randomly turn his luck into disaster and his despair into unexpected bliss. But not even for a moment does he lose his innocence.