From the stacks of Strand to the screen at Nitehawk, we invite you to join us for a night of literary adaptations. These stories have lived on shelves at Strand Book Store for 92 years, and we’re excited to see them come to life in 10 original short films.

Enjoy the films, hang around for the award ceremony, and do some networking in the bar after! Thanks to our judges, all those who submitted, Nitehawk Cinema and book lovers everywhere who made our first ever film festival possible!

The program:

They’re Made out of Meat – directed by Stephen O’Regan
A humorous but thought-provoking story based on a conversation between two aliens about meat creatures.

The Hobbyist – directed by George Vatistas
A seemingly ordinary man seeks out a sagacious druggist in search of an untraceable poison, but winds up getting more than he bargained for. Based on the 1961 Short Story by Frederic Brown.

Dulcinea – directed by Francisco Lidón Plaza
A young knight and his shield bearer travel the country roads in search of adventures pretending to be in a chivalry novel. But these are very hard times and it won´t be easy to become Don Quixote and find the lady he loves, Dulcinea.

Thumbelina and the Ogre – directed by Cécile Robineau
A tale for kids & adults which offers a sensitive story about friendship. The film has also an ecological message as the ogre has learnt to care about everything in his gigantic garden and that’s why he considers with kindness Thumbelina, who was born in a flower.

We Are – directed by Abigail Karl
An experimental film built around excerpts from various works of Sylvia Plath read by young women from our time. These excerpts are supplemented by sexist advertisements and informational films from the 50s & 60s, which is the time Plath was a young woman.

Fleeting Autumn – directed by Vojtech Domlatil
Stopmotion poetry, oscilating between animation, documentary and experiment. Transforming Haiku poetry based on 5-7-5 syllables to the audiovisual form using 5-7-5 second shots structure. Shot during two month art residency in Japan.

Speak Thou Vast and Venerable Head – directed by Julia Oldham
An animated film that reimagines chapter 70 of Herman Melville’s novel Moby Dick, “The Sphynx,” in which Ahab addresses the severed head of a sperm whale.

Speaking Daggers – directed by Sally McLean
Eight characters from five different Shakespeare plays discuss love, revenge, deceit and power in overheard conversations, set against the backdrop of coffee, cakes and waitresses in crisp white shirts.

The Blue from Heaven – directed by Suzie Hanna
Glenda Jackson provides the voice of poet Stevie Smith in this animated interpretation of her extraordinary 1950’s poem ‘The Blue from Heaven’. Suzie Hanna has adapted and animated the poet’s own drawings to communicate her rueful, wistful, comic, and melancholy themes with music and sound design by Phil Archer. (See The Collected Poems and Drawings of Stevie Smith, Faber, 2015, edited by Will May.)

Father to Son – directed by Thomas Stokmans
In this musical debut film, there seems to be hardly any verbal communication between a father and his young son. But when dad plays his saxophone, the boy listens attentively. He gets a sip of dad’s coffee. A very small, intimate film with its heart in the right place.

The Yellow Wallpaper – directed by Janna Jesson
A woman is confronted with her anxiety after hey boyfriend disables access to her phone. Adaptation of a short story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.