Program Guide Ascifff 2017

PRESENTS

WELCOME Welcome to the 2nd Annual Atlanta Science Fiction Film Festival presented by IMAX! We’re proud and excited to work with IMAX and HBO for the 2nd year in a row!!

And we’re elated to bring back The IMAX Young Filmmakers Award and a special new Jury Award for Best Sci-fi Feature Film! Still in its infancy stage, ASCIFFF is quickly becoming one of the most important film festivals in the country and soon, the world! And it’s all because of you—the sci-fi filmmakers, the smart and dedicated audiences that show up to be a part of an all-inclusive world of science fiction!

Science Fiction books and films have truly taken off in the last few years! And we’ve found some of the best, international indie films in this genre. We received more than 100 submissions from 12 U.S. States and 17 countries! Curating part of the featured film category has been a special treat for us. Showcasing some of the most talented, seasoned and professional filmmakers in the industry today! This year we will be the first in the U.S. to screen the new sci-fi film, The Beyond by Hasraf Dulull. Read this program cover to cover and you’ll be just as excited as we are with this year’s line-up!

The Atlanta Sci-fi Film Festival is organized by The Multicultural Sci-fi Organization.

MCSFO promotes, discusses and educates in the mediums of science fiction and technology with a unique focus from an international perspective. Encouraging diversity in science fiction is one of the main missions of The Multicultural Sci-fi Organization and therefore is strongly encouraged. We don't limit diversity to just ethnicity and race, but is inclusive of: culture, gender, sexual orientation and disability.

The mission of our annual Atlanta Sci-Fi (SF) film festival is to provide screens for the finest independent sf films locally and internationally. To increase cultural diversity and interest in SF film/tv, to inspire and strengthen the local SF film community by cultivating an engaged audience. We believe in encouraging rich storytelling, filled with infinite possibilities that challenge us and question our perception of the future!

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See you at the festival!

–Amanda Ray

THANK YOU! None of what we have done, could have been at all possible without the support of all of our sponsors, partners, staff and volunteers!!

This year, we’ve been very fortunate to work with some of the coolest people in our sci-fi family! This year, we want to honor just some of the following awesome rockstars for their outstanding dedication, commitment and support to The Atlanta Sci-fi Film Festival!

Dr. Lisa Yaszek Dr. Richard Utz Brittany Myers Erika Washburn Cara Pastore Dr. Bethany Jacobs Dr. Tobias Wilson-Bates Laura Grace Sears Louis Saavy All filmmakers in competition and featured film list Volunteers - past and present A special thanks to ALL the filmmakers who submitted their sci-fi film, we thank you for sharing your vision and hard work!!

Facebook.com/MulticulturalScifiOrg Twitter.com/MCSFO Instagram.com/MCSFO

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VENUES

Google Fiber Space Located in Ponce City Market 650 North Ave, NE #S205 Atlanta, GA 30308

Regal Atlantic Station Stadium 16 IMAX Atlantic Station 261 19th St. NW Atlanta, GA 30363 *Parking validation machine in front of Exit Door Other Parking Options Within 1-2 Mile Radius of Ga Tech Student Center:

Georgia Tech Georgia Institute of Technology Student Center Theater 350 Ferst Drive, NW Atlanta, GA 30332

Bank of America

600 Peachtree Street NE Atlanta, GA 30308 Sat: 8:00am - 6:00pm [20 Min $1] [8HR $9] [24HR $14]

One Georgia Center Tower

Getting to Georgia Tech:

September 30th is Georgia Tech Game Day from 12PM to 5PM and parking will be at a premium! Those interested in purchasing advance parking passes on campus may do so at: pts.gatech.edu/parking-on-gameday

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Other GA Tech Parking Locations are: W10 Parking Lot - $10 (next to CRC), short walk to the Student Center.

Please consider taking public transportation or a ride service to the festival.

600 West Peachtree Street NW Atlanta, GA 30308 Mon-Sun: All Day [$15.00]

Georgia Aquarium Parking Lot

357 Luckie St, NW Atlanta, GA 30313 Mon-Sun: 9:00am - 8:00pm [Flat Rate $10.00]

Emory University Hospital Midtown

56 Linden Avenue NE Atlanta, GA 30308 Mon-Sun: All Day [20 Min $3] [40 Min $5] [1hr $7.00] [1hr 20 Min $9] [1HR 40 Min $11] [4HR $13] [24HR $16]

SCHEDULE AT A GLANCE FRIDAY SEPT 29, 2017 at GOOGLE FIBER in Ponce City Market

VIP Opening Reception _ 7-9 pm · Cocktails from Old 4th Distillery Opening Night is RESERVATION ONLY

SATURDAY SEPT 30, 2017 at GA TECH INSTITUTE

12:00 pm _ Foreign Language Sci-fi Shorts [English Subtitled | Out-of-Competition Screening]

· Alekto by Thomas Kaufmann · The Fisherman by Alejandro Suárez Lozano · Breaker by Phillippe McKie · UU by Jeremiah Hammerling 1:00 pm _ CGI Sci-fi Short Film Competition

· Journey by Radheya Jegatheva · Spatial Delivery by Haley Samms · Revelation - The City of Haze by Qichao Mao

*Guest Judge Rodolphe Pierre-Louis gives feedback

Live Action SF Film Short Competition

AUDIENCE Votes for Winner!

2:00 pm _ Block 1

· Saturi - by Tyler Doehring · Backtrack Vodka - by Brandon Bruno · Destroy Madrid - by Joseba Alfaro · Real Artist - by Cameo Wood 3:00 pm _ Block 2

· Place of my Birth by Matt Harris-Freeth · Sleep Away by Christina Ruloff · The Consequence of Reliving by Christien Bart-Gittens · Hop by Darion D'Anjou

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SCHEDULE AT A GLANCE 4:00 pm _ Block 3

· Rewinder by Jean-Luc Julien · Screaming at the Stars by Richie Moore · To Pluto by Yen-Ju Lee · Luke & The Void by Matt Harris-Freeth 5:00 pm _ Block 4

Best of the Best Finals & Judging by Audience

6:00 pm _ SPECIAL AWARD WINNING FILMS

· AMERCON by Michael Wright Winner of the IMAX Young Filmmakers Award 2017 · THE BEYOND by Hasraf Dullul Exclusive US Premiere! BEST SCI-FI FEATURE FILM AWARD 2017 8:00 pm _ CURATED MUST SEE FILMS

· LOST BOY by Anthony Scott Burns & Ash Thorp · TEARS IN THE RAIN by Christopher Grant Harvey · FIRE BASE by Neill Blomkamp · ZYGOTE by Neill Blomkamp

SUNDAY OCT 1, 2017 at REGAL ATLANTIC STATION - IMAX

Award Ceremony _ Doors at 6:00 pm Announcing the Winners of the: · Best CGI Short · IMAX Young Filmmakers Award · Audience Choice Award for Best Live Action Sci-fi Short · Best Sci-fi Feature Film · Special Jury Award for Best Science Fiction Feature Film IMAX Surprise Exclusive Screening:

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· Blade

Runner THE FINAL CUT in IMAX

SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

12:00 pm _ Foreign Language Sci-fi Shorts

UU

· UU by Jeremiah Hammerling [9:22 min]

A world without sleep is a world without dreams, that would require no real homes or bedrooms and as such no need for intimacy. There would be little need for privacy, and were we to live in that world, we would probably be inclined to work as much as we could and fall in line with the status quo. UU is a film about a small police unit tasked with rising sleepers, individuals who have chosen to disobey the ruling order of the time, who will be punished and brought back to the waking world. But when one of the members of this elite "wake unit" begins to succumb to the world of sleep, she begins to become the very thing she has set out to defeat. A futuristic interrogation fever dream ensues and ultimately creates the fabric of the film.

BREAKER

· Breaker by Phillippe McKie [11:00 min]

TOKYO: In the near future technology and body have come together. Sensory-upgrades altering peoples sight and hearing abilities, communication devices implanted under the skin and memory boosts are the norm. In tomorrow's Tokyo, the technologicallyenhanced body of a young mercenary hacker is overrun by a sentient data weapon.

Wanted, the parasitic A.I. becomes her only ally as she is chased across the city by those seeking to salvage it.

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SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

12:00 pm _ Foreign Language Sci-fi Shorts, cont’d.

ALEKTO

· Alekto by Thomas Kaufmann [23:00 min]

Policewoman Julia Forward is kidnapped by the Alekto Corporation and is being transported in a Body-Transport-Unit from Earth. Distraught and unaware of where she is, she awakens in a clearing surrounded by dense forest. Primative armed warriors surround her and begin to close in. A chase proceeds but she is unable to flee and is captured.

She is taken to a Stoneage community, caged like an animal - their prisoner. Here she meets their depraved leader and space traveller, Olsndot. He is the only human that she can communicate with, here where ever she is. Tentatively he begins to trust her and finally reveals important information about the Corporation. Julia's world, as she knows it, is destroyed.

Alekto is a science fiction short film, from Michael Mehring and Thomas Kaufmann, which invokes questions about conspiracy theories and the entire evolution of Man. An earthling is kidnapped into space, discovering parallel dimensions that she could have never imagined.

FISHERMAN

· Fisherman by Alejandro Suárez Lozano [20:00 min]

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Honourable old Wong has been a squid fisherman for nearly all of his life, but unfortunately, nowadays, he struggles to make ends meet. Soon, his fishing rod's bell will cheerfully ring, but does he really want to surface his prized catch?

SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

1:00 pm _ CGI Sci-fi Short Film Competition

JOURNEY

SPATIAL DELIVERY

· Journey by Radheya Jegatheva [7:40 min]

Alone in space, an astronaut drifts through the empty void. After finding another astronaut in the same predicament, she gives him a polaroid image of the Earth. They then team up to go on an epic journey across the universe to return to their planet. Will these star-crossed lovers find home?

· Spatial Delivery by Haley Samms [3:42 min]

Every day, Ava delivers packages throughout the solar system. One day, she gets a package that just might deliver her from the solitude of space.

REVELATION CITY OF HAZE

· Revelation City of Haze by Qichao Mao [13:52 min]

After witnessed his mother’s death in a riot, the boy named Mai broke down and could not remember his own name since. One day, a girl named Yi, who’s a scavenger, found Mai in a garbage can and brought him back to the City of Haze. From then on, they lived together and depended on each other for survival. Mai, though suffered from mental disorder, grew up together with Yi in the City of Haze. A decade later, riot reoccurred in the city and reminded Mai the death of his mother. So he stood out and fought with the robot police. At last, Yi died in the chaos; Mai lost a leg and was arrested. During his years in prison, old Mai felt he owed Yi too much and could not stop thinking about her.

He created a robot with recycled iron which looks exactly like Yi. One day, he decided to escape from the prison together with robot Yi, but his attempt failed...

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JUDGES

of the cgi competition

Rodolphe Pierre-Louis Founder and CEO of ActionVFX

Rodolphe Pierre-Louis is an Award-Winning Filmmaker, Visual Effects Artist, and Entrepreneur from Port-au-Prince, Haiti. In 2015, his short film, The House Call, won the Audience Choice Award at the Asheville 48 Hour Film Festival.

Rodolphe is the Founder and CEO of ActionVFX, the industry's leading source for Visual Effects stock footage. Because of his work at ActionVFX, he was awarded the StudioDaily 50 Award, which honored the top 50 creatives and technologists of 2017.

TheCGBros

Co-founders Shaun Johnston and Bill Johnston TheCGBros are made up of a loyal collective of digital 3D/Animation//VFX professionals that have worked together in the digital animation/gaming/VFX industries across many different projects, for many different companies, in many different places all over the world. Our love of Computer Generated Imagery (CGI) in all its forms and the tech behind it is what binds us together as bold pioneering “Artists of the New Millennium.”

We currently feature hundreds of short films, and over two hundred artists and studios including: Sony Imageworks, The Mill, The Embassy VFX, MPC, Animal Logic, and Rhythm and Hues Studios.

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SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

2:00 pm _ Live Action Shorts Competition Block 1

SATORI

BACKTRACK VODKA

· Satori by Tyler Doehring

In the near future, a soldier awakes in the woods with no memory of how he got there, and discovers a featureless doppelgänger lurking amongst the trees.

· Backtrack Vodka by Brandon Bruno

Time travel never tasted like this! When a hopeless romantic is introduced to timetraveling liquor, his chances suddenly escalate, as does his state of inebriation.

DESTROY MADRID

REAL ARTIST

· Destroy Madrid by Joseba Alfaro

Madrid, 2030. In a world ravaged by the fight between governments and citizens, one member of the resistance has got a mysterious device that can finally end the war.

Will he escape from the drones that guard the city?

· Real Artist by Cameo Wood

Against all odds, Sophia Baker just scored her dream interview at the world-famous Semaphore Animation Studios -- who’d have thought a fan edit of one of their hit films could land her a shot at a job? But when she meets arch, mysterious executive Anne Palladon, she soon learns all is not as she expects behind the curtain. Every instinct Sophia has ever had about art in filmmaking is about to be challenged.

Based on Nebula, Hugo and World Fantasy Award-winning author Ken Liu’s short story of the same name, Real Artists asks a poignant question: In a dystopian near-future where big data, AI and natural language processing learn and create quickly and at massive scale, what role can a single artist play? Is Sophia a creative rebel who can make a difference? Or is the situation more serious than that?

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SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

3:00 pm _ Live Action Shorts Competition Block 2

PLACE OF MY BIRTH

SLEEP AWAY

· Place of my Birth by Matt Harris-Freeth

Anthony has an implant embedded in his neck to stop the bad memories of a tragic accident. But when the implant stops working, he is confronted with his anger.

· Sleep Away by Christina Ruloff

What do we do with our time - our precious spare time? And what if we had more time... because we didn't have to sleep anymore? This film is a journey of discovery... how we spend our time and how we live our lives.

THE CONSEQUENCE OF RELIVING

HOP

· The Consequence of Reliving by Christien Bart-Gittens

Life is precious, every moment of it. This is something Noah, a not-so-ordinary boy, must soon discover. On his 18th birthday he learns that he possesses a unique ability, but just as he starts to explore the potential of his power, he suddenly has to make the most difficult decision of his life.

· Hop by Darion D'Anjou

See what they see. Hear what they hear. Quince tries a hip new designer drug and quickly learns its effect are far more than recreational.

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SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

4:00 pm _ Live Action Shorts Competition Block 3

REWINDER

SCREAMING AT THE STARS

· Rewinder by Jean-Luc Julien

After humanity’s excesses have depleted the water supply, one man journeys to the past to secure his future.

· Screaming at the Stars by Richie Moore [12:00 min]

On one of their first dates, Craig affectionately tells Lilly about star light, how the mere act of looking into the cosmos is a kind of transcendence. Craig, a brilliant young scientist will soon be embarking on a another kind of transcendence. He has discovered how to travel to parallel dimensions. But Lilly begins to question if the person sleeping next to her at night is the same Craig she fell in love with.

TO PLUTO

LUKE & THE VOID

· To Pluto by Yen-Ju Lee [15:00 min]

Huan, a nurse who finds herself stuck in her current job and a dying long distance relationship, meets Mr Chang, a cancer patient who is trying to find the family he abandoned before it's too late. An undelivered letter brings the two together and provides an unexpected solution to their problems.

· Luke & The Void by Matt Harris-Freeth [14:51 min]

A stylised and cinematic sci-fi short set in 1986. Only child, Luke has problems at home and at school, but he’s on a mission to leave it all behind.

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SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

5:00 pm _ Live Action Shorts Competition Block 4 · Best of the Best Finals & Judging by Audience 6:00 pm _ Special Award Winning Films

AMERCON

Amercon

by Michael Wright *Winner Of The 2017 IMAX Young Filmmakers Award!

An employee of an experimental technology company, James, has been sent to an alien planet. The trip left him disoriented and confused. Unaware of his purpose, he wanders the planet looking for a way out. James eventually runs into another employee of this company stranded on the planet. He then discovers the awful truth of his circumstance.

“Out of dozens of film submissions in the Young Filmmakers category, Amercon rose above the rest! Michael Wright is a gifted young filmmaker with a bright future in cinema ahead of him! We are excited and proud to see Michael Wright win the 2017 IMAX Young Filmmakers Award!”

– MCSFO

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SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

6:00 pm _ Special Award Winning Films, cont’d.

THE BEYOND

The Beyond

by Hasraf Dulull [1hr 30 min] *Recipient of Special Jury Award For Best Sci-Fi Feature Film Exclusive U.S. Premiere The Beyond is a science fiction documentary film that blends the realism of “found footage” with the fantastical, “big idea” nature of the science fiction films of today.

Set in 2019, The Beyond chronicles the groundbreaking mission which sent astronauts— modified with advanced robotics, through a newly discovered wormhole known as the Void.

When the mission returns unexpectedly, the space agency races to discover what the astronauts encountered on their first of its kind interstellar space journey.

“We’ve been supporting Hasraf (Haz) Dulull films since the festival’s inception and teaser in 2015, with shorts - SYNC and I.R.I.S.! Last year we screened the short film, Project Kronos—the basis for The Beyond. It is truly great to see a filmmaker grow right before your eyes! We are so pleased to see this film grow and join our elite list of smart sci-fi films like The Arrival, Moon and Interstellar! We are honored to present, The 2017 Best Sci-fi Feature Film Award to Hasraf Dulull for his film, The Beyond!”

– MCSFO

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SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

8:00 pm _ Curated Must-See Films

LOST BOY

Lost Boy

by Anthony Scott Burns and Ash Thorp [10 min]

LOST BOY is an ambitious sci-fi concept heavily influenced by the American action classics and Japanese samurai films. LOST BOY represents the second feature in a series of director-driven film projects from the Amsterdam-based production company, PostPanic Pictures.

TEARS IN THE RAIN

Tears in the Rain

by Christopher Grant Harvey [11:11]

In a dystopian Los Angeles future, retirement engineer John Kampff hunts down suspected Replicant Andy Smith. As John soon learns, Replicant detection is nearly impossible without specialist equipment. (A Blade Runner Fan Film)

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SATURDAY SCREENINGS at georgia tech

8:00 pm _ Curated Must-See Films, cont’d.

FIRE BASE

ZYGOTE

Fire Base

by Neill Blomkamp [26:52 min]

Set during the Vietnam war, Firebase follows American soldier Hines through an everdeepening web of science fiction madness—the fabric of space-time literally beginning to bend around him.

Zygote

by Neill Blomkamp [22:23 min]

Stars Dakota Fanning and Jose Pablo Cantillo. Stranded in an Arctic mine, two lone survivors are forced to fight for their lives, evading and hiding from a new kind of terror.

We’ve been huge fans of Neil Blomkamp since his critically acclaimed film, District 9!

Now with his own playground, Oats Studios, he’s able to create in total freedom!

Firebase and Zygote—two recent experimental releases is an example of how Blomkamp’s changing the game for filmmakers paving their own road. Getting the films directly to their audience and staying connected to them is paying off with these latest projects. This year we recognize Neill Blomkamp for creating two awesome film shorts and inspiring other filmmakers!

– MCSFO

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SUNDAY SCREENINGS

at regal atlantic station - imax Closing Out the 2nd Annual Atlanta Sci-fi Film Festival 2017 6:30 pm _ Award Ceremony

Announcing the Winners of: · Audience Choice Award for Best Live Action Sci-fi Short · Best CGI Short, IMAX Young Filmmakers Award · Best Sci-fi Feature Film 7:00 pm _ EXCLUSIVE SCREENING

Blade Runner

THE FINAL CUT in IMAX

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