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The Best of NFMLA Awards recognize the best talent in independent cinema from around the globe. The 2025 Awards honor 130 Nominees across 16 Award Categories. The Nominees are comprised of projects that screened as part of the NFMLA Monthly Film Festival 2024 season which ran from January 1st, 2024 through December 31st, 2024.

Winners

Best New Filmmaker

Ashley Eakin Best

Feature Film

Riley – Directed by Benjamin Howard and Produced by Benjamin Howard, Tommy Anderson & Laura Scarano

Best Documentary Feature Film

Impossible Town – Directed by Meg Griffiths, Scott Faris and Produced by Meg Griffiths, Brandon Hill & Alia Mansoori

Honorable Mention: The Walk – Directed by Tamara Kotevska and Produced by Harri Grace, Orlando von Einseidel, David Lan & Tracey Seaward

Best Short Film, Documentary

Woyane – Directed by Jonathan Stern and Produced by Jonathan Stern & Adam Fried

Best Short Film, Comedy

Golden Child – Directed by Hannah Levin and Produced by Hannah Levin & Gracie Catanzarite

Best Short Film, Drama

When Big People Lie – Directed by Gianfranco Fernández-Ruiz and Produced by Gus Murray & Kouxiao Amy Zhang

Best International Short Film, Comedy

Nea – Directed by Alex Ulises & Nelson G. Navarrete and Produced by Jesus Peña

Best International Short Film, Drama

The Steak – Directed and Produced by Kiarash Dadgar

Best Short Film, Animated

The Old Young Crow – Directed and Produced by Liam LoPinto

Best New Media & Experimental

Harlem Fragments – Directed by Cameron Tyler Carr and Produced by Flor Tejada, Collin Meath, Ben Thompson & Salma Qarnain

Best Screenplay

A Great Divide – Written by Jeff Yang, Jean Shim & Martina Nagel

Best Performance, Comedy

Carmen Sylvestre, Lumen

Best Performance, Drama

Rubab Rasheed, Eid Mubarak

Best Cinematography

Jonathan Stern, Woyane

Best Film Editing

Fatima Wardy, Hair Care

Best Sound Design

Abdolreza Heydari, The Steak

Best Score

Dan Deacon, A Body Called Life

nominees

  • Feature
  • Documentary Feature
  • Documentary Short
  • New Media & Experimental
  • Animation
  • International Comedy
  • International Drama
  • Drama Short
  • Comedy Short
  • Screenplay
  • Performance Drama
  • Performance Comedy
  • Cinematography
  • Film Editing
  • Sound Design
  • Score

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jury

Alvie Hurtado
Will Packer Productions
Amanda Lebow
Creative Artists Agency
Andrea Alarcon
Sundance Institute
Anna Klein
HBO
Arif Zaman
Boardwalk Pictures
Collin Litts
Anonymous Content
Dan Fisher
VMI Worldwide
Danny Rose
Danny Rose Media
David Baggelaar
Good Fear Content
Eliot Goldberg
101 Studios
Elissa Friedman
Zero Gravity Management
Emma Ho
Aggregate Films
Fernando Rodriguez-vila
Exile Content Studio
Gesumino Rulli
Legendary Entertainment
James Swoope
M88
Jared Corwin
Silver Lake Shorts
Julia Iglesias
Focus Features
Jungyoon Kim
Blumhouse
Kacie Fagan
Constantin Film
Kyle Whited
Fuse Media
Leonardo Zimbron
3Pas Studios
Lexie Chu
Skydance
Loreli Alanís 
Point Grey Pictures
Maggie Gilbride
DreamCrew
Margarette Griffin
CBS Studios
Marilyn Minton
Velvet Hammer Media
Missy Laney
Adult Swim
Prerna Obhan
Amazon Prime Video
Rachel Kiner-Lucas
Amazon MGM
Reena Singh
MACRO
Shannon Barrett Prynoski
Titmouse Inc.
Shelby Goldberg
United Talent Agency
Sophia Gholdoian
Left Handed Films
Tham Singpatanakul
Circle Management + Production
Vanessa Miranda
Warner Bros. Discovery
Yira Vilaro
Mediapro

sponsors

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