I Promise Africa, 2:40 min, Public Service Announcement
Jerry Henry, Director/Producer
When Jerry Henry set off to Kenya to make a documentary about orphans he didn’t realize that he would be preserving on tape the voices of a generation that would soon be silenced.
Winner of the Jury Award
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iThemba, 5:19 min, Documentary Short
Keefe Murren, Director/Producer, Nelson Walker III, Director/Producer, Lynn True, Director
Through the mesmerizing melding of their voices, the Sinikithemba Choir turns stage into soapbox, singing and speaking for the 5 million HIV+ South Africans in desperate need of medication and support.
Winner of the Health Advocacy Award
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Seeds of Hope: South Africa, 6:12 min, International Documentary
Sarah Hesterman, Director/Producer, Produced by Gotham Pictures,
Funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation
Solutions to poverty and malnutrition require resourcefulness and dedication. A group of women in a South African township learn how to sustain themselves and their children.
Winner of the Environment Award
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The Meatrix, 3:47 min, Flash Animation
Louis Fox, Director, Produced by Free Range Graphics in conjunction with the Global Resource Action Center for the Environment
Will Leo the pig take the blue pill and remain in a fantasyland where quaint family farms produce food for our tables or will he take the red pill and get a cruel welcome to the real world?
Winner of the Film for Thought Award
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Laugh at the Fat Kid, 7:57 min, Narrative Short
Kristina Schoentag, Director/Producer
Whimsical and visually creative, "Laugh at the Fat Kid" intimately portrays a young boy caught in a cycle of ridicule and overeating, forcing the viewer to ask "What's wrong with this picture?"
Winner of the Peter Yarrow Peace in Our Classrooms Award
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Lean on Me, 1:46 min, Youth Digital Story
Harold Clinton, Director, The Center for Reflective Community Practice at
MIT and Creative Narrations, Producers
When the mayor’s office says “no,” a group of kids find their own way to make their dream for a safe place to play basketball a reality.
Winner of the SEE CHANGE, MAKE CHANGE Youth Digital Story Award
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Books Not Bars, 3:44 min, Campaign Portrait
Mark Landsman, Director/Producer for WITNESS
A growing number of youth are questioning the way their state governments spend money. The teens of the Books Not Bars movement demand that education, not incarceration, be the priority, now and in the future.
Winner of the Criminal Justice Award
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The Children of Birmingham, 6:17 min, Animation
Rebecca Yenawine, Director, Kids on the Hill, Producer
Through stirring narration and beautiful illustrations, Baltimore middleschool students tell the story of their 1960s counterparts who fought for their civil rights.
Winner of the SEE CHANGE, MAKE CHANGE Youth Video Award
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Day of Remembrance, 8:00 min, Political Documentary
Cynthia Fujikawa, Director/Producer
The legislators behind the Patriot Act claim to have made America safer, but in the process they have destroyed the lives of thousands of innocent Arab and Muslim Americans. Day of Remembrance calls attention to this tragic phenomenon and reminds us that American history has a tendency to repeat itself.
Winner of the Racial Justice Award
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Dedicated to My Family, 3:51 min, Personal Documentary
Nicole Sobottke, Director, Reel Grrls at 911 Media Arts Center, Producer
Nicole dreams about a perfect family. Living in a teen shelter, she has learned that family is where the heart is.
Winner of the Family and Society Award
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Struggling to Survive, 7:37 min, Youth Documentary
Dana Hall, Ashley Potter and Mary Profitt, Directors, Appalshop’s
Appalachian Media Institute, Producer
Having a job doesn’t mean you make enough to get by. Teenagers in eastern Kentucky turn their cameras on the living wage crisis in their community.
Winner of the Youth Documentary Award
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The Sixth Section, 8:10 min, Social Documentary
Alex Rivera, Director/Producer, Produced in association with
P.O.V./American Documentary
Sometimes the “American Dream” is realized on foreign soil. During the cold winters of upstate New York, a group of immigrants work together to give a baseball field, an ambulance and whatever else they can manage to their hometown of Boqueron, Mexico.
Winner of the American Dream Award
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Novela, Novela, 7:20 min, International Documentary
Elizabeth Miller, Director/Producer
Every afternoon, millions of Nicaraguans gather around their TV sets to watch their favorite imported novela (soap opera). What would happen if a group of activists produced a homegrown novela about real issues
like safe sex and domestic abuse?
Winner of the Women’s Rights Award
» Learn more about this film

Bush for Peace, 1:56 min., Satirical Short
Sarah Christman, Director/Producer, Jen Simmons, Director/Producer
It’s Dubbya as you’ve never heard him before in a re-mix of U.S. foreign policy created from the Commander-in-Chief’s “Moment of Truth” speech. Bush for Peace is at once a fantasy, a satire, and an earnest plea to stop the violence.
Winner of the Politics and Government Award
» Learn more about this film

Spring in Awe, 4 min, Experimental Short
Martina Radwan, Director/Producer, Moira Demos, Producer
The overpowering displays of Times Square put a spell on the world in a disturbing lullaby of global capitalism.
Winner of the Media Awareness Award
» Learn more about this film

POPaganda: The Art & Subversion of Ron English, 8:24 min, Portrait
Pedro Carvajal, Director/Producer
A modern-day Robin Hood of Madison Avenue, artist and satirist Ron English reclaims corporate billboards with uncanny canvases that force the man on the street to look twice…or maybe three times.
Winner of the Media Literacy Award
» Learn more about this film

If you want to purchase a DVD of these short films, instead of downloading them, please go to the Media That Matters website.

A desperate wife turns to the Santera looking for a miracle: she wants the forces of Santería to stop her husband from leaving her.

And when the sacred conch shells roll over the carpet…the future has just arrived.

From then on, both women will witness the Santería´s full power in action and this old ancient African wisdom will shine brightly until its task is finally completed.

Lucia acude a "Santeria Milagrosa" en busca de un milagro para que su marido no la abandone.

Necesita un "Amarre" de Santería para atar a un ser querido.

Y cuando la Santera tira las carcolas ... el futuro de llegar.

Ambas presenciarán a partir de ese instante toda la fuerza de la Santería en acción y esta ancestral sabiduría africana brillará con todo su esplendor para cumplir su ardua tarea.

Nuyorican Dream chronicles the struggles and aspirations of the Torres-Gutierrez clan, a Puerto Rican family trying to rise above and stick together in New York. But the effects of urban poverty run deep: eldest son Robert suffers alienation after becoming the first family member to graduate from college; siblings Beti and Tati deal with drug addiction; and mother Marta resorts to selling her homemade pasteles to support the extended family. Nuyorican Dream is not just about “making it” in America, but about making it with the family intact.

Set in a New York of the near future, complete with flying cars and glowing red cockroaches, "Red Cockroaches" is a mind bending and morally ambiguous astounding visual experience.

A man in his twenties meets a mysterious young woman who disrupts the banality of his day-to-day existence. Together, they will embark on an obsessive-destructive journey revealing dark family secrets and forbidden desires.

Miguel Coyula has created a work that is completely unexpected both in form and content. By using a different camera setup for every shot, and carefully planned transitions, he has created a visual feast in which no moment is like any other. This is the result of a two-year effort on a budget of $2,000 and a passion for filmmaking. Shot entirely using a portable digital camcorder and edited on a home computer, Red Cockroaches pushes to the limit the notion of what a "no budget" film can offer.