Rooftop Films Water Tower Feature Film Grant

Rooftop Films Water Tower Feature Film Grant is sponsored by Rooftop Films / Lawrence W. Levine Foundation. This grant provides funding for feature-length films at any stage of the filmmaking process.

While not exclusively faith-based, Rooftop Films has screened a wide range of independent films.

Filmmakers Fund Grantees – Rooftop Films About the Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Grants The Rooftop Filmmakers Fund is an opportunity to help our community of alumni filmmakers make their next movie and build sustainable careers in independent film. Rooftop Films has fourteen grants available—seven for feature length films and seven for short films.

Each year, Rooftop Films will give away over $45,000 in cash grants, over $30,000 of which helps fund four feature films. Our equipment and service grants are valued at more than $200,000 and come courtesy of our sponsors at Eastern Effects , NYCEDC , Edgeworx Studios , Parabolic , The Adrienne Shelly Foundation , elkind Lighting & Camera , Untouchable , DCTV , ARRI Rental , and Kate Geller Casting .

Past grantees include Nikyatu Jusu’s Nanny , Laura Moss ’ birth/rebirth , Eliza Hittman’s Never Rarely Sometimes Always , Gillian Robespierre’s Obvious Child , David Lowery’s Ain’t Them Bodies Saints , Benh Zeitlin’s Beasts of the Southern Wild , and many more. We’ve been screening films since 1997, and every filmmaker who has shown a film at the Rooftop Films Summer Series is eligible to apply for these grants.

The 2024 Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Grantees Are: Rooftop Films Water Tower Feature Film Grant As proud supporters of independent cinema, with the generous support of the Lawrence W. Levine Foundation, Rooftop Films has made over $30,000 available in cash grants for four feature-length films.

The Water Tower Feature Film Grant is a funding reserve designed to start flow at any junction in the filmmaking process by supplying critical resources.

Eliza Hittman | MOTHERLOVE The story centers around Ana, a Georgian immigrant in Brooklyn, who takes a job caring for Lori, an elderly woman in Manhattan, where she is forced to navigate end of life issues and complex family dynamics, while haunted by the separation from her own young daughter whom she has left behind in Tbilisi, Georgia.

Debra Granik & Alex Mallis | Untitled NY Cannabis Documentary (working title) The promise of legal weed in New York is pushed to its breaking point by an onslaught of illicit opportunists, weaponized stigma, and multi-billion dollar corporations racing to claim a share of the largest cannabis market in the world.

By design, newly enacted legislation should benefit those who were disproportionately impacted by the War on Drugs, but when idealism meets concrete, who wins and who loses in the future of cannabis in New York State? Rooftop Films and Eastern Effects Equipment Grant Eastern Effects is a film production rental house based in Brooklyn.

Since 1999, Eastern Effects has been providing Lighting & Grip Equipment Rentals for Independent Feature Films, Television Productions, Corporate & Industrial Videos, Student Filmmakers, and Live Broadcast. For this grant, Eastern Effects will award 30 days of lighting and grip equipment to one feature-length film.

Livia Huang | Our Triumphant Future As a close friendship unravels, Annie exchanges secrets on a counseling hotline with a frequent caller, older photographer Helen. Rooftop Films and NYCEDC Production Office Grant New York City Economic Development Corporation is the City’s primary vehicle for promoting economic growth in each of the five boroughs.

NYCEDC’s mission is to stimulate growth through expansion and redevelopment programs that encourage investment, generate prosperity and strengthen the City’s competitive position. For this grant, NYCEDC partnered with Brooklyn Army Terminal to offer production office space for recipients as they complete their works.

Adam Baran | In Loving Brotherhood In Loving Brotherhood presents first-hand accounts of the epic adventures of gay men who formed motorcycle clubs and traveled the open road to find one another from the post-WW2 era today. Together they ignited a movement that continues to impact modern gay identities, politics and queer culture.

Suzannah Herbert (director, co-producer) & Darcy McKinnon (co-producer) | Natchez Natchez is a feature documentary that explores the history and memory of the American South. Rooftop Films and Edgeworx Post-Production Grant Edgeworx Studios is a post-production house based in Brooklyn. With a sixteen-year track record, Edgeworx provides full service production and post-production.

Their areas of expertise include motion graphic design, animation, VFX, editorial and finishing. Harrison Atkins | Sour Minnows After witnessing a disturbing public ritual, two disaffected cinephiles find themselves helplessly drawn into the designs of an eerie creature beyond human comprehension.

Rooftop Films and ARRI Rental Camera Grant ARRI Rental’s mission is to be instrumental in realizing the creative visions of international film and program makers. As a service business within the ARRI group, ARRI Rental is focused on building client relationships through the provision of first-class camera, lighting, and grip equipment to the movie, television, advertising, and events markets.

High-quality hardware, innovative workflow solutions, and an unsurpassed level of service ensure long-term customer connections and a rock-solid brand reputation. They aim for warm welcomes, friendly expertise, personalized solutions, and relationships built on trust.

Jamil McGinnis | Wahnish Keeps Me Free Wahnish Keeps Me Free is an immersive hybrid documentary that explores Tallahassee, Florida, delving into the city’s history and dream-like HBCU homecoming culture. Using the musical cadence of Florida A&M University’s Marching 100, this project builds a vivid memory palace that reimagines fragmented intimate experiences, time and space, and the mystical aura hidden from the human eye.

Malika Zouhali-Worrall | Untitled Dystopia Film (working title) Like a Russian nesting doll, Untitled Dystopia Film unfurls to reveal a story within a story within a story where real-life and fictional dystopias collide in this hybrid documentary that examines an Egyptian novelist’s quest for a home in exile, and the limits of storytelling under authoritarianism.

Rooftop Films and Parabolic Sound Mix Grant Parabolic is a full service audio post-production facility for film, television, documentary, and web content in the heart of New York City’s Flatiron District. Encompassing partnership, collaboration and creative control between all disciplines, Parabolic offers all the necessary facilities and technologies in one space for comprehensive audio post production packages.

With two state-of-the-art Dolby certified Mix stages constructed with superlative acoustics and isolation, as well as ADR and Foley, Parabolic can boast a facility that is as advanced technologically as it is aesthetically comfortable.

Trade teleports seamlessly between and among over a dozen industry-facing trade shows in a kaleidoscopic exploration of labor, consumerism, community, and an array of market-based solutions to pressing contemporary issues as they are bought and sold within the walls of convention centers across North America.

Rooftop Films and Kate Geller Casting Grant Close friends Alex and Yan Bo, eighth graders, cram for a test in a prestigious prep school. Once they’re accused of cheating off one another, their friendship is threatened. Rooftop Films and Kodak Film Stock Short Film Grant When George Eastman marketed the first commercial transparent roll film in 1889, it enabled inventor Thomas Edison to develop the first motion picture camera in 1891.

By 1896, Kodak was marketing film specially coated for motion picture use. Even with today’s digital technologies, a faction of filmmakers continue to use Kodak film to record the action on movie sets, and in some countries, those movies are still distributed to theaters as printed copies on film. Since the inception of the Academy Awards, more than 80 Oscar®-winning “Best Pictures” have been shot on Kodak film.

The company even has nine Oscar® statuettes of its own — for scientific and technical excellence. That’s more than any non-studio company – not surprising given that Kodak has been involved in technological innovations throughout the industry’s history. Shuli Huang | News From New York As day meets with night, we become a fly on the wall to two seemingly innocent strangers entering a rendezvous in the underbelly of New York City.

Rooftop Films and Adrienne Shelly Foundation Short Film Grant For Women The Adrienne Shelly Foundation is a 501c3 non-profit organization dedicated in loving memory to the uniquely gifted actor and filmmaker Adrienne Shelly, whose highly accomplished life was tragically cut short November 1, 2006.

ASF supports the artistic achievements of female actors, writers and directors through a series of scholarships and grants, providing recipients with financial support and consultative access to the Foundation’s advisory board of actors, directors, producers, composers, law, publicity, academic and trade professionals.

Reflecting Adrienne’s spirit, generosity, courage and whimsy, its goal is to recognize the passion and commitment of women artists in creating their work, and provide them with support and guidance during periods of transition and struggle. For this grant, ASF will award provide funding support for a short film directed by a female filmmaker. Noemi Sjöberg | City woman City woman explores the impact of urban space on women.

Urban reconfiguration from a gender perspective is imperative. Women experience limited freedom in public spaces due to factors like apprehension, education, or criminality, leading to the adoption of restrictive routines. Rooftop Films and DCTV Short Film Grant Founded in 1972, DCTV has grown into one of the leading documentary production and film education centers in the country.

A community of and for documentary filmmakers located in a landmark firehouse in NYC’s Chinatown, DCTV is a unique space where community screenings, discussions, youth media, and continuing education programs, all exist side by side with award-winning documentary work. DCTV will provide credits to two separate filmmakers to be put toward registration in DCTV Workshops and DCTV Presents screenings and events.

Rebecca Blandón | Morgan Twins (working title) Retired identical twin morticians, Marvin and Melvin Morgan, search for their great-grandmother’s unmarked grave in the segregated cemeteries of North Carolina while reflecting on those they have laid to rest over 20 years as New York City’s most influential morgue technicians.

Harriet Tubman’s final resting place, Auburn’s dual identity—a symbol of freedom and a prison town, encapsulating America’s contradictions. Rooftop Films and Untouchable Short Film Scoring Grant Untouchable is a full service music scoring and audio post-production company based in Brooklyn, New York.

Founded by Eliot Leigh and William Chu, Untouchable combines Eliot’s extensive music and technical expertise with Will’s wide-ranging work in visual media. They work with a roster of music, post-audio, and voiceover talent in the US and abroad, ensuring clients’ and filmmakers’ projects sound as good as they look. Steve Collins | Dust Devils A shy motel maid meets a bold sex worker that causes her to question her life choices.

Set in the high desert, Dust Devils uses the vast emptiness to process the loneliness of existence with a bone dry comic bent. Rooftop Films and elkind Lighting & Camera Short Film Grant elkind Lighting & Camera takes pride in putting together the lightest, tightest, and brightest packages around for use locally and worldwide, also providing red camera packages with Leica and Zeiss primes and Canon Zooms.

Harriet Tubman’s final resting place, Auburn’s dual identity—a symbol of freedom and a prison town, encapsulating America’s contradictions. Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Short Film Grant Rooftop Films puts aside $1 from every ticket purchased and submission fee to support the production of new short films directed by Rooftop Film alumni. David Delafuente | Dungeon Dungeon is a short animated film that journeys through a forgotten place.

A quest for what remains hidden, beneath the images of swords and spells, in the common language of fantasy and queerness. Deep down inside, time does not exist. Zhen Li | For Everyone’s Safety A woman in a black dress visits a disappearing village town.

A camel-man searches for water in a reborn landscape. Everyone is waiting for the flood to arrive. Josh Locy (director, co-writer) & Kristin Slaysman (co-writer, producer, actor) | Potato Potato Cynthia is friendless, single, and very pregnant.

When she writes a letter to her unborn baby about her hopes for the future, the baby writes back. Potato Potato is a black comedy about motherhood, connection, and the infinite mystery of the uterus. Claire Read | Penn F-cking Station Penn F-cking Station is a gritty city-politics saga that follows the debate over how to fix New York’s Penn Station.

But when the battle breaks out between the city’s power brokers and the city’s residents, what’s at stake is not just a train station; it’s the future of New York City. A young boy’s dream of becoming a doctor is challenged when war forces him and his mother to flee their village and start a new life in New York City.

Rooftop Films and Kayla Thomas Filmmaker Grant The Kayla Thomas Filmmaker grant, in commemoration of our dear friend and teammate, will be rewarded every year to one or more Rooftop Films alumni filmmakers to help them to complete a short or feature film that communicates the power of hope, collaboration and togetherness to make positive change.

As we were creating this grant we knew we wanted to help new films get made, and particularly to support films that we thought would make Kayla happy. Florentina Gonzalez | Huesos de Azucar (Sugar Bones) In the near future, a new bone degenerative disease derived from the lack of nutrients in food will become pandemic.

Reckless, a group of sick friends decide to leave everything behind and go on the road to spend their last vacation together. Guy Kozak | Melody of Love The romantic advances of a beautiful damsel trigger a cowboy’s psychosexual nightmare in this surreal exploration into the strange heart of one of Hollywood’s most sacred masculine archetypes.

The 2023 Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Grantees Were: Rooftop Films Water Tower Feature Film Grant Carlos López Estrada | Kill Yr Idols Combining the high energy raucous humor of Superbad with the heartfelt and place-specific introspection of Y Tu Mamá También , Kill Yr Idols is a comedic coming of age punk rock journey through the Rio Grande Valley.

In 48 hours, best friends Carlos and Leo will finally play the first show of their teenage lives, opening for local legend Ramona Casas—if they can convince anyone at their high school to show up for it. Jodie Mack | Early Mourning, Tarpon Springs/Lindsey’s Color Service An auto-ethnography by way of a personal excavation and study of Floridian car culture.

A bereaved sibling unearths the details of a car accident in the state of Florida uncovering three types of ghosts: individual, collective, and ecological. (pictured above) Madeleine Sims-Fewer & Dusty Mancinelli | Honey Bunch Honey Bunch is a psychological horror about what it takes to sustain a marriage.

Reid Davenport | Life After In Life After , disabled filmmaker Reid Davenport reveals that we’re on the brink of a dystopia in which state-sanctioned death is unabashedly prescribed as a cure for disability.

Rooftop Films and NYCEDC Production Office Grant Cheryl Furjanic | Adventures in Miscarriage After a traumatic pregnancy loss, a lesbian filmmaker navigates her grief using surrealist humor to pull back the curtain on miscarriage care in the United States. Sierra Pettengill | Steel (working title) Rooftop Films and Eastern Effects Equipment Grant Alex Ross Perry | Pavements A kaleidoscopic portrait of the iconic band Pavement.

Rooftop Films and Edgeworx Post-Production Grant James P. Gannon & Matt Ferrin | Hardpan Hardpan tells the story of a young demolition derby driver who becomes stranded in the desert after crashing his car in the American Southwest. Injured and alone, he has only a case of beer to survive on and a cheesy romance novel on tape as his sole companion.

He must relay on his ingenuity to transform his wrecked car into something that can save him. Rooftop Films and Irving Harvey Color Correction Grant Elizabeth Lo | Mistress Dispeller Wang Zhenxi works as a “mistress dispeller” in China, hired to maintain the bounds of marriage — and break up affairs — by any means necessary.

Untitled Mistress Dispeller Project follows Ms. Wang’s work as she attempts to bring couples back from the edge of crisis, offering strikingly intimate access to private lives usually hidden behind closed doors. The film will shift our sympathies between husband, wife, and mistress to explore the ways class, capital, and cultural norms collide to shape romantic relationships in contemporary China.

Rooftop Films and Parabolic Sound Mix Grant Andrew Thomas Huang | Tiger Girl Set in 1967 Los Angeles, Tiger Girl is a coming of age fantasy about a repressed Chinese American teenage girl haunted by a tiger lurking in her attic. When pressured by her immigrant mother’s rigid social expectations, the girl must learn that the beast upstairs is the tiger within that will set her free.

Rooftop Films and Adrienne Shelly Foundation Short Film Grant For Women Ash Brandon | PAT! PAT! PAT!

PAT! PAT! PAT!

is a hybrid-documentary on Patricia “Pat” Palinkas, who in 1970 went from first-grade school teacher to overnight gridiron phenom and pariah, becoming the first woman to ever play professional football. Rooftop Films and DCTV Short Film Grant Julia Mendoza Friedman | Jason, Champion Jason, a New York City maintenance man, moonlights as a competitive pigeon racer.

He is a self-declared one of the top-three pigeon racers in Staten Island, and in 2023 New York City Viola Pigeon Race, his birds will go up against his biggest competitor and former training partner- his Uncle.

Sister Sylvester (director, co-producer) & Laudiceia Calixto (co-producer) | The Maids’ The Mai ds The Maids’ The Maids is a film made in collaboration with domestic workers, in response to Jean Genet’s notorious 1947 play The Maids . Using Genet’s trope of maids role-playing as their employer, a ritual transgression that becomes a rebellion, contemporary domestic workers stage experiences from their own lives.

Rooftop Films and Untouchable Short Film Scoring Grant Julia Mendoza Friedman | Jason, Champion Jason, a New York City maintenance man, moonlights as a competitive pigeon racer. He is a self-declared one of the top-three pigeon racers in Staten Island, and in 2023 New York City Viola Pigeon Race, his birds will go up against his biggest competitor and former training partner- his Uncle.

Rooftop Films and elkind Lighting & Camera Short Film Grant Sister Sylvester (director, co-producer) & Laudiceia Calixto (co-producer) | The Maids’ The Mai ds The Maids’ The Maids is a film made in collaboration with domestic workers, in response to Jean Genet’s notorious 1947 play The Maids .

Using Genet’s trope of maids role-playing as their employer, a ritual transgression that becomes a rebellion, contemporary domestic workers stage experiences from their own lives.

Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Short Film Grant Don Josephus Raphael Eblahan | Antropicalia: The Modern Prometheus Victoria (F/63), a retired zoologist known for developing a language system used to speak to animals during the 70s, is brought out of her seclusion, plunging her back into the wild- in order to help the police locate and retrieve a Feral Man accused of murders in a forest village Kate E.

Hinshaw | Teflon Body Rot Teflon Body Rot explores the human cost of an industry that poisoned the water in coastal Carolina and the industries that benefits from this crisis through pedaling false cures. Kati Skelton | The Arbiter Two groups of men meet once per year in a hotel ballroom to play a game of their own invention. When they enter into a dispute over the game, an arbiter appears to help them solve their conflict.

Ryan Weibush | Good Mother Reptile Sometimes we don’t know anything. Other times, all we have is an allusion to a beat poet in a book about a string of mysterious cattle deaths. Rooftop Films and Kayla Thomas Filmmaker Grant Stephen Neary | Living with a Visionary As the pandemic descends, a poet and professor cares for his wife of 50 years, learning to live alongside her worsening hallucinations.

Based on the short memoir Living with a Visionary , by John Matthais, first published in The New Yorker. Sean Pecknold | Thank You, My Friend A robotic vacuum suffering from burnout quits its job at a hospital and sets out to find community and a greater purpose on a quiet street where two lonely rabbits are stuck in perpetual loops.

The 2022 Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Grantees Were: Rooftop Films Water Tower Feature Film Grant Eleanor Mortimer | How Deep Is Your Love The deep sea has come to represent a final frontier of human discovery; the last wilderness on earth. The film follows biologists through the intricate process of discovering deep-sea species as they piece together the unknown ecosystems of the largest biome on the planet.

Rooftop Films and TCS Camera Grant Amalia Ulman | Magic Farm An American film crew working for an edgy media company travels to Argentina to cover a musician who has the potential to go viral. Rooftop Films and NYCEDC Production Office Grant Catalina Jordan Alvarez | Sound Spring Sound Spring is an anthology documentary about Yellow Springs, a midwestern village in Ohio with a unique civil rights legacy.

Its history distinguishes itself, because unlike today, when many communities have been fractured by racism and economic disparity, members of this community have confronted inequality together. Each resident portrayed helped create their own scene, based on an audio interview the filmmaker conducted with them.

Rooftop Films and Eastern Effects Equipment Grant Madeleine Hunt-Ehrlich | The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire How does a woman at the center of history disappear from it? For years the impact of Suzanne Césaire, one of the mothers of négritude, was overshadowed by the fame of her husband Aimé Césaire. The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire brings to life the images we might have had if history had been recorded differently.

Rooftop Films and Edgeworx Post-Production Grant Martin Hawk | Pressure Gradient Pressure Gradient explores the shades between love, rage, and rebellion as a black person surviving America. Set in Rochester, New York shortly after the murder of George Floyd, the city reels in the wake of another, Daniel Prude’s slaughter was covered up for months with collaborative effort between the Police Chief and the Mayor.

Dynamically captured from the ground level, this film shows the anguish, resilience, and majesty of a community reborn from the ashes of segregation and oppression. Taking their fight from the streets all the way to their rightful place at the seat of government.

Rooftop Films and elkind Lighting & Camera Grant Marnie Ellen Hertzler | Eternity One Situated in the waters of the Chesapeake Bay, off the coast of Virginia, Tangier Island is quickly disappearing into the sea. By 2040 this crabbing community will be completely submerged, making the 300 remaining residents some of America’s first climate refugees.

Eternity One explores the extremes of how science, technology, and spirituality could offer much needed salvation to the sinking island, and perhaps ourselves. What will we do in the face of unstoppable change? Rooftop Films and Irving Harvey Color Correction Grant Mike Ott & Isolda Dychauk | Wunderkind A new feature length work of non-fiction fiction by Mike Ott and Isolda Dychauk.

Rooftop Films and Parabolic Sound Mix Grant Brett Story & Stephen Maing | Union An intimate portrait of current and former Amazon workers taking on one of the world’s largest and most powerful companies in the fight to unionize. Rooftop Films and Adrienne Shelly Foundation Grant For Women Amina Sutton | Beach Floaty Thingys It’s the summer 1998, Grace and Hope have a plan.

They are going to attend their annual family reunion in Raleigh, NC then drop their introverted niece Bryanna off with their sister Vanessa. Then spend the rest of their paid time off picking up bikers and beach bums down at exotic Myrtle Beach, SC. But when they arrive at their sister Vanessa’s house their girls’ weekend plans are tossed out the window.

Rooftop Films and DCTV Grant A short multimedia film based on a poem of the same title that pays tribute to the spirit of José, a man, husband and father who died due to lack of health care access because of his immigration status.

Eugene Kolb | Berserk (working title) A non-confrontational filmmaker explores the various facets of masculinity and its relationship to violence and aggression after getting punched in the face by an unprovoked stranger.

Rooftop Films and Untouchable Short Film Scoring Grant Christopher Radcliff | We Were The Scenery In 1975, Hoa Thi Le and Hue Nguyen Che fled from Vietnam by boat and docked in the Philippines, where they were utilized as background extras during the filming of Apocalypse Now .

Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Short Film Grant Adam Baran | The Nine Plus Club From 1965-79, The Nine Plus Club was the hottest private fraternity for gay leathermen seeking sex and camaraderie in New York City’s after hours. With newly unearthed archival footage and interviews with surviving members, The Nine Plus Club takes us inside a forgotten landmark of queer history.

A young woman wants to escape from her abusive relationship at any cost except if it means leaving her pet dog behind. BUBBA is written and produced by Nina Buxton and Hannah Samuel. Nathan Truesdell | Untitled Fireworks Project Tensions rise on a busy street as news organizations and local residents witness an extremely volatile situation turn into a literal powder keg.

Rooftop Films and Kayla Thomas Filmmaker Grant Jordan Wong | Destiel Is Canon and Love, In Fact, Does Not Win On September 18th, 2008, the hit series Supernatural blessed the world with “Lazarus Rising”, the 1st episode of the 4th season. There, the character of Castiel (played by Misha Collins) was introduced. Almost immediately, the Supernatural fandom began shipping Castiel with Dean (played by Jensen Ackles) and “Destiel” was born.

After 15 seasons, Supernatural finally made Destiel canon, but at what cost? Anna Margaret Hollyman | WÜM Bennett, a recently escaped Manhattanite and queer choreographer, joins, WÜM, an upstate New York Mommy group in an attempt to navigate their new life as a parent to their newborn, Edie.

What is supposed to be a supportive space turns into a Hipster-Stepford wife pile-on with Bennett smothered smack in the middle by white lady “wokeness. ” Joe Bonacci | Cat Stickers: End of Days In light of the stabbing [at the end of the previous episode] Tabitha and Joe begrudgingly attend court mandated therapy. The butchering of Joe’s cherished limbs is discussed and Tabitha must reflect on the wretched person she has become.

Joe has acquired even greater wealth and real estate from further lawsuits. Joe’s decorative plans unfold in therapy, in spite of massive push-back from both the therapist and Tabitha.

The 2021 Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Grantees Were: Rooftop Films Water Tower Feature Film Grant Stefani Saintonge & Yvonne Michelle Shirley | Point 5 Point 5 is a web series created by New Negress Film Society inspired by the edicts of the Black Panthers — compiling audacious anti-racist and Black feminist scholarship and transforming their directives into imaginative, enlightening and cinematic digital content.

The series will investigate vital theories on the function of systemic oppression while exploring radical ideas for liberation. (pictured above) Sharon Yeung & Natalie Chao | We Are Volcanoes Rooftop Films and TCS Camera Grant Jamil McGinnis & Pat Heywood | In Search of Time Over the course of one day and night, a nine-year-old boy journeys across Brooklyn to return his classmate’s notebook.

Inspired by Iranian legend Abbas Kiarostami’s remarkable approach to narrative cinema, In Search of Time is a meditation on home, childhood discovery, and the poetry of everyday life.

Rooftop Films and NYCEDC Production Office Grant Michael Almereyda | Zero K Don Delillo’s Zero K centers on a tech billionaire in his sixties and his estranged son, brought together at a remote compound where the rich man’s second wife is preparing for cryonic preservation. The story toggles between this mysterious facility and New York, with characters exploring perceptions of death, immortality, desire, and transcendence.

Producing team: Anthony Katagas, Jay Van Hoy, Per Melita and Renee Frigo. Rooftop Films and Eastern Effects Equipment Grant Laura Moss | birth/rebirth birth/rebirth is a psychological horror film about motherhood and creation, inspired by Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

The film is centered around two female protagonists, a single mother and a childless morgue technician who are bound together by their relationship to a re-animated little girl.

Rooftop Films and Edgeworx Post-Production Grant Steve Maing & Eric Metzgar | The Great Experiment The Great Experiment is a poetic reimagining of America, a symphonic ensemble of divergent lives, all vying for survival and belonging in a rapidly changing nation.

Rooftop Films and Irving Harvey Color Correction Grant Jesse McLean | Light Needs An experimental documentary about houseplants who cohabitate with people and the surprisingly intimate and complex relationships that can develop between them. Light Needs asks us to rethink the connections humans have with nonhumans, and the responsibility for care towards other living beings.

Rooftop Films and Parabolic Sound Mix Grant Haley Elizabeth Anderson | Tendaberry This project will also receive the NYCEDC Brooklyn Army Terminal Production Office Grant.

Rooftop Films and Red Hook Post Sound Mix Grant Penny Lane | Confessions of a Good Samaritan Director Penny Lane’s decision to become a “Good Samaritan” by giving one of her kidneys to a stranger kicks off a funny and moving personal quest to understand the nature of altruism.

Confessions of a Good Samaritan is a provocative inquiry into the science, history and ethics of organ transplantation, asking an ancient question in a whole new way: who is your neighbor, and what do you owe them?

Rooftop Films and Adrienne Shelly Foundation Grant For Women Days from giving birth, a pregnant woman tries to relax and get her ducks in a row and have some fun and do everything she has to do before the baby arrives and changes everything.

Rooftop Films and DCTV Grant Zelene Suchilt | Se llamaba José ( José Was His Name ) A short multimedia film based on a poem of the same title that pays tribute to the spirit of José, a man, husband and father who died due to lack of health care access because of his immigration status.

Jing Wang & Mel Gonzalez | No-contact delivery No-contact Delivery is a short documentary exploring the challenges immigrant delivery workers have experienced during the pandemic in New York City. Rooftop Films and elkind Lighting & Camera Grant Alex Wolf