Film Fest Open for Submissions

The Hamptons International Film Festival has opened its annual film submission process. It also announced that it is now an Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences qualifying festival for the documentary short subject category. The academy gives out the Oscars to recognize filmmaking achievement.

The festival is already a qualifying festival for short live action films. Now, a winner of its documentary short film competition will be eligible to enter the documentary short subject category of the Academy Awards without a standard theatrical run.

Three of 2015’s Oscar-nominated short documentaries were screened at October’s festival. They were “Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah,” “Body Team 12,” and “Last Day of Freedom.”

A showcase for diverse films by international filmmakers, the festival has four competitive categories: narrative feature, documentary feature, narrative short film, documentary short film, and has programs in seven non-competitive categories. Across all categories, films shown at last fall’s festival earned 36 Oscar nominations in all.

This year’s festival takes place from Oct. 6 through Oct. 10.