The Kieth Brothers (Chris and Clete, sons of actor Byron Kieth) produced and directed this comedy about a dysfunctional family gathering at their father's Beverly Hills estate to celebrate his 75th birthday. Vividly funny and filled with humorous digressions like blow-up dolls, an eBay addiction, and a sneaky, silent gardener, this indie production bounces along with the spit-fire dialogue, outright looniness, and memorable characters rarely found in mainstream Hollywood productions.

In 1991, Rick Walker was convicted for a murder he did not commit. After 12 years in some of California's most dangerous prisons, he was exonerated, and entitled to $100 for each day of false imprisonment. That started a whole new battle: becoming a political pawn in the fight over California's budget. This engaging story, about one man's struggle for justice in the current era of bitter partisanship, examines the ideal, the hope, that our elected officials can transcend their narrow perspectives and be inspired to do the right thing.

"South Park" meets the Yuletide season as eight-year old Leroy has just seen the girl next door and is in love! Now, what does a quick witted eight year old with no money and no help from family get a girl for Christmas?

Abandoned

Adina's Deck:
The Case of the Online Crush

Set in a modern day Renaissance Fair, "All's Faire in Love" is about a dysfunctional group of renaissance fair enthusiasts in Elizabethan dress-up, dishing out all the kooky trickery and deceit the royals, peasants, and witches can throw at an audience.

Director Scott Marshall, son of comedy king Gary Marshall and nephew of Penny Marshall, has a funny bone going back to the days of "Laverne and Shirley," "Happy Days," and movies like "Pretty Woman" and "Beaches."

EIFF is proud and happy to present one of the first screenings of this brand new, madcap, romantic comedy. The cast is marvelous: Christina Ricci, Ann-Margret, Cedric the Entertainer, and Owen Benjamin among others. EIFF audiences will be laughing often and easy. A festival gem.

Ascending the Giants

Autism is a major growing health problem in America and there are many theories as to why. This feature length documentary examines what autism is, peels away many misconceptions, and shows how concerned parents and health care providers can finally take some solace in finding effective treatments for this debilitating childhood disease.

First time writer/director Will Dages out of Kent, Ohio gives us a memorable short about love at first sight-a couple in love that have to decide between doing what they want and what's right. Add in a third party, who is unknowingly keeping them apart, and this film becomes a moving journey about loving someone you cannot be with.

Canadian actress Sharon Lewis ("Degrassi: The Next Generation") gets behind the camera to direct this moving, atmospheric, Sci-Fi short. The Aretians, who survive underground on dumped waste, are experts in recycling and re-using rubbish. Sunlight and clean water are scarce. But the artist Chain, along with her lover Fric, decide to buck the accepted doctrine of functionality and grow something completely useless...a beautiful Gerbera daisy. Charged with the crime of "wasting" water, the jury sentences them to take turns shooting themselves until one dies. But before Fric will fire the gun at himself he demands to see the flower. The Artisan people begin to demand it as well, and they are shown the first flower they have ever seen. A riveting story.

A mysterious salesman arrives at the doorstep of an Inventor and his wife and offers them an important component that will change their lives, or not.

This insightful documentary is a chronicle of how a community responds to out-of-state energy speculators who wish to build LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) terminals in the Columbia River Estuary near Astoria, Oregon. Grass roots activism, salmon recovery, native perspectives and cultural issues make this a moving story of America at the crossroads of sustainable energy or reliance on foreign fossil fuel.

Loner, slacker, and all-round flop with the ladies, Alexander is a matchmaker who gets people together based on their fun and funny last name combinations - like Hanus-Deeds or Harrie-Privates. And when it works, as it often does, he gets to keep the humorous wedding announcements as trophies.

The emotional strain of trying to steer a dysfunctional family in the right direction is explored in "Diamond." Eleven year old Diamond tries to connect with his father, who is in jail. His grandmother arrives to take care of him, but she thinks the father is nothing but poison for the child. Diamond grows more and more desperate to see his Dad.

In a parked car in a residential neighborhood, father and son discuss love, sex, mother and death. Oh, did they mention mother? It's "an atypical connivance, a fissional relationship" and above all it's great dialogue in a mystery about what these two are about to undertake.

This animated painting explores the quixotic nature of memory where the emotional space between motherhood and daughterhood intersect. We watch as the painting repeatedly layers new images on top of the old with expressive brushwork - a metaphor for the way we bring to each life experience the sum of all the previous ones

A young illegal immigrant couple spends their time furtively avoiding the German authorities. When they have to enroll their young son in school, they are likely to be exposed and maybe deported. Their sleazy landlord has comes up with a plan to help them. Winner of several independent short film awards.

Gerald the dog has been scheduled for termination by the pound at 5:00 - but he's full of hope, putting on an expressive face as each person walks by his cage, imagining what it would be like to be their ideal pet. Winner of the Best Animation Prize of the 2009 International Family Film Festival.


"Gerald’s Last Day” headlines a collection of family friendly shorts with 100% of the ticket sales for this group of films going to support Greenhill Humane Society.  Saturday, October 10, Theater 13, 1:00 PM.  Tickets available from Greenhill Humane Society.

Take a journey with two children through the woods of a magical town where they encounter the haunted tree known as The Ghost-Eye Tree. Experience the wonder of their imaginations as they embark on an adventure they will never forget. Produced and crewed entirely from students and alumni of Five Towns College in Dix Hills, NY.

This pilot is a short for an actual show in development. Animated in bright colors and original textures, we enter the mind of a young boy, Gideon, as he takes us on a fun and adventurous ride through the sky battling the Red Barron.

Goalball is a sport that was created for blinded war veterans in the 1940s, now played by visually impaired teens in schools for the blind. This documentary tells the story of three visually impaired teens who play at the Oregon School for the Blind. Led by their coach Eric Paterson, each relishes the opportunity to play the sport and each learns important life lessons.

Two young brothers, Shannon and Webber, struggle to support each other in the face of their parents' divorce. Webber is getting into more and more trouble at school and Shannon feels lost trying to figure things out. Both feel powerless when they discover Webber's first-grade teacher is a factor in the divorce.

"H for Hunger" will catch you off guard for its passion and clarity. Don't miss this raging perspective on the despicable loss of life around the world due to ineptitude, greed and apathy. Your next meal will be a punctuation mark in your understanding of world hunger.

Henry Rollins stars as the only cast member, surrounded by images of opulence and appalling indifference. A truly unusual story crafted by French writers Neil Hollander and Régine Michelle, directed by Neil Hollander. Neil Hollander will be attending the festival.

"H for Hunger" was originally released as a French language film with its North American Premiere taking place at the Eugene International Film Festival in 2007. Following the success of the film in Europe it has been re-released as an English language film.

The plant guy gets curious about a couple's inverse machine while they are away on vacation. He gets stuck upside down, waiting for their return. And when they do - well that's when the fun really begins.

Some light-hearted fun on the harvest celebration in central Montana showing how the farmers extend their imaginations to create eye-popping hay-bale sculptures.

This timely documentary about health care isn't what you expect. It doesn't bore you with talking-head policy wonks, but is visual, clear, and logical; it's a movie that informs as it entertains.

Made in Portland by an ER doctor, we get the frontline perspective of one who deals with health care everyday, and knows full well the bottom line of how we spend more money and get less care than any developed country.

But this film also goes beneath policy issues to explore the basic emotion health care brings to the fore: fear: fear of liability, fear of not having enough, and the fear of death.

Between 1951 and 1991, the United States Atomic Energy Commission detonated 928 nuclear warheads on and under the Nevada desert. In southern Utah, generations of down winders have suffered from radiation-induced illnesses.

"Hot Wind" portrays the personal stories of suffering in the patriotic Mormon community of Parowan. They not only have to deal with the physical consequences of radiation poisoning but the psychological trauma of having been betrayed by the United States government as well.

Director William Akers creates the reality you expect in an exceptional narrative short and turns it upside down. Protagonist Peter Hollister, a documentary filmmaker, takes his camera with him to visit the people in his life - his father in the hospital, his old lover in Paris, an ex-wife, a best friend who's dying, and more- provocative things happen.

His burning desire to confront his failings is met with anger by his sister, bewilderment by his composer, and a general unforgiving irritation. Confessing to his wife that he has something to tell her, she is enraged, thinking he's been cheating.

When he says he has incurable cancer, she falls apart. This moving narrative shows how nothing is what it seems when it comes to what matters most in life. You may even leave the theater believing that this narrative is a documentary. This is short filmmaking at its best.

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Infection

Inner Calm

Inner Circle, The

Irene in Time

Jim Thorpe,
The World's Greatest Athlete

Labrorers, The

Living to Dream