14th edition of First Look runs March 12–16; Working on It sessions run on consecutive days, March 12–14.

We're excited about this year's First Look festival, our showcase for new and innovative international cinema, taking place in less than two weeks! Today, we're pleased to share the lineup for the three-day Working on It program, in-person sessions focused on exploring the creative process—a great opportunity for aspiring filmmakers and writers and the public-at-large to get an inside look. 

Special thanks to our Presenting Sponsor Lismore Road for their support of Working on It.

Plus, we're very pleased to announce the filmmakers and artists who will be joining us in person this year:

Omar Mismar, A Frown Gone Mad (Mar. 15)

Maximilien Luc Proctor, Aotearoa (Illuminations, Mar. 16)

Gerard Ortin Castellvi, Bliss Point (Mar. 15)

Durga Chew-Bose and Lily McInerny, Bonjour Tristesse (Mar. 12)

Claudrena N. Harold, Chelsea Drive  (Illuminations, Mar. 16)

Miguel Coyula, Chronicles of the Absurd (Mar. 16)

Matthew Pehl, Cowboy Strike (First Sight, Mar. 14)

Yoko Yamanaka, Desert of Namibia (Mar. 13)

Giovanni Tortorici, Diciannove (Mar. 16)

Sarah Ballard, Full Out (Mar. 16)

Goran Hugo Olsson, Israel Palestine on Swedish TV 1958–1989 (Mar. 13)

Sofia Bohdanowicz, Measures for a Funeral  (Mar. 16)

Eva Giolo, Memory Is an Animal, It Barks with Many Mouths (Illuminations, Mar. 16)

So Yo-hen, Park (Mar. 13)

Brigid McCaffrey, Sanctuary Station (Mar. 14)

Michael Coleman, Satan's Greatest Lies (First Sight, Mar. 14)

James Edmonds, Songs Overheard in the Shadows (Illuminations, Mar. 16)

Sam Drake, Suspicions About The Hidden Realities of Air (Illuminations, Mar. 16)

Radu Ciorniciuc, Tata (Mar. 15)

Ben Balcom, The Phalanx (Illuminations, Mar. 16)

Deniz Eroglu, The Shipwrecked Triptych (Mar. 15)

Tessa Jagger-Wells, Victim (First Sight, Mar. 14)

Iva Radivojevic, When the Phone Rang (Mar. 14)

Charlie Shackleton, Zodiac Killer Project (Mar. 15)

 

Projects participating in Working on It: 

The Working on It program offers a lab-like environment for work-in-progress screenings, workshops, and discussions about the artistic process. This year’s edition will take place during the afternoons of March 12–14, and is open to the public.  

Tickets for Working on It are $15 per day (discounted for students, seniors and youth; free for MoMI members at the Student/Senior level and above). Admission is also included with the All-Access Festival Pass. 

Wednesday, March 12

• Work-in-progress presentation and discussion: Artist Diana Haro presents a cut of her project Portrait of Absence, an experimental documentary about growing up in Tijuana and reckoning with the death of her homeless father. 
• Work-in-progress presentation and discussion: Filmmaker Julia Mendoza Friedman presents material from her short film Fracaso es un río mío / Failure Is a River of Mine, in which an American filmmaker and a rural Guatemalan ex-midwife contend with the results of a failed documentary project.
• Work-in-progress presentation and discussion: Artist Max Bowens shares material from his project Male Fantasies, an embodied portrait of law, order, and masculinity in the American Midwest. 

Thursday, March 13

• Work-in-progress presentation and discussion: Filmmaker Michael Coleman presents an edit under construction, along with sample scenes, from his debut feature documentary Satan’s Greatest Lies. What began as a document of George Haw Russell’s decades-long fight to preserve East Texas’ disappearing wilderness transforms into an intimate study of a man grappling with purpose, loss, and the weight of legacy. 
• Multimedia performance and discussion: Filmmaker Argyro Nicolaou presents Unsettled, a multimedia lecture performance and work-in-progress feature that explores the fast-changing landscapes of an island under occupation and the filmmaker’s attempts to reconstruct her mother’s past. 
• Work-in-progress session: shorts from the Jonathan B. Murray Center for Documentary Journalism at the Missouri School of Journalism. Moderated by First Look Senior Programmer Edo Choi. 
• Work-in-progress presentation and discussion: Amelia Evans presents a cut of her feature-length documentary Minor Attraction, an attempt to craft empathetic portraits of three people who acknowledge they have pedophilic desires but who claim never to have sexually interacted with a child—and who each want more support to keep it that way. 

Friday, March 14

• Work-in-progress presentation and discussion: Director Alessandra Sanguinetti and producer Julia Solomonoff present a cut of their feature The Illusion of an Everlasting Summer, an intimate portrayal of the lives of two cousins growing up in rural Argentina, spanning decades. 
• Work-in-progress presentation, multimedia performance, and discussion: Filmmaker Robert Kolodny explores the possibilities of a future film built from hand-scanned 8mm reels captured by his grandparents, his own relationship with capturing motion picture on celluloid, and the mentors who taught him the craft.
• Live presentation and discussion: First Look filmmaker Göran Hugo Olsson discusses the making of Israel Palestine on Swedish TV 1958-1989, and shares a parallel film constructed out of one specific thematic element—all the maps of the region that aired during that period.  
• Work-in-progress presentation and discussion: Filmmaker G. Anthony Svatek presents an excerpt of his work-in-progress feature film Humboldt USA. Nineteenth-century gay naturalist Alexander von Humboldt, the world’s most used namesake, serves as an instrument to explore the pursuits of everyday Americans reckoning with their disappearing environments. 
• Work-in-progress presentation and discussion: Filmmakers Steve Maing and Eric Metzgar present material from their project The Great Experiment, an intimate and sweeping portrait of one of the most volatile and perplexing eras of American history, 2017 to 2020.
• Work-in-progress presentation and discussion: Filmmakers Toma Peiu and Luiza Parvu share material from How Come We Ended Up Here?, a 16mm poetic journey across New York City during times of pandemic, war, and urban transformation. The film is guided by the histories, recollections, and dreams of the post-Soviet Korean Central Asian diaspora. 

Alongside Working on It, we are pleased to note the Reverse Shot Emerging Critics Workshop will be taking place with a new cohort of participants. We hope to share their names soon. This select group of young film writers will have the opportunity to meet established critic mentors, take part in talks and workshops, and attend First Look. This new generation of critics will engage in discussions about the present and future of criticism. This program also helps foster bridges between critics and filmmakers, with critics attending work-in-progress screenings, presentations, and talks about artistic process.  

And, as in past First Look festivals, we are thrilled to present the Sloan Readings and Awards Ceremony on Saturday, March 15, at 4:30 p.m. The Sloan Student Prizes are awarded annually in partnership with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to emerging filmmakers for their outstanding science-themed screenplays. The 2024 Sloan Student Grand Jury Prize Winner is Brittany Wang for her script Thin Ice and the Sloan Student Discovery Prize winner is Yoel Gebremariam for his script Impact. This event will include an awards ceremony with remarks by the filmmakers, members of the jury, and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, as well as staged readings of excerpts from each project featuring a cast of professional actors. Followed by a reception. This event is supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.