All filmmakers and screenwriters must pay the required submission fee to enter unless they fall under one of two categories:

1 – Any student (elementary school, middle school, high school, college, or graduate school) can submit their work for free to the early deadline. After that, they must pay to enter the regular and late deadlines.

2 – Filmmakers/screenwriters from or currently living in the states of Kentucky, Virginia, or West Virginia can submit their work for free. If your film/screenplay was shot in or set in those states you can submit for free as well. There is a special category for these submissions.

All filmmakers that submit to this category are required to clarify their Kentucky, Virginia, or West Virginia connection in an accompanying cover letter or in their film information. Failure to clarify this will result in us marking your submission “Incomplete” until you can clarify your entry’s eligibility. We require this because a significant number of films are inappropriately entered into this free category as an attempt to avoid submission fees. If you fail to explain your film’s eligibility it will eventually result in your entry being disqualified.

We are accepting works of all lengths (shorts and features) and types (documentary, animation, music video, and traditional narrative).

For purposes of categorization, we are considering feature films to be 40 minutes or longer, and shorts to be 39 minutes or less.

All that being said, if you are making a film specifically for this festival we encourage you to produce short films that are less than 10 minutes. As with any festival we only have so much time to show films, so the shorter your film is then the greater its chances are of being accepted and screened.

All entries need to be original work, and you must have the legal authorization to utilize all the content within your film.

We do not have a premiere requirement, but we do ask that you only submit works that were completed within the last 2 years.

Feature screenplays should be 50 pages or longer, and short screenplays should be 49 pages or less. TV pilots are accepted just submit to the appropriate category based on your page count.

Finally, we reserve the right to disqualify or reject your submission if we believe that it does not adhere to our rules or requirements.