OSCAR SPOTLIGHT: NATALIE LAUREN ON WHY UNAUTHORISED ABSENCE PUTS NEED BEFORE PUNISHMENT

The producer behind the Oscar-qualified short talks school distress, neurodivergence, the hidden reality facing families and bringing Anna Maxwell Martin on board for her executive producing debut Oscar-qualified short film Unauthorised Absence takes an intensely personal look at a crisis facing families whose children are struggling to attend school, asking what happens when the systems they turn to for support respond not with understanding, but punishment. Developed … Continue reading OSCAR SPOTLIGHT: NATALIE LAUREN ON WHY UNAUTHORISED ABSENCE PUTS NEED BEFORE PUNISHMENT

OSCAR SPOTLIGHT: AMOS SUSSIGAN’S PIGEONS FINDS HUMANITY IN THE AGE OF AI

Narrated by Andy Serkis and created by 45 artists over the course of a year, Amos Sussigan’s Oscar-qualified animated short turns the story of an obsolete carrier pigeon into a timely reflection on technology, creativity and the future of artists. When filmmaker and Academy member Amos Sussigan first began thinking about PIGEONS, the idea came from an unlikely conversation about wartime carrier pigeons. A friend had shared an … Continue reading OSCAR SPOTLIGHT: AMOS SUSSIGAN’S PIGEONS FINDS HUMANITY IN THE AGE OF AI

OSCAR SPOTLIGHT: Director Tamás Yvan Topolánszky on Never Give Up!, the Business of Short Film and Why Words Can Outlive the People Who Speak Them

Oscar-qualified filmmaker Tamás Yvan Topolánszky talks independent financing, discovering a remarkable nine-year-old first-time actor, the economics of ambitious short filmmaking and why his latest film asks a deceptively complicated question: who really owns a message? There is a deceptively simple question at the centre of Topolánszky’s Oscar-qualified short Never Give Up!: Do words belong to the person who says them, or to the person who ultimately gives them meaning? Produced by … Continue reading OSCAR SPOTLIGHT: Director Tamás Yvan Topolánszky on Never Give Up!, the Business of Short Film and Why Words Can Outlive the People Who Speak Them

London Flair PR Founder Catherine Lyn Scott to Host Oscar-Focused Panels at HollyShorts Film Festival

Publicist Catherine Lyn Scott will moderate industry conversations on awards strategy and Oscar qualification as part of HollyShorts’ 2026 industry programme. London Flair PR founder and publicist Catherine Lyn Scott will host two Oscar-focused industry panels at the 2026 HollyShorts Film Festival, bringing together filmmakers and industry experts to discuss awards campaigns, Academy Award qualification and navigating the road from the festival circuit to awards season. The panels … Continue reading London Flair PR Founder Catherine Lyn Scott to Host Oscar-Focused Panels at HollyShorts Film Festival

Oscar-Nominated The Singers: Sam Davis on Underdogs, Improvisation and Finding Beauty in Ordinary Rooms

By Rebecca Ford Now streaming globally on Netflix, The Singers is an Oscar-nominated, genre-bending short from two-time Academy Award® nominee Sam A. Davis. Inspired by a nineteenth-century story from Ivan Turgenev, the film reimagines classic literature as a contemporary meditation on connection, artistry and the overlooked voices hiding in plain sight. Set inside a down-at-heel pub filled with downtrodden men, The Singers unfolds around an impromptu sing-off that gradually dissolves emotional barriers. … Continue reading Oscar-Nominated The Singers: Sam Davis on Underdogs, Improvisation and Finding Beauty in Ordinary Rooms