Astoria Film Festival Inc, in the Kaufman Arts District in Astoria NY, is a 501c3 non-profit organization and an official NYC DOE VENDOR.

Each year, we produce a main festival and a Youth Festival; organize a Career Fair; teach filmmaking workshops to ages 8-adult in schools, after schools, and community centers; and train high-school and college age youth in our Media Production Lab where we provide instruction in media production skills, real-world production experience, and connections to industry professionals.

Some of our Lab Fellows and our festival filmmakers are invited to work with us, as instructors in our filmmaking workshops and/or as part of AFFStudio, which is our production and social media content creation division. AFFStudio conceives of, creates, and edits video content for local nonprofits and businesses and manages social media accounts for small businesses.

Astoria Film Festival is devoted to increasing the representation of under-represented people in media and film by providing them with the skills, experiences, and connections needed to obtain jobs in the media industry, and with the exposure and community to build their own bodies of work in media production.

Astoria Film Festival is especially focused on supporting groups historically-ignored in society - Disabled people, women, FLI (First-Gen/Low-Income/Immigrants), BBIA (Black/Brown/Indigenous/Asian), women, LGBTQIA+ people. We also connect our younger students to our older students and to our festival filmmakers and industry professionals who work with us, thus creating a multi-generational, diverse, local filmmaking community and network.

Please follow us on Instagram, Facebook, or TikTok for more info.
For more information visit astoriafilmfestival.org

There are separate prizes for filmmakers in the Youth Festival and Main Festival.

They include:
Grand Jury Prize
The Zukor Award
Best Drama Short
Best Comedy Short
Best Experimental Short
Best Documentary Short
Best Horror Short
Best Dance Short
Best Animated Short
Best Directing
Best Editing
Best Cinematography
Best Performance

Submissions must be made in an mp4 format via FILM FREEWAY ONLY and should contain subtitles as some of our judges are deaf and will not be able to judge otherwise.
Please do not email or DM us films. They will not be part of the judged films.
Projects should not be more than 2 years old at time of submission.
Projects need to have the rights to use included music or use royalty-free music.
Projects cannot be screened in any other Queens-based festival in June 2024.
Selected projects will need to have captions and be 1080x720 or higher mp4s for screening purposes.

Short films: 20 mins or less.
Exception: Documentary Shorts can be up to 40 mins.

Web Series/TV Pilots - upload only ONE EPISODE, 40 mins or less.

Podcasts/Audio Stories will only be screened IN OUR ONLINE FESTIVAL, with an online panel. They will not be screened in person. Upload only ONE EPISODE of your podcast/audio story, 40 mins or less. Add an image to the podcast or audio file to upload it as a MP4 file that can be shown in our online festival.

Returning festival filmmakers and Disabled creators - please contact us for a submission discount code.

Overall Rating
Quality
Value
Communication
Hospitality
Networking
  • The best Astoria film festival

    September 2023
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    Response from festival:

    That is so very kind of you. Thank you for your amazing film and for being a part of the festival! It was our honor to have you in it.

  • Defiance Films

    An empowering, motivational, supportive, and caring environment executed with TLC on speed!

    September 2023
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    Response from festival:

    You are wonderful and your film is amazing. Thank you for being a part of the festival! It was our honor to have you in it.

  • Liz Galalis

    Such a lovely fest! I fell in love with AFF's mission to support and uplift young artists and marginalized creatives. It was especially cool to screen in the historic Zukor Theater at Astoria-Kaufmann Studios. Definitely submit!

    June 2023
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    Response from festival:

    Thank you so very much!! You and your film are both so lovely and we hope to see you again!!

  • Thank you! It was wonderfull!

    June 2023
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    Response from festival:

    Thank you for your wonderful film! Sending best wishes to you and all the Ukrainian people.

  • A small yet intimate festival that was well-organized, professionally run, and gave plenty of time to highlight each individual filmmaker/creative. This festival has the potential to grow more and more as the years go by. The screening venue at the Zukor Theater at Kaufman Studios was top-notch in both picture and audio quality. They also gave plenty of time afterward for a professional Q&A with the filmmakers. Huge thank you to Nina and the rest of the team for putting on a great event! Will definitely submit future work to the festival and highly recommend any independent or first-time filmmaker in the NYC area to submit!

    June 2023
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    Response from festival:

    Thank you so very much! That's extremely kind. Congratulations on your amazing film and we very much look forward to seeing more of your work in the future.