Middlebury New Filmmakers Festival

Schedule

Thursday, August 21, 2025

Inside The Onion and The Daily Show

9 - 10:30 AM @ Crooked Ladle

Join us for an up-close-and-personal conversation with The Daily Show 's Devin Delliquanti and actor and puppeteer Paul Zaloom as they talk about what makes for good comedy, both on-screen and off.

Shorts Program: Narrative Spotlight

9 - 10:30 AM @ Dana Auditorium

A program of four narrative shorts, including Overcomer , Cliff Edge , Learners and Sally Get the Potatoes. | A self-conscious woman with a striking scar battles anxiety when an online job interview is switched to an in-person one. | When David, a retired widower, reluctantly agrees to give driving lessons to his son’s girlfriend Ellen, things get off to a terrible start. As Ellen crunches the gears, can they find enough common ground to tolerate one another? 

The Waste Commons

9 - 10:30 AM @ Twilight Hall

Enclosing open-air dumps and outlawing waste picking are key approaches to modernizing cities around the world. The Waste Commons explores the dramatic transformations involved in the impending closure of the city waste dump in Dakar, Senegal, and the lives that hang in the balance.

Room for Us?

11 AM - 1 PM @ Axinn Center at Starr Library

Where do you go when the cheapest freestanding house costs $1.8 million and you're 30 miles out to sea? This documentary explores the vibrant, diverse lives of Nantucket's year-round community as they grapple with the challenges of finding a home in one of the world’s most expensive real estate markets.

DJ Ahmet

11 AM - 1 PM @ Dana Auditorium

15-year-old Ahmet, from a remote Yuruk village in North Macedonia, finds refuge in music while navigating his father’s expectations, a conservative community, and his first experience with love - a girl already promised to someone else.

Mad Bills to Pay (with The Steak)

11 AM - 1 PM @ Middlebury Marquis Theatre

On an ordinary day, a mother prepares a cake and food for her daughter's birthday. Suddenly, the enemy's Army launches a surprise attack, leaving the mother with no time to escape. | Rico’s summer is a mix of chasing girls and hustling homemade cocktails out of a cooler on Orchard Beach, the Bronx. But when Destiny, his teenage girlfriend, crashes at his place with his family, it’s only a matter of time before his carefree days come spiraling down.

André Is an Idiot (with Oh, Yeah!)

11 AM - 1 PM @ Town Hall Theater - Main

The story of the iconic electronic music group Yello and the phenomenon of their 1980s hit song, exploring the song’s cultural impact and its enduring place in the American psyche. | André, a brilliant idiot, is dying because he didn’t get a colonoscopy. His sobering diagnosis, complete irreverence, and insatiable curiosity, send him on an unexpected journey learning how to die happily and ridiculously without losing his sense of humor.

Filming for Laughs

11 AM - 12:30 PM @ Town of Middlebury Offices

Join a roundtable of funny people for a lively conversation about the role of comedy on screen. Vermont-raised comedian Tina Friml, The Onion 's Paul Zaloom, The Daily Show 's Devin Delliquanti and professor Caty Borum muse on what makes for good comedy on film and television. Plus, Tina Friml performs a special MNFF live stand-up set!

Far Out: Life On & After the Commune

11 AM - 1 PM @ Twilight Hall

The story of two rural New England communal farms, and the group of "hippie" writers, activists and artists who transformed Vermont and Western Massachusetts.

Walk with Me

2 - 4 PM @ Dana Auditorium

Walk with Me is the journey of Charlie and Heidi as they learn to live with his Early-Onset Alzheimer’s disease. Over four years, they criss-cross the country, redefining how life will be lived to its fullest, Charlie’s charm, warmth and appeal take center stage, illuminating a story of love and a reminder that life is really about our relationships.

Remaining Native

2 - 4 PM @ Middlebury Marquis Theatre

Ku Stevens, a 17-year-old Native American runner, struggles to navigate his dream of becoming a collegiate athlete as the memory of his great grandfather's escape from an Indian boarding school begins to connect past, present, and future.

Paint Me a Road Out of Here

2 - 4 PM @ The Sheldon Museum

Following the film, join John Vincent of A Revolutionary Press and Museum staff for print-making on a historic press and conversation in the Finding Hope Within: Healing and Transformation through the Making of Art Within the Carceral System special exhibit. | The 50 year journey of women at Rikers Jail and a painting that leads the way out.

The Serious Power of Comedy for Good

2 - 3:30 PM @ Town Hall Theater - Anderson Studio

Can comedy save us from ourselves? In this multimedia presentation, professor and author (The Revolution Will Be Hilarious and A Comedian and An Activist Walk Into a Bar) Caty Borum takes us on a journey through her research. Join us to hear Caty's stories from the weird (and fun) world of studying, showcasing, and producing comedy for social good and civic power.

Anxiety Club

2 - 4 PM @ Twilight Hall

ANXIETY CLUB provides a humorous and heartfelt look at our common experience of anxiety through the lens of some of the most brilliant (and anxious) comedians working today.

Student Film Program: Doc Shorts

2:15 - 4:15 PM @ Axinn Center at Starr Library

A program of five student documentary shorts, including A Good Death , Hey Hugo , Two Trees, Boil That Cabbage Down and Kitty Kathryn Sings the Blues. | Nurse Karen Morin helps terminally ill patients acquire life-ending medications as they prepare for their final moments on this earth, along with the loved ones who support them. | A film about a son who loves his mom, and the family who wants him to come home. 

Traces of Time

5 - 7 PM @ Dana Auditorium

Over the final six years of his mother’s life, a filmmaker documents their time together. What began as an act of staying connected evolves into a meditation on memory, loss, how to hold on... and how to let go.

Fantasy Life

5 - 7 PM @ Middlebury Marquis Theatre

After getting laid off, a thirty-something paralegal in New York starts babysitting his psychiatrist's three granddaughters and falls for their mother, an actress in a rocky marriage.

The Silence of My Hands (with In Totality)

5 - 7 PM @ Town Hall Theater - Main

One woman's existential journey into the path of the total solar eclipse. | Rosa, the first deaf law student in Guadalajara, and Sai, an immigrant from California confronting her gender identity, try to stay together despite their realities and the distance that separates them.

Arrest the Midwife

5 - 7 PM @ Twilight Hall

The arrest of trusted midwives ignites an unexpected rebellion, as Amish and Mennonite women break from tradition and emerge as fierce political activists - joining the broader fight for reproductive justice.

Forge

7:30 - 9:30 PM @ Axinn Center at Starr Library

In Miami, siblings Raymond and Coco Zhang run a profitable art forgery ring. When they meet millionaire Holden Beaumont, they're coerced into creating counterfeit masterpieces as a front for his old American family's art collection.

Natchez

7:30 - 9:30 PM @ Dana Auditorium

Natchez captures a clash between history and memory through a small Mississippi town reliant on antebellum tourism to survive, exploring who has the right to share America’s story.

Friendship

7:30 - 9:30 PM @ Middlebury Marquis Theatre

Suburban dad Craig falls hard for his charismatic new neighbor, as Craig’s attempts to make an adult male friend threaten to ruin both of their lives.

Champions of the Golden Valley (with Dale)

7:30 - 9:30 PM @ Twilight Hall

Dale Hikawa was the first Asian American woman to ever join the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Taking stock of her long career, this trailblazing violist reflects on the meaning of her life’s work. | After missing his chance to become Afghanistan’s first Olympic skier, a coach inspires his home village to create their own ski competition. 

Marcel the Shell with Shoes On

8 - 10 PM @ Town Hall Theater - Maloney Performing Arts Plaza

A cash-strapped documentary maker decides to make his newest documentary about a mollusk shell he finds living in his Airbnb with his friends.

Festival Afterparty

8:30 - 10:30 PM @ American Flatbread

Join us for conversation, camaraderie, light fare and drinks at American Flatbread in the Marble Works. Pass holders only, please.

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