How long should a short film be for submitting?

I

ironpony

Carbonite Member
I shot my first one that I want to submit to festivals next year, but different festivals have different rules. One says it's okay if it doesn't go over 60 minutes. One says nothing over 18 and nothing below 15. My short I intended to be 10-13 minutes but it came out to almost 30 so far. I've already trimmed off most of what I can and anything more will result in less character development. I could trim it down to 15 I think but then the plot would just barely make sense, and not everything will be fully explained. There will be some mystery left in it, but that's also a weakness, besides a strength. The hero and villain will be more mysterious but there development will not be near as strong, since I would have to cut two scenes. Not just parts of the scenes, the whole scenes to get it down that low by chance. The rest of scenes need to stay for the plot to make sense. But what should I do? I could do a few versions, and the festival with the longest amount of time rule, will get the version that slows down for the most depth.

But this could also be more money, cause I would have to pay the music guy to do more than one score, for different edits. What to do, what to do... Thanks for any advice.
 
The sweet spot is usually said to be 12 minutes. Plenty of longer films do well, plenty of shorter films do well, but going over about 15 potentially does give you a headwind to fight against.
 
That's interesting that your 12 page script came out to be 1/2 hour. It usually runs about a minute a page when the screenplay is formatted. Unless of course there were valuable improvisations by you, your team, or your actors.

Anyway, shorts according to SAG, usually called experimental or something like that, are not longer than 35 minutes. As you know different festivals have different requirements. The thing is that you want your short to have the best chance to be selected for viewing and those that land around 15 minutes are valuable to the exhibitors because they can make a nice evening, you know a couple of narratives, animations, etc. At 30 minutes you put a lot of pressure on yourself because it has got to be really great and it better not drag anywhere. 30 minutes is a big commitment. That said, I am shooting a short with a friend that he has for over 20 minutes. We'll see.

In the end, the film has to work so if yours works only at 30 then that's your answer but if you can cut, by all means cut.
 
ironpony said:
How many festivals would you say have headwind on this, percentage wise?
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It's not that as much as the selection committee sitting there thinking "OK, we have this good 25 minute movie, this good 12 minute movie, and this good 13 minute movie. We only have 25 minutes left on the schedule. Should we program one good movie or two good movies..."

That's assuming all are of equal merit.
 
I always think of it like this: Many festivals like films under 10 minutes, then under 15 minutes, then there's under 30 minutes. You'll probably get less selections with shorts under 30 minutes as those slots are limited, but I wouldn't sacrifice the story to cut a few minutes off of it. I always edit very tight, but on my last film I couldn't take it shorter than 20 minutes without sacrificing a lot of the story.
 
My first short which is being edited now is running 17.30 from a 12 page script. Very dialogue heavy. The first cut ran 18 mins excluding titles and credits.
We'll keep cutting until we can't cut any more without making the story (An occult horror) even less understandable than it is now.
 
ironpony said:
I shot my first one that I want to submit to festivals next year, but different festivals have different rules. One says it's okay if it doesn't go over 60 minutes. One says nothing over 18 and nothing below 15. My short I intended to be 10-13 minutes but it came out to almost 30 so far. I've already trimmed off most of what I can and anything more will result in less character development. I could trim it down to 15 I think but then the plot would just barely make sense, and not everything will be fully explained. There will be some mystery left in it, but that's also a weakness, besides a strength. The hero and villain will be more mysterious but there development will not be near as strong, since I would have to cut two scenes. Not just parts of the scenes, the whole scenes to get it down that low by chance. The rest of scenes need to stay for the plot to make sense. But what should I do? I could do a few versions, and the festival with the longest amount of time rule, will get the version that slows down for the most depth.

But this could also be more money, cause I would have to pay the music guy to do more than one score, for different edits. What to do, what to do... Thanks for any advice.
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I'm pretty narrow minded on the point of 'short film'... for me a 'short film' is 5-7 minutes, at the most... more typically 3-5 minutes.

The fests often have 'under 60', which to me is a 'mid-length' film at the least. Others use perhaps shorter times, but really when one starts coming to 20-30 minutes, that's a typical TV show length, and only 'short' when compared to a 'feature' of 90 minutes or more. I think the fest should have 'under 10', 'under 30', 'under 60', and then 'must be over 90' for features. (Yeah that leaves out the gray zone of 60-90... but heck... that sort of scaling would be better than 'anything under 60 is a short'...)

For a 'fest strategy', a '3-5' minute short may be better than a 10-20 minute. The reason being is that a program director may be able to squeeze in a couple of 3-5 minute 'shorts' where as they would reject a longer 'short' because they like something better, and there are fewer 'long short' slots.

Of the 'over 5 minute' short films that have been presented here on this site... I'd say most could use some heavy cutting, especially in 'wordy dialog'.

Dialog takes time, and unless the dialog is absolutely essential it can be pared down considerably... and if your 'short' is so dependent on dialog... well... that to me is another negative attribute.

For me, 'shorts' are heavy on visual story telling, and use dialog really to punctuate, or communicate where visuals would require far more 'work'.
 
Jordan Scott Price said:
I agree with this so, so much.

+100
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Absolutely, but if you're going to do anything like a traditional narrative structure you need 12 minutes at least. To do a real 3 act you have to move into the old "One Reeler" territory of 30 to 40 minutes. It's a wide spectrum, but for festival purposes, yes shorter is absolutely better in most cases.
 
Short films should be, well, short.

As mentioned, festival programmers are more likely to program films that are under 10 minutes than films that are over 20 minutes. It's a matter of dynamics & math. It's easy to squeeze 1 or 2 or 5 really short films in between a couple of features, and it's relatively easy to put together a program of really short films. You can always squeeze in another 1 or 2 minute film. You can often squeeze in an extra 5 minute film. If you have a film that's 20 or 30 minutes, it needs to stand alone, like a feature, because you need to build the program around it.

Take a look at 1 and 2 reel films from the silent era, or "Our Gang" shorts (aka "The Little Rascals") or shorts by the Three Stooges. You'll be amazed at how much story you can tell in under 10 minutes. But those stories are somewhat simplified. There aren't a whole lot of plot points. There isn't a lot of character development. The 3 act structure is collapsed into 1 act. Forget subtlety, you need to make your point and roll your end credits.
 
gonzo_entertainment said:
Absolutely, but if you're going to do anything like a traditional narrative structure you need 12 minutes at least. To do a real 3 act you have to move into the old "One Reeler" territory of 30 to 40 minutes. It's a wide spectrum, but for festival purposes, yes shorter is absolutely better in most cases.
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The classic theatrical one reeler was a single 1000 ft. roll of 35mm Academy 4 perf. Running time was 11 minutes. Probably a good target range for festival shorts.

But stories have to be told in their own time frame, whatever that may be.
 
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arniepix said:
Short films should be, well, short.

As mentioned, festival programmers are more likely to program films that are under 10 minutes than films that are over 20 minutes. It's a matter of dynamics & math. It's easy to squeeze 1 or 2 or 5 really short films in between a couple of features, and it's relatively easy to put together a program of really short films.
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Yep. A 22 minute short I shot and co-produced got into a top 10 domestic festival a while back and the director was told by a few of the other festival programmers that they really liked the film, but that t it was just too long. If it's over 20 minutes, it better be extra special.
 
I am trying to get mine under 20 which I think I can do, but if I go lower than 15, then it would have plot holes for sure. There is a fight scene I can cut down that is 2+ minutes, but my friends say I did a good job on the fight scene and have to keep cut, as is, cause that alone will make a good impression.
 
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ironpony said:
I am trying to get mine under 20 which I think I can do, but if I go lower than 15, then it would have plot holes for sure. There is a fight scene I can cut down that is 2+ minutes, but my friends say I did a good job on the fight scene and have to keep cut, as is, cause that alone will make a good impression.
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No... the watch word of any film is "Kill Your Babies", while it sounds savage, no scene should be so 'golden' that it can't be considered for cutting. (Ok there may be some absolutely essential scenes, but every scene could be trimmed a few frames...)

The choice is either you savaging your film... or the critics...

In literary terms there's a concept called 'purple prose'...

Here's what Horace has to say... said some 2000 years ago...

------
"Your opening shows great promise, and yet flashy
purple patches; as when describing
a sacred grove, or the altar of Diana,
or a stream meandering through fields,
or the river Rhine, or a rainbow;
but this was not the place for them. If you can realistically render
a cypress tree, would you include one when commissioned to paint
a sailor in the midst of a shipwreck?"
-------
 
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