BDF/Flatlands Dance Film Festival | Sunday | July 19 | 7:30PM

Bates Dance Festival is happy to partner with The Flatlands Dance Film Festival to curate an evening of screendance that touches on the themes of autobiography, time, comedy, and social systems as found in Leslie Cuyjet’s For All Your Life. Drawing from finalist submissions from the last three years of The Flatlands Film Festival, a BDF panel has chosen short films that highlight these themes and offer deeper insight into the intersection of dance and media. The selected films will be announced in April.

The Flatlands Dance Film Festival is dedicated to supporting and presenting Dance Cinema, a medium that explores and innovates the intersections between filmmaking and dance making. The festival builds educational platforms, encourages dialogue, and promotes a diverse range of cultural perspectives from around the globe. Learn more about FDFF here.

The BDF/Flatlands Dance Film Festival 2026 jury is Leslie Cuyjet, Natalie Gotter, Cara Hagan, and Laura Chiaramonte.

Photo from Ruins of the Future

2026 Films:

“Belia”

Eman Hussein (Director)

A young woman and her friends join a car repair shop as “Belia”(colloquial Egyptian for apprentices) to learn the craft from the Ustas (craft headmasters). They explore what this relationship creates as it merges labor with everyday life rhythms to open up a new space for movement.

“Anything With a Switch”

Charli Brissey (Director)

A short movement study on sapphic longing and obsession.

“Lowelyfe Episode 1: The Only Way Out Is Through”

Quilan “Cue” Arnold (Director)

Agui Luz, survivor of the Tower of Aeries collapse, seeks refuge from his survivor’s guilt at a mysterious clinic—only to find himself caught in a deeper test, one that may reveal a calling he’s spent years trying to escape.

“The Ballad of a Home”

Keely Song, Robert Machoian (Directors)

Conversations and connections spoken and missed over a family dinner unfold. Within their fragile resolutions and tension, other moments quietly slip away.

“Kielo”

Janina Rajakangas, Sinem Kayacan (Directors)

Kielo finds it hard to sit still in class. She takes a break venturing into the corridors of her imagination.

“Shame (عيب)”

Hadi Moussally (Director)

In the 19th century, in the Levant region, Salma Zahore, along with her parents and neighbors, participated in a photoshoot using a long exposure technique. At the end of it, Salma decided to take off her coat, revealing her body. Unaware of the chaos this gesture could cause within her circle, she did not know it could lead to shame (عيب).

“Solum I Soil”

Rob Kitsos, Meagan Woods, & Beau Han Bridge (Directors)

This work was created by Moving Matter, a collaborative research team developing methodologies for making. Each project includes many artists across dance, costumery, music and film who devote themselves to innovative modes of making that break habits of privileging human-centric design over more-than-human materials and the wellbeing of the planet. The team is interested in collaborating with raw materials as a way of developing new choreographic approaches, wearable designs, and material generation for screen dance, installation and performance - finding different ways that human-generated design might learn from the choreographic intelligence of our earth’s shifting materials.

“Crosswinds”

Grégoire Verbeke (Director)

A woman looks around in her dream.

Deserted landscapes and invisible things are left.

The wind carries her memories.

Know what’s Happening Next — before everyone else does.

Get App

Host or Publisher Bates Dance Festival