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6th Annual Albany Film Festival, presented by the NYS Writers Institute
The 6th Annual Albany Film Festival will take place from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. at the UAlbany Campus Center, 1400 Washington Avenue, Albany, NY 12222. All events are free and open to the public. No registration is required.
“We are proud that we’ve carved out our niche as the ‘bookish’ Albany Film Festival while nurturing a wonderful audience of filmmakers and film lovers,” said Paul Grondahl, Opalka Endowed Director of the NYS Writers Institute at UAlbany. “Our approach to our festival centers conversations and discussions while exploring the intersection of writing and filmmaking in all its forms.”
Oscar-nominated filmmaker and acclaimed novelist John Sayles headlines the event and will receive the Ironweed Award for Exemplary Achievement in Film.
Sayles, who grew up in Schenectady, is a two-time Academy Award nominee for Best Original Screenplay: “Passion Fish” in 1992 and “Lone Star” in 1996. His other films include the iconic 1980 drama “Return of the Secaucus 7,” “Matewan” (1987), and “Eight Men Out” (1988).
An accomplished writer, Sayles’ first published story, "I-80 Nebraska," won an O. Henry Award, and his 1997 novel Union Dues was a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction. At the film festival, Sayles will discuss his film career and his new novel Crucible (2026), a story about Henry Ford, the ruthless, power-mad “tech bro” of his generation.
“Ironweed Award honoree John Sayles epitomizes the indie spirit of our undertaking and an emphasis on homegrown talent,” said Grondahl. Earlier this month, the Writers Institute screened Sayles’ directorial debut “Return of the Secaucus 7” (1980) to a large audience.
Ironweed Awards will also be presented (virtually) to filmmakers Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson, co-founders of Rada Studios. Their 2023 documentary, “Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project,” won a Primetime Emmy for Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking, and the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance. The film was also shortlisted for a Best Documentary Oscar.
Sayles (in-person), Brewster and Stephenson (via Zoom) will participate in earlier events at the festival.
Another festival favorite returns in 2026: the Short Film Contest. Finalists will screen their films – in categories for animated, comedy, drama, experimental, documentary, and horror.
Winners in those categories, along with Best Overall Film and the Brendan Fahy Bequette Student Short Film Award -- underwritten by Brendan’s parents, Senator Pat Fahy and Wayne Bequette -- will be announced at the Ironweed Award ceremony at the close of the festival.
Along with the Sayles and Brewster/Stephenson events, other featured conversations include:
• Dylan and Springsteen: Biographies and Biopics
Music biographers Elijah Wald, author of Dylan Goes Electric!, the book that inspired the 2024 Oscar nominated film “A Complete Unknown,” and Warren Zanes, bestselling author of Deliver Me from Nowhere, the basis for the recent Springsteen biopic “Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere.” Zanes’s previous bestseller was Petty: The Biography (2015), one of Rolling Stone's 10 Best Music Books of the Year.
• On the Set of “Forrest Gump”
With Phillip Caruso, known in Hollywood as “Still Phil,” one of the most sought-after still photographers in the film and television industries. His many iconic images include the “Forrest Gump” movie poster of Tom Hanks as Gump waiting on a bench for a bus. Caruso received the Society of Camera Operators Lifetime Achievement Award in 2017.
• Discussion of “Trump and Television”
James Poniewozik, New York Times chief TV critic, will revisit his 2019 book, Audience of One: Donald Trump, Television, and the Fracturing of America, named a “Notable or Best Book of the Year” in the New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Publishers Weekly, Slate and NPR.
Screenings/discussions and other events include:
• Kareema Bee: Film screening and discussion of “The Self-Love Act”
Kareema Bee is a two-time Emmy-nominated writer, producer, on-camera talent, and digital content creator who graduated from the University at Albany (B.A., English, 2009). Her newest project is a docuseries that follows her personal journey to rediscover self-love through dialogue with others.
• Film screening and discussion of “Death by Numbers”
With Sam Fuentes, a poet, activist and survivor of the 2018 Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Short Documentary in 2025.
• Film screening and discussion of “The Truck”
Director and screenwriter Liz Rao will discuss the film short (executive produced by Spike Lee) about a Chinese-American teen and her Iranian-American boyfriend on a frantic search for the “morning after” pill in post-Roe v. Wade America.
• “Calico Rebellion” - The Anti-Rent War and the Second American Revolution
A multi-media presentation with director Victoria Kupchinetsky, producer Misha Gutkin, author Nancy Newman, and musicia
Event Links
Website: https://go.evvnt.com/3531101-0
