Isa worries that her abuela is forgetting her thanks to dementia. Meanwhile, on a whim she decides to chop off her hair, which upsets her mother and then worries her — what if this makes her aunt forget her even more? All of the grief and worry powers her hair as it crawls back from the dead and up the drain pipes, confronting her with her impulsive decision.

Split Ends is more than just horror. According to the filmmakers, it’s “a commentary on Latina beauty standards — especially ones that concern women’s hair and are perpetuated by mothers.”

Director and writer Cookie Estés said of making this film, “I’ve leaned very heavily on the making of this film for the last few years, in all of the varying shapes and forms it’s taken on, as a way of processing the anticipatory grief of losing my abuelita who raised me. She passed away peacefully in April of 2021 and this film is dedicated to her.”

I love when horror can help us process emotions that aren’t always easy to articulate. What an interesting film and a cultural experience that I would be ignorant of without getting to watch movies.

Skeletons, directed by Steven Hedrick, has a father taking his son through a haunted house. It’s only three minutes long, so it doesn’t have much time to build much of a story other than the mood and attitude shift of the father. That said, it looks pretty nice and I’d like to see what could happen next given more time and budget.

A movie star named Eugene gains superpowers and sets out to become a superhero. He may not have a tragic origin or a team to help him, so he has to reach out to others online to learn how to best use his powers. This allows everyone he meets to form a community that helps one another instead of just beating up super villains.

Choi Woo Gene’s film presents a more grounded and humanistic take on superheroes. At 27 minutes, it’s not far from being able to be expanded into a much larger story.

Jake (Jake Cash) is a young man in his mid-twenties dealing with multiple traumatic events all at the same time. Meanwhile, as he navigates these experiences, something has taken root inside of his mind and is growing into something that he may not be able to control.

Cycles is body horror as way of dealing with emotional trauma and would really work well as a full length film. Director and writer Jakey Lutsko has created something really intriguing here and I hope to see it expanded at some point.

In Afghanistan, development aid worker Carina Nowak and a squadron of Bundeswehr — German army soldiers — walk into a trap set by the Taliban. Only she and young soldier Luca survive and they both have to fight to reach their own goals.

Nahrani is a short film produced by students of HFF Munich and the final project of director Simon Pfister. It was shot t in Andalusia with a crew of 35 people from Germany and Spain, with six of those days in a set built for the film Exodus and later reused for Game of Thrones.

It looks gorgeous and way better than you’d ever expect a student film to look whole presenting a story of different goals in the face of the chaos of war.

To learn more, visit the official site.

Daniel Slottje directed, wrote and co-stars — as the father — in this film about a young girl (Lilliana Ketchman) battling leukemia and being haunted by a sinister being she calls The Tumor Man (Kelsey Strauch).

You must decide if this monster is real or a metaphor for the pain that Casey, the little girl, is enduring. Slottje — who had a hormone-based disease in his childhood — is now developing the story into a feature film. I can’t wait to see it.

At the California Men’s Colony in Central California, dogs and their inmate handlers — who are preparing them to become fully operational service animals — share a special bond that helps both.

Director and writer Alex Astrella also made Trial By Fire, a documentary about inmate firefighters. As a dog owner, this movie spoke to me and shows how we are saved by animals instead of us saving them.