Short films are the proving ground of cinema, a space where new voices experiment and seasoned directors condense powerful ideas into minutes. From the Oscar-winning The Silent Child to All These Creatures, which took home the Palme d’Or, and genre festival favorites like The Dress and Cargo, short films prove that brevity doesn’t limit impact. They are often the birthplace of future feature films, with projects like Whiplash and Saw beginning life as shorts before capturing global attention. This category gathers award-winners, hidden gems, and boundary-pushing works from around the world, showcasing just how much emotion, tension, or laughter can be delivered in under half an hour.
Short horror films on YouTube. Have you got 3-minutes? Bill is a self-funded, single-location horror movie about ghosts. It’s really scary.
Apprev. is a short film by director Damien Harris. It takes the pro-life, pro-choice argument one step further.
Next to me from Imagine Dragons is directed by Mark Pellington. This music video may as well have been a movie, it’s that good.
The Isolation Horrors anthology movie is free to watch on YouTube. A found-footage project of short films from creators in quarantine.
5 independent filmmakers decided to use the current pandemic to make an anthology horror movie. Watch The Isolation Horrors free on YouTube
Shadowed is a 3-minute new horror movie short from David F. Sandberg. Starring his wife Lotta Losten, this is a companion piece for 2013’s Light’s Out.
