The Solar Punk Film Festival | Portland, OR 2025

SPFF aims to showcase stories that illuminate paths to a better tomorrow, exploring themes of environmental technology, harmonious living, and creative community-building. Through film, we seek to connect audiences with visions of a sustainable future, amplifying diverse perspectives and inspiring collective action.

WHAT IS SOLAR PUNK?

a hopeful, solution-driven outlook on environmental and societal futures. A genre that envisions what is possible in a future that centers the interdependence of technology and nature.

SPFF will feature two screenings at the Redd East Event Space in Portland, Oregon. Submissions should adhere to the Solar Punk theme. Films should be 2 – 15 minutes long, fictional, but can be animated or live-action. Eight finalists will be selected to screen their films at the festival. These films will be evaluated by a panel of guest judges and audience members, with winners announced following the final screening. 

OUR FINALISTS

• PARTHENOGENESIS

  • a film by John Longenbaugh

    Three crew members on a space ship receive a distress call from a mysterious freighter–and have to quickly decide what their next actions should be.

• ARCH ANGELICA

  • a film by Scott Wray

    Follows a solar technician navigating wildfire smoke and crumbling community infrastructure under the shadow of a powerful AI. As corporate systems falter, unlikely truths emerge in a story about autonomy, resistance, and the power of human connection.

• A.R.T.L.T.Y.

  • a film by Derich Hartfeil

    A man struggles to know what is reality – the horrific “insane asylum” that he is stuck in OR the flashbacks of the possible reality he had before (as a lonely astronaut exploring distant worlds). In both realities there is someone there with him… but was she ever real?

• THE LAST PASSENGER

  • a film by Hernán Dvojak

    Follows a robot who awakens aboard a vast, deserted mothership, long after humanity has evacuated. Confused and alone in an unfamiliar world, he begins to search for meaning in the silence.

• SNAILIEN

  • a film by Alicia Navarrette

    Snailien is a cultural response to global crisis and planetary blight. In this short film we follow an intergalactic traveler to Earth while seeking inspiration to revitalize their home planet.

• IF ONLY

  • a film by Lassen Anderson

    A girl finds herself in a war she saw coming, stuck in the crossfire of pollution and violence. She realizes the only thing she can do is document and reflect on what she sees.

• A MESSAGE FROM THE FUTURE

  • a film by Allen Myers

    In 2018, the historic Camp Fire destroyed the town Paradise and killed 85 people. This film is set 50 years in the future and reflects on the rebuilding process in Paradise. The film is a blueprint for communities around the world who are facing disastrous conditions and seek to create a better world.

• IN SEARCH OF LIFE

  • a film by Ilia Ramazni

    Space explorers, searching for life, find a brilliant, beautiful planet. Hopeful, they approach. But landing reveals a shocking truth: this Earth is not what they expected.