BIFF Offscreen: Fissure and Donna

Original artwork by Spain Rodriguez on view at the Burchfield Penney Art Center October 7-11.

Free Event

BIFF Offscreen: Stephanie Rothenberg's Aquadisia

What if humans could cure climate change and themselves by drinking a magical water made by a new species of bioengineered oysters!?

Free Event

BIFF Offscreen: Van Tran Nguyen's Erie County Smile

Erie County Smile is a parody of “Paris By Night” (PBN), a popular Vietnamese-language variety show from the mid-90s, still airing today.

Free Event

Bison Pass

All access pass to all festival films, events, parties + more!

Night Zero Party

Come pick up your Bison Pass and kick-off the 2021 festival with cocktails and conversation!

Free Event

Laguna Ave

A disaffected former musician is drawn into the mysterious and sinister world of his downstairs neighbor.

Sapelo

The story of matriarchal griot, Cornelia Walker Bailey, and the last remaining enclave of the Saltwater Geechee people.

Manzanar, Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust

Members of the Lone Pine Paiute Shoshone Tribe, Japanese-American WWII incarcerees & environmentalists defend their land and water from LA.

Leda w/ This Bank of The River

A young woman's isolation and terror lead to madness in this retelling of the Greek myth.

Bad Attitude: The Art of Spain Rodriguez

A loving tribute to the legendary and controversial, Buffalo-raised underground cartoonist and graffiti artist, Spain Rodriguez.

BIFF Shorts: Global Documentary

Real stories from around the world.

Catch The Fair One

A boxer retraces the steps of her kid sister after she disappears in this Western New York lensed revenge thriller.

Party Number 541

((All of Us at The Tralfamadore)) Come time-warp with us for two Earth hours...

Free Event

BIFF Shorts: Danger Zone

NSFW / OMG / LMFAO flicks… the weirder, wilder sider of BIFF is back.

BIFF Offscreen: Jordan Smith & Dancers of the Haudenosaunee

Featuring Jordan Smith, Kehala Greene Smith, Jordy Smith, Gaehnew Printup and Ariyen Stevens.

Free Event

BIFF Panel: Reflexive Nonfiction

Explores personal cinema through Film About a Father Who, Bad Attitude, Now Return Us to Normal + 100 Years from Mississippi.

Free Event

BIFF Shorts: Saturday Morning Cartoons

A collection of sweet and fun family friendly animations from Western New York based and international creators.

BIFF Shorts: Students

The next generation of filmmaking, today.

Now Return Us to Normal

Classmates from a behavior modification boarding school confront the personal cost of the trauma inflicted by the school’s cruel practices.

BIFF Offscreen: Alexandres, Bajus + Lichty

Art Installation Tours of Restoration at Silo City w/ Avye Alexandres, Jozef Bajus and Gareth Lichty.

Free Event

BIFF Panel: On Location

Focuses on two films shot on location in Buffalo in this year's fest – Catch the Fair One + Bitchin': The Sound and Fury of Rick James.

Free Event

BIFF Shorts: The Unexpected

Comedies, lighthearted docs and dramas with a twist.

Bitchin’: The Sound and Fury of Rick James

A musical, kaleidoscopic portrait of the man, the myth, the legend–

BIFF Offscreen: Turkey Boi + Buddy Boi

DJ performance and dance party.

Free Event

BIFF Offscreen: Brian Milbrand

VJ performance projected on the Silos.

Free Event

Party All The Time Party

The Party All The Time Party runs from 3PM on Saturday to 12AM on Sunday, with BIFF's main party offerings from 9PM Saturday – 12AM Sunday.

Free Event

Rust Belt Driller

An artist spirals into a homicidal rage, turning his studio into a slaughterhouse, thanks to his trusty Drillinator 9000.

Swimming in the Clouds

Filmmakers share their Covid dreams which range from funny and deeply personal to political and traumatic.

Free Event

BIFF Offscreen: Oscar Alston

Solo among the Silos. Bass. Multimedia performance.

Free Event

The Laws of the Universe - The Age of Elohim

Set on Earth 150 years in the past, this thrilling animated epic follows the adventures of female soldier Yaizaer.

BIFF Shorts: Experimental

Cinematic poetry and essays in signals, pixels and celluloid.

100 Years From Mississippi

Fleeing Mississippi in 1915 as her father escaped a lynch mob, Mamie Lang Kirkland resettles and eventually raises her family in Buffalo.

BIFF Shorts: WNY Stories

Narratives and nonfiction films from around the block and around the region.

Life After You w/ Turning Blue

A suburban family’s life is turned upside down following the overdose death of their son.

My Dead Dad w/ Paper Geese

A young burnout grows closer to his estranged and deceased father after he leaves him an apartment complex with eccentric tenants and staff.

Beans

This coming of age drama explores the Oka Crisis, a 78-day long land dispute between Mohawk people and the town of Oka, Quebec.

Roy's World: Barry Gifford's Chicago

An impressionistic portrait of poet, author and screenwriter Barry Gifford.

Landlocked

Nick reunites with his estranged, transgender father Briana as they journey to scatter his late mother's ashes off the Georgia coast.

We Burn Like This

When 22 year-old Rae, a descendant of Holocaust survivors, is targeted by Neo-Nazis in Montana, her ancestors' trauma becomes tangible.

Workhorse Queen

A local legend becomes a national sensation when Mrs Davis finds herself cast onto RuPaul's Drag Race.

Film About a Father Who

An intimate, 35-year character study and meditation on fatherhood and masculinity.

Catch The Fair One

A boxer retraces the steps of her kid sister after she disappears in this Western New York lensed revenge thriller.

BIFF Panel: Racial Justice in View

Discussion will focus on the film selections and related topics.

Free Event

Workhorse Queen (Encore)

A local legend becomes a national sensation when Mrs Davis finds herself cast onto RuPaul's Drag Race.

Laguna Ave

A disaffected former musician is drawn into the mysterious and sinister world of his downstairs neighbor.

¡ BIFF ENCORE !!

Back by audience demand (!!!) – BIFF's Official 2021 Online Selections!

Manzanar, Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust

Members of the Lone Pine Paiute Shoshone Tribe, Japanese-American WWII incarcerees & environmentalists defend their land and water from LA.

Making an Exoneree

16 students reinvestigate five wrongful conviction cases, helping to free a man incarcerated for over 25 years – Buffalo’s Valentino Dixon.

Semkhor

This sweeping drama follows a midwife confronted with unthinkable choices in the remote community of Samsa.

BIFF Shorts: Interventions + Intersections

Films about life changing moments.

Dynamite Soul Bambi

A young, indie filmmaker is given the chance of a lifetime to make his feature film debut in this hilarious, reflexive comedy.

BIFF Shorts: Racial Justice In View

Docs, video essays and narratives that shine a light on race, (de)colonialism, and inequity in the US, Canada and nearby Indigenous Nations.

Free Event

BIFF Shorts: Episodic

A small glimpse at a bigger picture.

No Visible Trauma w/ Hello Sunshine

The story of the deeply troubled Calgary Police Service told in the midst of a global uprising against police violence and systemic racism.

BIFF Shorts: Global Narratives

Films from around the world, brought to your home.

Savage Days

A student eager for experiences, a drug dealer trying to escape and a lonely trader cross paths in this story of love, lust and betrayal.

The Badger

Right before Soodeh Sharifzadegan’s second marriage, her 11-year-old son, Matiar is kidnapped, setting off a chain of events.

Lost

A young woman who has been programmed and manipulated by members of a mysterious organization finds herself in the middle of a conspiracy.

High Maintenance - The Life and Work of Dani Karavan

Endearing portrait of the life and work of Dani Karavan.

Mother's Day

Jordan reconnects with his mother Wendy in the midst of a mental health crisis.

Mr. Emancipation : The Walter Perry Story

A portrait of the larger than life Walter Perry, organizer of the largest Emancipation Day celebration in the world.

BIFF Shorts: Time Stands Still

A series of shorts making sense of the last year.

Rust Belt Driller

An artist spirals into a homicidal rage, turning his studio into a slaughterhouse, thanks to his trusty Drillinator 9000.

Ludi

Ludi, a hardworking and exhausted nurse, chases the American Dream in Miami's Little Haiti neighborhood.

25 Years of Innocence

The ordinary life of Tomasz Komenda is turned upside down when he is wrongly accused of brutal murder and sentenced to 25 years in prison.

Rez Metal

Metal band I Don’t Konform is given the chance of a lifetime to work with legendary Metallica producer Flemming Rasmussen.

The Daphne Project

Daphne, actress and social justice warrior, wreaks havoc on a production of Euripides’ “The Bacchae” in the name of progress. Her progress.

The Ants & The Grasshopper

Anita has many gifts- she farms food from dead soil to feed a village and more – but can she convince Americans that climate change is real?

Rebel Dykes

When punk met feminism in the riotous London of the 1980s, it was the start of a beautiful friendship...

Missing in Brooks County

Families search for loved ones who went missing in Brooks County, Texas, the site of more migrant deaths than anywhere else in the US.

On Our Own Island

An intimate portrait of the seasons of a relationship from its romantic beginnings through its unexpected end.

Rage

Beatrice embarks on a journey to reconnect with Costa, a man she saved as a teen.