American Filmmakers
What We Do: Film Screenings
Annually, AFS offers U.S. Embassies a curated collection of critically acclaimed new documentaries covering a wide variety of themes, including entrepreneurship, women’s empowerment, African-American history, sports, and more.
The AFS roster of 40+ films includes features, shorts, and episodic docs, which reflect the diversity of the American experience and provide space for cross-cultural dialogue with a wide range of audiences. Embassies often partner with NGOs or government entities to screen the AFS films at academic institutions, cultural centers, and film festivals.
Occasionally, U.S. Embassies can invite filmmakers to travel with their films to attend screenings and Q&As and lead masterclasses.
American filmmakers can submit their documentaries for consideration for our annual collection of 40+ American films (see below.)
What We Do: Workshops
AFS also curates a roster of American filmmakers and top industry experts who represent the full range of jobs that exist within the American film and TV industry.
U.S. Embassies invite AFS filmmakers and experts (referred to as “envoys”) to travel on weeklong exchange trips to share their expertise with emerging talents around the world.
Why We Do It
AFS works to support America’s policy goals—from promoting freedom of speech and creative economies to combating disinformation. AFS is part of a number of cultural and educational programs that aim to build friendly, peaceful relations between the people of the United States and the people of other countries through academic, cultural, sports, and professional exchanges.
It's hard to put into words how I feel after this trip. It expanded my horizons, it crystallized some of my feelings about the importance of independent filmmaking, and it relit some of the fires that had propelled me into documentary filmmaking to begin with. I don't want to just have this experience and these feelings and leave it at that - I want to do something with themJoy Davenport, Director of Fannie Lou Hamer's America, AFS Envoy to Cuba
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Before submitting, we encourage you to take a look at our current slate to get a sense of what projects have been a fit for our program. When submitting, please introduce yourself and include the logline, runtime and access to a screener of your film.
Please format the subject line of your submissions as “Film Submission-Name of Title” and email to AFS@cinema.usc.edu
AFS accepts submissions on a rolling basis and extends invites between January-March of every year for a slate launch in September.
If your project is a fit, we will reach out. Our program is very specific, if your film is not invited to participate please do not consider that a reflection of the quality of your film.