First Look at the BIFA 2026
Best British Short Film Longlist

DN’s heart and soul has always been short film, so partnering with the
British Independent Film Awards to announce the 15 longlisted films vying for the
Best British Short Film award at the 29th edition of the BIFAs is a true honour.

As we’ve consistently seen over our 20 years, the short form has long been a space where filmmakers take risks, find their voice and announce themselves to the world. This longlist is proof of how fearless, inventive and wonderfully varied that work continues to be.

FARANOOKA

"I think it’s important to make the audience work. I’ve always tried to lean into that. I want the audience to fill in the gaps themselves, to imagine what they’re not being shown. For me, that’s when cinema gets exciting."

In 'FARANOOKA', Craig Bingham creates a dark, otherworldly universe where light itself becomes a symbol of hope and something worth fighting for. Bingham returns to Directors Notes to discuss working with his two DoPs to create the film’s raw visual language, the importance of sound and light in the world-building, and his plans to expand the short into a much larger universe.

Everything Will Be Totally Fine

“It was extremely difficult to find a structure that could make the film accessible and digestible for an audience coming to it fresh, while simultaneously capturing the messy, mushy, formless vortex of grief.”

Sam Baron opens up to DN about turning a decade of footage - from asking friends and family to predict the future in 2016 to filming them again once it arrived - into a documentary shaped by loss rather than prophecy. In ‘Everything Will Be Totally Fine’, Sam steps out from behind the fictional veil of his comedy shorts to face grief on camera, grappling with how to give it shape without implying it ever resolves.