“Freedom Hair,” directed by Dianne Houston, walked away with four awards at Anthem this year, including Best Narrative Feature, Best Original Score, Best Libertarian Hero for Melony Armstrong, and the Anthem Grand Prize. The film, produced by Lana Link of the Moving Picture Institute, tells the story of Armstrong’s courageous fight to secure the right “to make a living…especially for black women,” who were blocked from braiding hair due to onerous licensing laws. The film received a standing ovation from the audience.
Mikki Willis’s “The Great Awakening” won the coveted Audience Choice Award,” screening to a standing room crowd and earning a 4.91 approval rating (of a possible 5) from the audience.
The Anthem Film Festival has been called “one of the centers of film innovation… running counter to film industry practice.” At Anthem, we’re proud of being counter-cultural when it means being in favor of individuality, choice, accountability, and self-reliance.
This year our theme was “Brave New World,” and it couldn’t have been more timely as we considered Aldous Huxley’s view of a disconnected, technological future. Our audience enjoyed films about free speech and student protests, new solutions to the housing crisis, vaccine trials, transgenderism and parental rights, immigration and border control, and the “great reset” where “you will own nothing, and you will be happy.” We followed these films with lively Q&A with the directors, and provocative panel discussions where the audience joined their voices with the experts.
Be a part of Anthem! Submissions for the 2025 season will open in mid-October and will close April 8. And join us for the Anthem Film Festival at Palm Springs Convention Center June 11-14, 2025.
We’ll see you at the movies!
