Winning Alumni

Faraday Okoro
Faraday Okoro

Nigerian Prince

Sasie Sealy
Sasie Sealy

Lucky Grandma

Kate Tsang
Kate Tsang

Marvelous and the Black Hole

Nardeep Khurmi
Nardeep Khurmi

Land of Gold

So Young Shelly Yo
So Young Shelly Yo

Smoking Tigers

David Fortune
David Fortune

Color Book

Lilian T. Mehrel
Lilian T. Mehrel

Honeyjoon

2025 One Million Dollar Recipient

Take Me Home

Written and Directed by Liz Sargent

Anna, a 38-year-old Korean adoptee with a cognitive disability, cares for her aging parents in a fragile balance of meeting each others’ needs. When a Florida heat wave shatters their family and Anna’s routine, her future is uncertain - until she creates a world where she can thrive.

Will Premiere at the 2026 Tribeca Festival

2024 One Million Dollar Recipient

Honeyjoon

Written and Directed by Lilian T. Mehrel

A surprisingly sexy, darkly funny, life-affirming movie. Lela and her sensual daughter June take a trip to the romantic Azores after their major loss — with opposite ideas about why they’re there, how to grieve, and June’s tiny bikini. Between honeymooners, Woman Life Freedom, and their hot philosophical-surfer tour guide João, they find each other… coming back to life.

Premiered at the 2025 Tribeca Festival

2023 One Million Dollar Recipient

Color Book

Written and Directed by David Fortune

Following the passing of his wife, a devoted father learns to raise his son with Down syndrome as a single parent. Through their journey to a professional baseball game, he fights to keep his promise to his child while healing from the loss of his significant other.

Premiered at the 2024 Tribeca Festival

2022 One Million Dollar Recipient

Smoking Tigers

Written and Directed by So Young Shelly Yo

Set in Los Angeles in the early 2000s, Smoking Tigers is a portrait of a lonely 16-year-old Korean American girl named Hayoung who is taken under the wings of three wealthy students she meets at an elite academic boot-camp. As she falls deeper into their world, Hayoung works harder to hide her problematic family and lower-income background from her new friends, only to discover the bittersweet pains of adulthood that will forever shape her life.

Available to stream on Max

2021 One Million Dollar Recipient

Land of Gold

Written and Directed by Nardeep Khurmi

First-generation Punjabi truck driver Kiran is about to become a father, but his irresponsibility is alienating everyone close to him. When he hears pounding on a shipping container at work and discovers an undocumented girl named Elena inside, everything changes as he sets out on a cross-country road-trip in search of her family. Over the arduous journey, the pair evade the police while feuding and bonding over music, paint swatches, and what it means to be seen as “other” in white America.

Available to stream on Max

2019 One Million Dollar Recipient

Marvelous and the Black Hole

Written and Directed by Kate Tsang

Teenage delinquent Sammy Ko teams up with a surly children's party magician on a bizarre adventure to navigate her tumultuous home life and inner demons. A coming-of-age comedy that touches on unlikely friendships, grief, and finding hope in the darkest moments.

Available to stream on multiple platforms.

2018 One Million Dollar Recipient

Lucky Grandma

Directed and Co-written by Sasie Sealy
Co-written by: Angela Cheng

Set in New York City’s Chinatown, the film follows an ornery, chain-smoking Chinese grandma who goes all in at the casino, landing herself on the wrong side of luck… and in the middle of a gang war.

Available to stream on multiple platforms

2017 One Million Dollar Recipient

Nigerian Prince

Written and Directed by Faraday Okoro

A troubled American teenager, sent away to his mother's native Nigeria, finds himself entangled in a dangerous web of scams and corruption with a con-artist cousin as his guide.

Available to steam on Netflix and other platforms