From The Heart Productions
Fiscally Sponsored Indie Films and Projects
From the Heart Productions Fiscal Sponsorship Program
is designed to carry out our mission to help independent filmmakers who have unique projects that make a contribution to society, get their films funded.
Working with our 501(c)3 non-profit, fiscally sponsored filmmakers can offer donors tax deductions for their donations. Our “boutique” program sets itself apart by offering hands-on personalized attention, support, and film funding advice from our board members and staff.
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Touch & Go
Narrative Feature
Touching the Sky
Documentary Film
Tough Times
Short Film
After losing his job, his wife, and a reason to exist; Guy, a former accountant for a scandalous corporation, faces his demons through a tape-recorded piano lesson left in his father’s will.
After meeting with his father’s lawyer, Guy, a former accountant fired for fraudulent accounting, receives a collection of audiotapes marked as his father's will. He discovers the tapes come together to form a piano lesson his father recorded. Determined to play through the piano lesson and engage with the art form his estranged father seemed to care about more than anything, Guy not only comes to terms with his resentment towards his father but also finds a new outlook on himself.
Trending Voices
Other
Trending Voices is the TV music special of the grand finale of the Trans Voices Festival. This will be a showcase of the various transgender and nonbinary groups throughout the USA. We'll be having celebrity performers and guests on the show, to help bring a large viewership, targeting the Millennials.
Scattered throughout will be info that helps audiences understand the history, science, and biology as to why trans people have this biological condition and need medical care, that it's not a mental illness. With all these divas coming together, we expect lots of behind the scenes drama, included in the show.
We'll have the best of the best in all areas of production and performance.
TRUFFLE SAUCE
Short Film
TRUFFLE SAUCE, a drama short, is about Tweet, a tattoo artist, who needs to pay one more tuition bill in order to graduate from community college to fulfill the agreement with her grandparents. Graduate = get a tattoo shop. But Tweet keeps letting life get in the way. Not this time. She's gonna sell the truffle sauce, pay her bill, and start over... for real this time. That is until a customer arrives and begins to push her into a setback. Ugh, not again.
Trusted Sources
Documentary Film
Caught up in an attention-driven media landscape, idealistic journalists struggle to overcome public distrust, re-shaping the future of news publishing.
Trusted Sources examines the reasons many people don’t trust news outlets. We go behind the scenes to see how news is gathered and reported, sitting in on editorial meetings where decisions are made that determine what gets published. Trusted Sources demystifies the journalism process, reveals the factors that influence how – and whether – stories are covered, and provides the audience with skills for deciding what news to trust.
Two for One
Short Film
When a funeral in rural Quebec suddenly becomes a funeral for two, a young man reflects on his relationship with the deceased.
Two for One follows Thomas, who has spent his whole life in the US, as he attends the funeral of the Québecois grandfather he barely knew. Thomas has always regretted not having a better relationship with his grandparents. Over time, his poor command of French and a significant geographic distance have led to an emotional distance with his grandparents.
Now, back in his grandparents’ rural Québec village for the first time in years, Thomas finds that he has to confront his regrets while also being surrounded by an extended family who doesn't know who he is.
Ukraine: Fetal Stem Cell Pioneers
Documentary Film
Ukraine is the only country in the world where fetal stem cell therapy is legal and regulated. After curing their first patient of bone marrow failure in 1991 using fetal liver cells, a group of Ukrainian scientists have learned to extract up to 24 different organ types of fetal stem cells and deliver them to patients. Aside from taking a deep dive on the science behind this technology, this story follows patients from the United States who have made the journey to Kyiv, Ukraine to be successfully treated for muscular dystrophy, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis, and autism. The Russian invasion has complicated this journey. Eric Merola is the only journalist on earth covering this story.
Unboxing
Short Film
Unbridled Courage
Narrative Feature
1899 Texas; a grieving widow forced to take over the family ranch, while raising her children, battles a prominent landowner and his band of outlaws who try to run her out of town.
When Audrey is challenged with the safety of her two children, she forms an uneasy alliance with a rival rancher’s son.
Undone
Narrative Feature
Unlikely Heroes The Men & Women Who Saved Israel
Documentary Film
Unlocking Desire
Narrative Feature
Urban Uptake
Short Film
Urban Uptake follows, Ayanna, a corporate marketing coordinator, to work. While at work, the unimaginable happens, her boss fires her due to her hair not meeting the company’s professional standard for clients. Upset, Ayanna talks to her best friend, Eesha, who suggests that Ayanna apply for a job on Urban Uptake. She finds a job posting on Urban Uptake and submits an application. To Ayanna’s surprise, she enters into a digital world called Urban Uptake, which is a place for women like her. Little does she know how close her ties are to the digital world.
Victor Frankenstein
Narrative Feature
Voices of Grief, Honoring the Sacred Journey
Documentary Film
The Documentary Film – “Voices of Grief, Honoring the Scared Journey” - shares a fresh perspective on the many ways we navigate successfully through grief or companion others along their journey. Wisdom from contemporary authors, grief experts and spiritual teachers is woven through personal stories of loss to explore the roles of compassion, community, and connection in this sacred journey.
Void
Short Film
A married couple comes one final time to their late son’s apartment to pick up his last belongings.
After a chain of events and a change of heart, their grief and needs prove to be incompatible.
Mainstream media has successfully presented the trauma of losing a loved one. But surprisingly few films explore the incredibly personal sorrow that can explode even genuinely loving marriages. We aim to explore and make visible this familiar yet unseen drama.
'Void' talks about the individuality of the healing process: everybody has different needs in order to deal with grief, and sometimes this can get in the way of love.
Water
Short Film
Water is a short filmed based on a real encounter I had with a probable homeless man when I lived in Los Angeles. I witnessed him accessing a water line illegally to fill up a number of plastic water bottles he was carrying in his tattered vehicle. His car was filled with clothes and day-to-day items. He was likely one of the estimated 16,000 Angelenos who live in their vehicles full or part-time.
Water is Love: Ripples of Regeneration
Documentary Film
Water is Love: Ripples of Regeneration follows a group of young people grappling with the climate crisis while we also journey around the world to share incredible stories of regenerative ecosystem design to create water retention in communities, villages, and regions. We touch upon traditional ecological knowledge, how water makes climate, and the importance of restoring complete water cycles. Through inspiring stories from successful projects in India, Kenya, and Portugal, we aim to spark conversations and actions that contribute to a regenerative and resilient world.
We are like Waves
Documentary Film
Along the South Coast of Sri Lanka, surfing is everywhere. Yet only foreigners and local men fill the lineups. Surfing is not seen as a sport for girls. This is a result of cultural and societal expectations that place women inside the household, particularly in rural areas. Young girls are expected to follow certain standards: be kind, look nice, and smile. Attend school, study, work. Get married, and start a family. Be a housewife, cook, and clean.
The ocean is simply not seen as a place for women.
Sanu must decide if she wants to continue a typical life as a housewife, or risk carving her own path as a surfer. This is a story of finding one’s voice in a sea of expectations.
We Woke
Narrative Feature
Wendigo
Narrative Feature
A former tribal police officer struggling with addiction must return to his home reservation and estranged family to assist in the disappearance of a young teenage girl. As he begins to confront his past and his former community, he starts to unravel the arcane and possibly supernatural elements at play.
What's in a Name
Documentary Film
Three trans women fight to overturn a harsh law that binds them to their past.
Tania Cordova, Eisha Love, and Reyna Ortiz are suing the state of Illinois to strike down a law that prohibits people with felony convictions from legally changing their names. A male name on their government ID exposes the women as transgender, which opens them up to harassment and danger on a daily basis. WHAT'S IN A NAME shares the personal journeys of three women who, at the risk of exposing themselves - not only as trans, but as people with felony backgrounds - have become key activists involved in the effort to pass HB2542, a state bill that strikes down the name change law.
When I Was a Human: The Movie
Narrative Feature
Being human is no walk in the dog park. Indy, an ex-shelter dog, has begun to understand it soon after turning himself into a human by eating a miracle dog biscuit. But he must expose the lies by his owner's new love interest. Human Indy is ready to take back Kimmy, his owner's affection!
Among all the confusing rules and behaviors that Indy has to understand, he sees the pain he's causing Kimmy by disappearing as her dog. It will take more than living as a human for Indy to secure his spot by Kimmy's side; it will take discovering what it means to love and be loved.
When Mountains Fall
Documentary Film
The children of three families from Syria and Iraq struggle to rebuild after surviving war and forced migration. With ever-increasing barriers in their new home in Europe, the challenges are daunting. But these kids are not lost—they are working to rebuild new lives, meet new challenges, and prepare for adulthood. In this film they tell their own stories.
When the Bass Drops
Narrative Feature
Where Fools Go
Narrative Feature
Whitehead: An Improbably Charmed Life
Documentary Film
Born to a working class English family just after World War Two, Paul Whitehead was destined for ordinariness but his unique outlook, unquestionable talent, and joie de vivre led him to extraordinary adventures, friendship with rock luminaries, and experimentation with identity and perception that is anything but ordinary. Now in his 70s and forced to move from downtown LA, Paul looks back on a life of playing with perception and identity as he finds the setting for his third act. He’s not who you think he is and you might not be either.
Who Are You, Nanu?
Short Film
After her Nanu’s (‘grandfather’ in Hindi) ceremonial cremation brings her to the Holy Ganges River in India, 8 year-old oddball Aisha befriends the phantom of her Nanu’s rambunctious 10 year-old self. After being told those who die go to the Moon by her father, a sentiment from a traditional Indian lullaby, Aisha and her Nanu’s ghost, named Little Nanu, go to that very place themselves. Fueled by curiosity and connection, together they discover what's after death and forge a relationship they never had the chance at whilst Nanu was alive.
Wind In Their Sails: Death and Resurrection
Documentary Film
Bring them back from the dead
This film celebrates the classic yachts that have survived and the people who have dedicated their lives to maintaining them. These people are passionate about their work, and it shows in the way they talk about the boats and the care they take in maintaining them.
The dark side to this story is wooden boats need lots of tender loving care to keep them afloat and capable of sailing. Without that care these boats fall into disrepair quickly and every year several of them just disappear.
A few lucky boats find a way to come back to life and that is where our story begins.
Without Her
Narrative Feature
Based on true events from millions of women around the world and told from the heart of a dog. Sophia is a young woman who has been putting up with her abusive relationship because she can't stand the thought of leaving her beloved dog, Storm behind. She has finally decided to leave with her dog and find a safe place for them both to start a new life together. Sophia quickly learns how much her support group has been damaged by the events in her abusive relationship and how difficult finding pet friendly shelter can be. She must find the strength and determination to find a shelter that will let her bring Storm along before she becomes another victim who returns to her abuser.
Written in the Light
Narrative Feature
Written in the Light follows the story of Skyler, a college student suffering from anorexia and bulimia and her mother, Leah, as they work through the healing process together. One night, Skyler goes too far and vomits blood. Leah rushes her to the hospital where she stays for a week. Upon returning home, Skyler is too weak to feed herself and Leah offers to help her. This creates an unusual bond between mother and daughter as Leah continues to feed Skyler. Follow Skyler and Leah's journey through healing. What's written in the dark will be read in the light.
Yellow
Short Film
You Don't Look Sick: A Documentary Series
Web/TV Series
YOU DON'T LOOK SICK: A DOCUMENTARY SERIES follows the lives of 3 people with autoimmune disease and fibromyalgia during the height of the Coronavirus pandemic. Throughout the 6-episode series, Aliza, Justin and Ariana share their experiences getting diagnosed, living with chronic pain, maneuvering the healthcare system, finding effective treatments, managing intimate relationships, and enduring the struggle.