NOFF Awards
The New Orleans Film Festival is one of the few film festivals that is Oscar®-qualifying in all three Academy-accredited Short Subject categories: Documentary Short, Narrative Short, and Animated Short.
Winners of the NOFF Jury Shorts Award in Documentary Short, Narrative Short, and Animated Short are eligible for consideration in the Short Subject category of the Academy Awards® without the standard theatrical run, provided the film otherwise complies with the Academy rules.
2025 NOFF Jury Award Winners
Past NOFF Jury Award Winners
See the #NOFF2024 Jury Award winners here
See the #NOFF2023 Jury Award winners here.
See the #NOFF2022 Jury Award winners here.
See the #NOFF2021 Jury Award winners here.
See the #NOFF2020 Jury Award winners here.
See the #NOFF2017 + #NOFF2018 Jury Award winners here.
To honor the legacy of New Orleans filmmaker John-Carlo “JC” Monti, the New Orleans Film Festival announces the fourth year of the John-Carlo Monti Memorial Award, an award for crew members in the Greater New Orleans film community who, like JC, bring warmth, joy, and energy to every set that they are a part of. We ask our treasured New Orleans film community to join us in honoring John-Carlo by submitting nominations for Louisiana-based crew members who carry on his spirit of excitement, generosity, joy, and adventure. The recipient of this award will be publicly announced at the 2025 New Orleans Film Festival Awards Ceremony and will receive an unrestricted $500 honorarium.
The award is named for John-Carlo Monti, lovingly referred to as JC by friends. JC’s passing coincided with the New Orleans Film Festival in 2019, and his loss is felt deeply by our filmmaking community. The award highlights his contributions to our community, as well as the role filmmakers like JC play in independent filmmaking.
JC’s name has rolled in the credits of countless New Orleans Film Festival films in various roles, and his collaborative spirit and enthusiasm highlighted the best of what the New Orleans film community can be. Like so many people in this community, as well as being an invaluable crew member in a variety of different positions, he was an artist in his own right. We hope this award will provide others like JC both an acknowledgment of their contributions as crew members and a validation that will help support their own career ambitions and artistic visions. Visit JC’s memorial website here.
This award is intended for below-the-line, on-set crew members who aren’t traditionally recognized at festival awards ceremonies.
John-Carlo Monti Memorial Award Winners
2025
2024: LeDerek Rocque
2023: Kenneth White Jr.
2022: Bao Ngo
2021: Andres Ballesteros
Watch the video below as our Programming Manager Zandashé Brown and New Orleans filmmakers Bruno Doria, Jason Foster, and Paavo Hanninen introduce the John-Carlo Monti Memorial Award.
The Audience Awards at the New Orleans Film Festival celebrate the power of our community’s voice in cinema. Audience members cast their votes for their favorite films after each in-person screening and on our Virtual Cinema platform. These awards honor the films that resonate most with our viewers, offering an opportunity for audiences to champion the stories and creators that leave a lasting impact on them.
