The 2026 Cedar Rapids Independent Film Festival was held from April 9th to the 12th and showed over 60 films, including those of University of Iowa filmmakers. The festival appearances highlighted the growing presence of emerging Iowa filmmakers and gave both current students and graduates an opportunity to showcase their creative work. For many involved, the screening marked an important step in their filmmaking careers and a chance to connect with audiences beyond campus.
Lucas Gregory
Current student and double major in Cinema and Screenwriting Arts, Gregory earned the Silver Eddy in the Student Freestyle category at CRIFF 2026 for the film he directed titled The Mouse. The short film follows the journey of an abandoned computer mouse searching for a place to belong after being overlooked by those considered “normal”. Through the unusual premise, Gregory explores themes of rejection, identity, and acceptance, turning an everyday object into the center of an emotional story about finding connection.
Haydon Bailey
A current Theatre Arts and Screenwriting Arts major at the University of Iowa, Bailey is director of Cake in an Elevator, shown in the Hobbyist Short category at CRIFF 2026. The film follows two strangers who meet in an elevator and what starts as small talk between the two quickly becomes conversations of their diametric beliefs and their ensuing discussion dramatically shifts their perspectives.
Abbie McLaren
After receiving her Bachelor of Arts in Cinema and Journalism and Mass Communication (Multimedia Production and Design), McLaren served as the writer, producer, and director of her film titled NO CANS. Shown in the Student Documentary category at CRIFF 2026, NO CANS follows McLaren's grandmother's retelling of a Czech family recipe for cabbage rolls. The film combines paper scans, still digital images, and digital video to explore the lines between the physical and oral history of the recipe. What started as a project in CINE:4843 Film and Video Production: Image Design made it all the way to the CRIFF 2026 selected screenings.
Negar Torabi Soufi-Ryssemus
Current student in the Master of Fine Arts program in Film and Video Production at the University of Iowa, Soufi had her film selected for screening at the CRIFF 2026. Soufi served as the writer, producer, director, and editor of her film Self-Portrait (Mirroring) and was awarded the Gold Eddy in the Student Freestyle category. The film's protagonist traces her life across shifting images, gathering memories of migration and belonging, and shaping a self-portrait that is both fragile and whole.
Grace Potratz
University of Iowa Cinema BA alum and incoming graduate student in the Master of Fine Arts program in Film and Video Production, Potratz directed Waverly 217, which won the Student Audience Choice Eddy at CRIFF 2026. The experimental short film was shown in the Student Freestyle category and touches on her experience of finding a new home in Iowa City after growing out of her childhood home.
Dillon Jacobson
Jacobson (Cinema BA, '24) was awarded the Gold Eddy in the Hobbyist Feature category at CRIFF 2026 for On Our Way, of which Jacobson served as the writer, producer, and director. The film follows the story of five friends whose annual Christmas Eve gathering is jeopardized by a winter storm, and as unresolved conflicts surface, the five friends are forced to confront their differences. Jacobson has been working as a sound mixer post-college, and two additional films he worked on received awards at CRIFF this year. Winning the Silver Eddy in the Hobbyist Short category was the horror short Relax, of which Jacobson served as the production sound mixer and sound designer for the short. Jacobson also worked as the boom operator in a western short titled The Valley of the Devil, which earned the Silver Eddy in the Professional Short category.
