2026 Backyard Docs Film Festival: Backyard Docs Shorts

Join us for Backyard Docs 2026 Short Film Program! This collection of short films takes audiences from the cold hallways of New York City's immigration court, a butterfly sanctuary in Chicago, back home to the streets of Pittsburgh, and beyond. These films cover complex histories, stories of speaking truth to power, and journeys to discovering something deeper about life and self. After the screening, we will be joined by filmmakers from most of the films for an audience Q&A.
Big Bass
What does it mean to feel seen by others before you’re ready to see yourself? A filmmaker travels back to 1997 to revisit a dream-like memory from second grade that centers around her queer identity, her legendary PE teacher and a mysterious large plastic fish.

Born Secret
A filmmaker returns to his hometown, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the secret city that built the atomic bomb. There, he meets the workers who created humanity's greatest weapon that now wrestle with their legacy, while their grandchildren inherit a world on the brink of nuclear catastrophe.

Water Cooler

The Trump administration has turned immigration courts into deportation traps. As ICE agents wait to arrest their targets outside of courtrooms, their banal conversations clash with the severity of their actions.