2025 Film Festival

Download the Wrap-Up as a PDF here.

On September 20th, 2025, film lovers and friends of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities gathered at the Long Center in Austin, Texas for the 22nd annual Cinema Touching Film Festival. Attendees enjoyed a full night of entertainment, including three blocks of short films, live music, a panel with disability advocates, and a Q&A with visiting filmmaker Spencer P Sherwin.

A white wheelchair user speaks animatedly to two other white fest attendees during a moment between films  Backstage view of an Asian woman giving an announcement and a white ASL interpreter. The spotlight on the wall is lit up blue and pink, the CTDFF colors.

Gretchen McMahon, a local musician with a disability, joined the Fest again to provide music during pre-show and intermissions. McMahon is a multi-instrumentalist with a genre-bending style that explores five hundred years of music in five minutes, rooted in folk, world, jazz, and Celtic sounds.

A white woman smiles playfully while playing the harp. Other acoustic instruments are around her.  A white woman smiles and plays the acoustic guitar. A harp and the corner of the film screen are in the background.

Program highlights included the First Place Documentary Winner SIMPLE MACHINE and the First Place Non-Documentary winner DREAMSCAPES.

SIMPLE MACHINE is part portrait of an architect who became an amputee in midlife, and part meditation on the beauty and challenges of classical mechanics in the ingenious tools of our everyday lives.

A white man with one arm lines up a saw blade with a focused expression.

DREAMSCAPES is a genre-blurring experimental film centered on a powerful performance by Amelia Rose Griffin. The film transforms her lived experience into movement, colour, and sound. Dreamscapes gives voice to experiences that are often hidden because of shame, stigma, and silence.

Five white women in matching long red wigs perform a choreographed dance together on a flight of stairs.

Disability advocates updated us on the fight for higher attendant wages in the state of Texas. After a block of short films exploring attendant care, Edgar Pacheco and Chase Beardan (pictured, with moderator Laura Perna) shared their thoughts on the films, their experiences using attendants, and some insights on the ongoing movement to raise wages for attendants.

A white women and two men who use wheelchairs, one white one Latino, are onstage speaking into microphones.  A white women and two men who use wheelchairs, one white one Latino, are onstage speaking into microphones.

People traveled from all over the state to attend the Festival this year, including two Fest guests who were featured in the program. Spencer P Sherwin (left) is the director of IN CASE OF FIRE, which won 3rd place in the Non-Documentary Division. Maddy Ullman (right) is one of our Fest judges, as well as a disability film consultant.

A white man and an Asian woman, both wheelchair users, pose at a small table before the program begins.

In addition to introing the block of films featuring IN CASE OF FIRE, Spencer joined us during audience voting to discuss the making of his film (right, with Louise Ho). Spencer shouted out some of the influences behind his artistic choices and shared the process of getting the impressive wheelchair stunts for the film. He encouraged everyone to find creative outlets.

A white wheelchair user with long hair tells a joke into a microphone  An Asian woman interviews a white male wheelchair user onstage

Maddy joined us onstage to announce this year’s recipient of the Gene R. Rodger Creative Advocacy Award, the Thunder and Lightning Poetry Collective (pictured right). The audience voted on their favorite film of the night, which went to QUAD LIFE (3rd place winner, Documentary Division, pictured middle).

Two asian woman are onstage. One is a wheelchair user, and she is reading a list out loud from her phone.   A Black man and Black woman smile into the distance. The man is a wheelchair user.  The Thunder and Lightning logo. A brow hand holds a bolt of lighting in a circle colored like the Pride flag.

This year, the Festival screened 11 short films to an audience of 72 attendees. 

A white family smiling at the camera at the festival. The daughter is wearing a brace and assistive devices.  A Latino family at the festival smiling at each other. The young man has cerebral palsy.

Anonymous feedback from attendees:

“Excellent as always. I always feel I’ve learned, am thinking differently, and am uplifted.”

“Creative, thought-provoking, fun!”

In 2025, Cinema Touching Disability expanded our year-round programming with a number of partner screenings, including:

Thank you for a great fest to our sponsors, volunteers, audience, guests, and judges! See y'all in 2026.