Film Independent celebrates the 23rd edition of its Fast Track Film Finance Market this year, wrapping up of last of its three days today. On November 19, filmmakers and industry professionals convened at the market in the spirit of advancing exciting new works of fiction and non-fiction.
Film Independent is a longstanding film partner of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and together the organizations have supported filmmakers in a myriad of ways, including annual fellowships and grants.
On the eve of this year’s market, Deadline published an exclusive announcement about the market’s 2025 participants, revealing the two filmmakers awarded the year’s Sloan Fast Track Grant and Sloan Distribution Grant, respectively. Read more about the promising new works to receive game-changing support from the Alfred P. Sloan foundation below.
The Winner of the 2025 Film Independent Alfred P. Sloan Fast Track Grant:
KILLING JAR by Etzu Shaw
Logline: Burdened by guilt after her mother’s abrupt death, an insect researcher decides to undertake her own forensic entomology investigation to uncover the truth.
This is writer/director Shaw’s third grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. The foundation previously awarded KILLING JAR a screenwriting grant at Columbia University and the Science in Cinema Filmmaker Fellowship at SFFFILM in 2023. The script was also a finalist for the 2023 Sloan Student Grand Jury Prize.
The Winner of the 2025 Film Independent Alfred P. Sloan Distribution Grant:
HUMANS IN THE LOOP by Aranya Sahay
Logline: An indigenous woman works as an AI data-labeler after returning to her village with her children, but soon questions the human bias in machine learning.
HUMANS IN THE LOOP is currently available to stream on Netflix. Watch the trailer below.
FILMMAKERS
PARTNERS
TOPICS
SHARE