'Where I'm From,' and What It Looks Like

The Austin Film Festival and Texas Monthly's Where I'm From Short Film Contest has narrowed to a field of 15 films that offer unique portraits Texas towns, from Galveston to Bandera to Austin. No matter where you're from, they hit close to home.

Stuart McSpadden's short "Now Leaving Amarillo" just about gutted me. McSpadden conducted phone interviews with members of his family about their push/pull relationship with Amarillo, and then used those recordings to complement the brutal beauty of the unbearably flat, bleak Texas Panhandle. "I would have just lived this boring, middle-class, working-class, Republican life," says one woman, wondering aloud what her life would have been like if she hadn't left Amarillo. "I could have been flat and bored and nothing."

Not all the shorts take such a serious, soul-searching approach to the contest. You can watch 'em all – including Ryan Light's "Austin From the Eyes of a Videographer" – here and vote for your favorites through Aug. 15. Finalists will be screened at a shorts showcase during this year's Austin Film Festival, which runs Oct. 20-27.