The short film Yellow Plastic Raygun directed by Alessandro Cima, which was featured on the Underground Film Journal just a few weeks ago, has won the Best Experimental film award at the Downtown Film Fest Los Angeles that ran Sept. 8-12.

I believe this was the second year for the festival, which was created by the former organizers of the defunct Silver Lake Film Festival in an effort to help promote the formerly neglected, but now popular downtown neighborhood of L.A.

Yellow Plastic Raygun is a mix of found and original footage that creates a retro-futuristic tale of society crumbling. The film also ends with creative shots of the World Trade Center that Cima filmed himself several years ago prior to 9/11. You can watch the film on the Underground Film Journal here.

Another winner of the DFFLA include the Matt Harlock and Bill Thomas’ documentary American: The Bill Hicks Story, which also screened Australia twice recently, first at the Revelation Perth fest and the Sydney Underground.

Plus, the fest gave a Best Green Film award to Joel Tauber’s Sick Amour; Debby Wolfe’s Gordita won for Best American-Latino Film and Carlo Besasie’s The Violinist won Best “Urban Fun & Games.” Those were just some of the more interesting of the awards given out in addition to traditional awards such as Best Cinematography, Best Narrative Feature, Best Short, etc.

The full list of award winners is below. You can also read more about the DFFLA on their official website. And visit the website for Alessandro Cima, Candlelight Stories.

Best Experimental
Yellow Plastic Raygun, dir. Alessandro Cima

Best Documentary
American: The Bill Hicks Story, dir. Matt Harlock, Bill Thomas

Best Narrative Feature
The Prospects, dir. David Brundige

Best Short
Sissy, dir. Bonnie Root

Best New Filmmakers
Brian McGuire and Bret Roberts

Best of the American-Latino Film Series
Gordita, dir. Debby Wolfe

Best Downtown L.A. Film
Wilshire Express, dir. (not listed on DFFLA site)

The Fox Studio Diversity Award
Yours Truly, Miss Chinatown, dir. Daisy Lin

Best Science Fiction
The Man Who Knew How to Fly, dir. Robi Michael

Best Green Film
Sick Amour, dir. Joel Tauber

Best “Urban Fun & Games”
The Violinist, dir. Carlo Besasie

Best Soundtrack
So Long, Lonesome, dir. Cameron Beyl

Best Cinematography
William Never Married, dir. Christian Palmer