Announcing Hey Alma’s Fourth Annual Hanukkah Movie Pitch Challenge

Write the Hanukkah movie you wish to see in the world.

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One of the most liked recent posts on Hey Alma Instagram — liked 20.5K times, to be exact — is this tweet:

Clearly, dear Hey Alma readers, you are frustrated by the lack of fun Hanukkah movies and we are right there with you. And so, we are excited to announce Hey Alma’s Fourth Annual Hanukkah Movie Pitch Challenge! This is your chance to come up with the Hanukkah movie of your dreams (and no, the winning movie won’t get made, but still, it’s fun, we promise).

For the past three years, we’ve hosted this contest and have been blown away by the variety of entries. Last year, the challenge was open to all genres of holiday movies, not just rom-coms, though the winner was Katie Esmonde with her original Hanukkah movie, “A Boyfriend for Hanukkah.” Here’s the poster we made, it is quite good if we do say so ourselves:

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This year, we’re bringing back the contest and leaving the parameters wide open: You can pitch us any genre of film. It can be about a Jew celebrating Hanukkah. Or a Jew on Christmas. Or a Jew just generally living through the December holidays. We’ll take gritty action films. Epic historical romances. An animated family romp. Or, obviously, you can stick with the classic and give us the cheeseball Hanukkah Hallmark film of your dreams.

Will the winning movie idea get made? Absolutely not. Who do you think we are? We’re a tiny Jewish non-profit that runs a publication, not a movie studio. But the winner will get fame, glory and a custom-designed digital movie poster for their idea that they are free to brag about until the next Festival of Lights.

The deets:

  1. Enter by using this form. Submissions will be open until Thursday, December 8 at 9 a.m. ET. We are looking for the name of your Hanukkah movie and a one-paragraph description of the plot. Take inspiration from last year’s finalists.
  2. On December 12, check back here at heyalma.com for how to vote on the finalists.
  3. We’ll announce the winner on the fourth night of Hanukkah, December 21!

Warm up some hot cocoa, put on your Hanukkah long johns and start thinking up your dream Hanukkah movie!!!

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