TWO Gwent film-makers are going head to head for two awards this weekend as the Newport International Film Festival gets under way.

The seventh annual festival starts on Friday with short and feature-length pictures from Wales, America, Germany, Belgium and France screened at a red carpet venue, to film professionals, students, journalists and the public.

Tom Leaman, a 22-year-old film graduate from Malpas, has entered his short film Passing of the Bridle, it is nominated for the Welsh Dragon Award and Best Short Film.

Directed by Lewis Barker, the 15-minute piece is set in 1965, when steelworker Phil Davies finds out his son doesn’t want to follow in his footsteps.

Phil has to decide whether his ambitions outweigh his son’s dreams.

For Mr Leaman, who graduated from the then University of Wales, Newport, in 2012, this was the first time he had entered the festival.

“The film was a final year piece when I was in university, which I made with a few other colleagues in the same year as me,” he said. “The story stems from my grandparents, the stories they used to tell about long-lost relatives and I thought it was a really nice story”

Machen film-maker Richard Pask is also up for the Welsh Dragon Award and Best Short Film awards, with his three-minute film Clymau, which he directed.

The piece chronicles the decision in the 1960s to flood the Tryweryn Valley in North Wales, to create a reservoir for Liverpool.

Mr Pask’s credits include Busker Bout in 2012, this was selected and nominated for awards at film festivals across four continents.

The short films screening starts at Warehouse 54, Cambrian Road, at 12noon on Saturday, entry is free.

The feature films will be showing at Cineworld, Spytty, on Friday at 8pm, and on Sunday, at 12noon and 2.05pm. Tickets are available now.

Visit thefilmfestivalguild.com/#!niff 2013/c1yqx for details.