For your viewing pleasure those lovely people at Raindance HQ have packaged together the best of last year's 14th Raindance Film Festival shorts onto one DVD. It's an enjoyably eclectic bag with comedy, drama, music video and animation – and like all good shorts programmes it's an occasionally hit and miss affair.

A definite hit is the Official Selection short winner, Three Towers, a likeable take on the unchanging nature of Italian rural life just after the twin towers collapsed on 9/11. The enjoyably slight Goodbye Mr Snuggles see good old chaps James Fox and Robert Hardy's painting expedition briefly interrupted by a rogue drink driving clown. While the typically laconic and droll Australian Booth Story follows a underground car parking attendant, whose life is turned upside down by the discovery of a discarded duck egg. As the deserved winner of last year's Diesel Film of the Festival, the director's of this short, Edwin McGill and Kasimir Burgess, will have the proud honour of making next year's festival trailer.

Unfortunately missing from this collection are the truly unique mixed-media Best UK Short Film Noir and also the Best Digital Short Temerario. That said the narrative confidence of Spanish offering Sofia, about a girl who decides to disappear because she dislikes her annoying family and boyfriend, goes some way to make up for these oversights. As does the inclusion of last year's astonishing trailer. And it's also good to see the inclusion of the short-listed Nokia 15-second films – which range from dinosaur and silent film pastiches, fart gags, and some YouTube-ish entries. Despite the varying quality this competition in particular reminds you of what's possible with just a mobile phone and some imagination.

Overall, by the very nature of selecting shorts from just one festival, the DVD perhaps lacks the sheer quality and award-winning punch of its competitors such as Best v Best and the Cinema 16 series. But in a way this Raindance disc is a more realistic and even optimistic cross selection of what's out there – for a couple of the lesser inclusions here will no doubt make would-be-filmmakers sit up and think "I can do that, and better too". And if that's your reaction you've got no excuse – the 15th Raindance Film Festival is now accepting submissions.

15th Raindance Film Festival
The 15th Raindance Film Festival will take place in London from 26 September to 7 October 2007. The festival aims to reflect the cultural, visual and narrative diversity of the international independent filmmaking community and specialises in films by first-time directors. Raindance accepts fictional, documentary and experimental features, short films, pop promos, and children's films for the Raindance Kids Film Festival.

Submission Deadline
Submissions will be accepted from 1 January 2007.
The early deadline is 1 May 2007.
The final deadline is 1 June 2007.