One world, one week, one festival.

That is the mantra of the Manhattan Short Film Festival which annually showcases the 5-15 minute spots from the top up-and-coming filmmakers in the world. The shorts are shown in succession in theaters in 99 theaters across three continents, and this year, the festival’s tenth, Bainbridge Island’s historic Lynnwood Theatre will be one of the figuratively red carpeted cities.

“I have to say, I am blown away this year,” Lynwood Theatre manager/programmer TJ Faddis. “I think what stuns me is with shorts how complete a story you can tell in a short period of time.”

One of the shortest films of the festival — “One Hundredth of a Second” by director Susan Jacobson of the United Kingdom — is also one of the most powerful, wrapping up the saga of a photojournalist in a war torn country and the enormous impact of that gruesome, seemingly helpless work into five minutes and 20 seconds.

Another five-minute short relays, verbatim, the story of a 14-year-old kid who forced his way into John Lennon’s hotel room during the revolutionary’s famous “Bed-in for Peace” for a chat. Canadian director Josh Raskin got his hands on the actual tape of the conversation and brought it to life with pen-and-ink animation.

“It’s deliciously trippy and cool,” Faddis said.

From trippy animation to stone-cold serious drama about a class of high school boys being sent off to basic training against their will to an exploration of the age of living attached to the computer screen, the short festival is sort of like cinema for the hyperactive mind.

Thought concepts and languages range across the board with up-and-coming directors hailing from Kenya, Australia, Israel, Sinapore, the United States, Spain and more.

Their shorts will be showing on Bainbridge at 4:30 p.m. Sept. 23 at the Lynwood — 4569 Lynwood Center Rd. on Bainbridge. Tickets are $6.75.

Filmgoers will be handed will be handed a voting card and asked to vote for the one film which they feel should win. Votes will be tallied and forwarded to the festival’s headquarters where the winner will be chosen and announced in Union Square Park, New York City following the final showing Sept. 30.

Results will also be online at the Manhattan Short Film Festival website — www.msfilmfest.com.

For more information on the Bainbridge showing visit www.lynwoodtheatre.com or call (206) 842-3080.