Matt Gorman’s 10-minute mystery with a dusting of sci-fi Waking Up follows a woman’s quest to discover what happens to her after she wakes up in a strange location with no memory. The two-hander plot finds its other character weaving in and out of Sarah’s life, helping her decrypt the clues scattered about, easily found,… Continue reading Waking Up: Mystery That Disorients Its Audience as Much as Its Protagonist
Tag: Mystery
The Switcheroo Room: Aspiration and A System of Its Exploitation
Richard Corso’s The Switcheroo Room opens with a startling audition scene. Marilyn Monroe (or at least someone mimicking her) delivering a monologue in a loop, paused, resumed and picked apart at the whims and desires of the powers that be of Hollywood. Written by Gregory Ferbrache, The Switcheroo Room travels to the seedy underbelly of… Continue reading The Switcheroo Room: Aspiration and A System of Its Exploitation
Life 72: Adding A Weightlessness To Life And Death
Life 72 is as eccentric as it is oddly comforting. Josh Wann’s 7-minute film follows its protagonist Kurt through lifetimes and the times in between, and in doing so offers soothing explanations for those things about living that unsettle or frighten us. Kurt (Denver Taylor) falls off a ladder. He dies. After launching a tirade… Continue reading Life 72: Adding A Weightlessness To Life And Death
Echoes: The Mystery And Grief Of Acutely Personal Regrets
Written and directed by Anthony Kalmetta, the mystery of Echoes is wrapped up in time and bitter regret. The 13-minute film follows Oliver, who, with only fragments of memory, struggles to piece together the life he shared with his partner, stumbling around their house, which is simultaneously where things died as well as their grave. Oliver (Dane… Continue reading Echoes: The Mystery And Grief Of Acutely Personal Regrets
Unskin: A Mix Of Sci-Fi and Fantasy
Elcid Asaei’s Unskin is a work of science fiction which combines fantasy and urban myth with the grind of everyday life, the blend of which becomes intricately interconnected. A commentary on our capitalist society and our now ingrained apathy, it has you asking, Is one caused by the other? It opens with Roger, trudging through an interview… Continue reading Unskin: A Mix Of Sci-Fi and Fantasy
Polaroid: Revenge Drama Dipped In Mystery And Megalomania
Dante Aubain’s Polaroid takes Patrick Bateman, and everything he represents, perhaps even more than that, and makes it anew, this time allowing the other side a spot at the table as well. In some ways, it is the familiar revenge drama, but looked at through the lens of American Psycho (as it is intended to be), the subtext comes… Continue reading Polaroid: Revenge Drama Dipped In Mystery And Megalomania
Mr. E, P.I. – Children of the Night: An Ode To Counterculture With Vampirism And Mental Health
Done right and taken seriously, the vampire genre has much to offer. With the figure of the undead predator, artists have long delved into the nooks and crannies of humanity, exploring countercultures, and all that is frowned upon, or considered taboo. Writer-director George A. Velez now borrows the vampire to explore another frowned upon subject:… Continue reading Mr. E, P.I. – Children of the Night: An Ode To Counterculture With Vampirism And Mental Health
Daydreams: A Pharmaceutical Experiment To Disrupt The World Into Chaos
This film couldn’t have come at a more telling time. With one half of the world dealing with the virus and the other half with its trauma; and the conspiracy theorists somewhere in the middle having a field day—writer-director Elijah Rodriguez’s Daydreams, finds its place effortlessly somewhere amidst all this. All of 5:27-minutes in duration,… Continue reading Daydreams: A Pharmaceutical Experiment To Disrupt The World Into Chaos
Rendezvous: An Engaging Thriller That Subverts The Crime Genre
Seth Kozak’s 15-minute Rendezvous feels apt material for a feature-length, making one wonder at the effort it must have taken to truncate it to its current runtime. A film about crime and deception, the short labours on vaguely familiar characterizations, only to spin them around to offer something surprising. There is very little background that… Continue reading Rendezvous: An Engaging Thriller That Subverts The Crime Genre
Life…: A Lesson Or Two For Those In The Medical Fraternity
Medical drama is a dynamic subgenre. It can be thrilling, or emotional, or melodramatic, or even sleuthing adventures. And yet there is so much within this sub-genre that remains unexplored, whether it is iatrogenesis, or even self-medication by practitioners themselves. For the 32-minute Life, director-writer Mirlande Amazan picks a well-explored theme, but presents it in… Continue reading Life…: A Lesson Or Two For Those In The Medical Fraternity