festival international shorts: discomfort zone

The last thing i went to see was a group of international shorts, i found this extremely interesting and encouraging as we have just finished our first short. They were all based around the same idea(discomfort zone) but were completely different styles and all passed very differently. Some i liked more than others.

Birthday by Sandor Csukas :

Even though for the most part of the film was simple hands,hair and mouth close ups was not boring at all. in tone it was characterised by a blue and dark shadowy gloom, which was contradicted by the eerily cheerful party music and grins of the children at the party.

I liked the idea of having a definite obvious tone, almost like choosing sepia in photoshop, this had a blue tone over it and it stuck with it through out, it added to the darkness of the ending when we realise that the party was taking place on a huge landfill site, were in eastern european contries its common for children to play. An extremely simple concept with no inciting incident or real plot just a statement and a pretty shocking final shot.

this was one of my favourite out of the group .

incident by a bank by Ruben Ostlund:

the clever lip dub type on shot of this film was impressive alone never mind the fact that the films characters ware hilarious even from a distance. its a film i would never be inspired to make but i am glad to have seen it as it was simple and made me laugh , intelligently thought out it was almost like a high quality youtube video with sleek dialog.

out in that deep blue sea by Kazik Radwanski:

There was a general feeling of dislike towards this one however, i feel it is one the the strongest of all the films. it follows a man who is clearly trying to get some control back over his life , physically and mentally, finding the balance between work and social life. The character is an overweight 50 something and is trying to loose weight by working out, a man who is a hard worker at a job that seems unsatisfying to him. when his wife pushes him to sell a house to there friends its like a bus mans holiday and this is his breaking point. the end shot of this film is the man in a chair trying to put a piece of thread through a needle its static and stays on him for sometime until he achieves this. The immense hope this gives the audience that even if its only a tiny piece at a time , he's not going to give up and he will even if its mundane things go towards something he is more proud to call his life. I really enjoyed this short as it had more of a story than the others and its mundane but relevant and relatable story. really interesting and down to earth .

Tele-global dreaming by Eric Flanagan.

Hmmmm this was pretty weird subject wise, when a down and out actor is mistaken for a big shot actor in a foreign country .... yea i wasn't really taken by he plot , the cinematography however made up for it as it was very intrically lit and very beautiful to watch.

peace