Joel Golby on the surreal horror of the educational films and videos that many of us grew up with: [A] calm voice tells you of the mysteries of the ocean; a man with an ungroomed beard stands emotionlessly in front of some cream-colored industrial machinery; an incredibly lo-fi, three-cel animation tells you how frogs are…
Tag: short films
“Flight from the City” and “Ama” – Two short films of aqueous feminine beauty
This short film from 2016 is the official video accompaniment for JĂłhann JĂłhannsson’s “Flight from the City,” the opening track from his sublime final album, 2016’s OrphĂ©e. OrphĂ©e traces a path from darkness into light, inspired by the Orpheus myth. A story about death and rebirth, the elusive nature of creation and art and the ephemeral…
The inherent sadness of stop-motion puppets: Short film ‘Stems’
A short film by BAFTA award-winning Scottish animator Ainslie Henderson, with music by Poppy Ackroyd. Suddenly, what was just stuff becomes this character staring back at you. What I love about stop-motion puppets is that they have this inherent sadness about them. They’re like little actors that only ever get to play one role. Everything…
Brilliant: This one-minute short film about a prepper’s dream coming true
This one-minute film by neophyte French filmmaker Gaspar Palacio is just brilliant. And I don’t use that word lightly. It’s like a master class in cinematic microfiction. Here’s how Palacio describes it at Vimeo: The one minute tale of a survivalist. When the siren rings in the distance, a family has to get inside the…
Our smartphone apocalypse, animated by Steve Cutts
This remarkable animation comes from the hand (or computer) of illustrator and animator Steve Cutts, famed for such things as 2012’s Man, which packs an unbelievable punch. So does the one I’ve chosen to post here. Cutts created it for last year’s hit song “Are You Lost in the World Like Me?” by Moby and…
Our Craving for Apocalypse: ‘Dispatches from the Ruins’ (short video)
This brief video essay on the source of our collective craving for “the awful futures of apocalyptic fiction” is really well done. Skillfully executed and thought-provoking. A worthwhile investment of five reflective minutes. Here’s the description: In the first two decades of the new millennium, stories of the post-apocalypse have permeated pop culture, from books…
WE SLEEP – John Carpenter’s ‘They Live’ as Prophecy (video essay)
Love this video essay from filmmaker (and former Buddhist Studies scholar) Daniel Clarkson Fisher. Perhaps you will, too. It’s great stuff, excellently conceived and executed. Perhaps I don’t agree with absolutely all of the political statements made in it. But I agree with enough of them. And anyway, it’s about Carpenter’s They Live. So what…
Jan Svankmajer: “A puppet is a magical object”
A puppet is a magical object. It is not a toy, is it? Here they see it as puppet theatre, as puppets for kids. But it’s just not like that. These native tribes — in Africa or Oceania, etc. — the shamans use puppets in communication not only with the upper world, with the gods,…
Short Film: ‘2084’
Remember: You must conform. Better yet: Doughnut thing. (Watch for explanation.)
If Thomas Ligotti, David Lynch, and Philip K. Dick made a sitcom: “Too Many Cooks”
In case you missed this when it basically took over the Internet for a couple of weeks last fall (late October to early November 2014), I give you Too Many Cooks, which I think has been described most ably by Simon Pegg: “Too Many Cooks is so deftly engineered to unnerve stoned people in their…