Category: Short Films

Surprising how much can fit into so little.

ANUJA Film Review & Article – Part 1 of 2

Director Adam J. Graves – “I wanted to capture that wondrous combination of magic and emotion, of innocence and mischief, which is part of childhood itself — these are kids after all, not statistics. Though every film is collaborative, this one was much more so than most. Were it not for the talent and support of the children of the Salaam Baalak Trust (especially our brilliant star, Sajda Pathan), we never could have brought this important story to the screen.” – Review-Article by Gregg W. Morris

DREAM CREEP Film Short Review (2024): Part 1 – As Ghoulishly Creepy As All Git Out

Suzie (played by Sidney Jayne Hunt) is trying to communicate with her hubby, David (played by Ian Edlund). Though she is sleeping in bed right next to him she is addressing him from inside a dream or nightmare, begging David to stick a meat thermometer in her ear to help her escape from something monstrous that is chasing her. Guess what David does? – Review 1 and 2 by Gregg W. Morris – Review 2, the Director Interiview is in the works.

IN WONDERLAND Review by J Perez

The story revolves around Nina, portrayed by Elizabeth Phoenix Caro, an 8-year-old Mexican child who has recently crossed the US-Mexico border with her father.
Review by J Perez

SEVAP/MITZVAH directed by Sabina Vajraca

Short films have become popular because they can provide a cost-effective learning experience for filmmakers and because of increasing audience diversity – though SEVAP/MITZVAH has the look and feel of a feature. That train of thought has this writer-reviewer imagining Director/Writer Sabina Varjraca’s 17-minute virtuoso SEVAP/MITZVAH is in the works to become a SEVAP/MITZVAH feature film. – Review by Gregg W. Morris

STREET REPORTER Film Review – An Award Winning Cinematic Gem 26 Minutes Long, Packing the Wallop of a Full Length Award Winning Documentary

Director Laura Waters Hinson’s STREET REPORTER is a captivating documentary about homelessness featuring a homeless person cum photo journalist pursuing the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about homeless in the Nation’s Capitol. Advocacy, investigative and ethnographic journalism are fused transcendently in this 26-minute film short packing the wallop of those full length, five-star documentary films. Critics raves’ and reviews about this award winning film aren’t shy calling it as an Oscar contender.

Abigail Jean’s QUEEN OF THE DESERT Film Review Short

Director Mary Ann Rotond, who won Best Woman Directed Short at the Poppy Jasper International Film Festival this year, believes that the power of shared humanity, which is the essence of empathy, can overpower the centrifugal forces she believes are at the core of racism and bigotry tearing away at America.
 
She tells her visually stunning movie short through an encounter of a young woman Black and proud who is hitch hiking and the long-haul trucker, White, who gives her a lift. Once inside the cab of the trucker’s rig, the woman discovers that the truck driver is enamored with the culture and mores represented by the Confederate flag that is a banner inside his rig. And the sparks fly. – Film short review by Abigail Jean.

Luis De Leon’s THE QUEEN OF THE DESERT Film Short Review

QUEEN OF THE DESERT is Director Mary Ann Rotondi’s creative endeavor to make a movie commentary about what she believed are the dynamic social and political forces menacing this country, writes the WORD’s Luis De Leon. Rotondi, who won Best Woman Directed Short at the 2022 Poppy Jasper International Film Festival, uses two characters of different gender, ethnicity, personal values as well as social and political mores to express her point of view that the power of people’s shared humanity can ameliorate the centrifugal forces she believes are tearing away at America.
 
In other words, people living in the United States of America need to empathize more with people who don’t appear to be like them.