Category: Shorts

REVIEW: The Deja Vuers [2017]

Jared Mobarak

“Perhaps you should keep your deja vus to yourself” It’s nice to find a entertaining little gem every once in a while that doesn’t require you to think too far beyond its premise. This sounds like a backhanded compliment, but I don’t mean it as one. I think director Chris Esper would agree that his film The Deja Vuers is meant as an escapist lark with the sole purpose of putting smiles on its viewers’ faces. Screenwriter Jason K. Allen molds it as though a constantly evolving joke to ensure…

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REVIEW: Ennemis intérieurs [Enemies Within] [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“Between you and me, what’s the difference?” The definitive exchange in Hidden Figures—the one that defines America then and still today—is when Kirsten Dunst‘s personnel manager tells Octavia Spencer‘s yet-to-be-given-the-title supervisor, “Despite what you may think, I have nothing against y’all.” Spencer’s Dorothy Vaughan counters without missing a beat, “I know you probably believe that.” It’s such a perfect distillation of how racism permeates the very core of who we are to the point where we don’t even understand why we are racist. It happens all the time now, white…

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REVIEW: La Femme et la TGV [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“I’ve never sent an internet and I never will” While its age-old conceit of a misunderstood curmudgeon discovering joy after being perpetually caught in a cycle of monotony is familiar, Timo von Gunten‘s cutely inspiring La femme et le TGV is in fact based on true events. The woman at its center is Elise (Jane Birkin), a baker left alone after her husband passed on, her son (Mathieu Bisson‘s Pierre) moved away, and her clientele gradually enticed by a cheap German bakery with unbeatable prices. She rides her bike to…

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REVIEW: Silent Nights [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“I live a very hard life” It’s extremely difficult for me to blindly accept a film like Aske Bang‘s Silent Nights on faith. The idea that someone can do bad things—no matter how good he/she is at heart—and continuously be rewarded is a tough sell. But that’s exactly what this look at immigration through a charitable Danish lens attempts. A man may be a saint, but that doesn’t excuse thieving, adultery, or lying with ease. I understand the message comes down to “hard living” and “impossible decisions,” but the film’s…

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REVIEW: Watani: My Homeland [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“I am responsible for destroying my children’s future right now” Out of five Oscar-nominated documentary shorts, four deal with the cost of genocide with three being specifically about today’s Arab refugees. This shouldn’t come as a surprise considering the topic is very much at the forefront of the world’s mind, the internet allowing injustices thousands of miles away appear as though they’re occurring right next door. What sets Marcel Mettelsiefen‘s Watani: My Homeland apart from the other two, however, is that it focuses on the innocents made to endure civil…

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REVIEW: The White Helmets [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“To save a life is to save all of humanity” Every year seems to bring a new on-the-ground document of nightmarish tragedy thanks to Netflix’s fearless international programming. 2013 brought the fantastic The Square about Egyptians standing ground in their revolution against tyrants. 2015 brought the equally eye-opening Winter on Fire to ensure everyone acknowledged the human cost of what was and is happening in Ukraine. And now 2016 brings Orlando von Einsiedel‘s short The White Helmets, a look at the heroes risking everything to preserve life in a nation…

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REVIEW: Mindenki [Sing] [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“Well life isn’t always fair, my dear” A new candidate for cinema’s best villain of 2016 emerges out of Kristóf Deák‘s Hungarian short Mindenki [Sing]. Her name is Miss Erika (Zsófia Szamosi), the Middle School choir conductor in charge of her school’s nationally recognized troupe of youngsters readying to defend their previous championships. She seems so wonderful and the kids who love her love her, but there’s more to her actions than kind-hearted and pure leadership leaving each student with a chocolate candy upon class end. Beneath this façade adored…

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REVIEW: Extremis [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“I have to be right for her” If there’s substance to Dan Krauss‘ documentary short Extremis beyond its observational look at the emotionally heavy compromises made when a patient is faced with life or death scenarios, it’s to provide concrete evidence as to why you should put your own decisions down in writing before anything bad can occur. It’s a difficult conversation to start, but that difficulty is ultimately for you and you alone. Your not having the courage to start it is what subsequently transfers the difficulty onto the…

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REVIEW: Timecode [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“See you tomorrow” A Spanish parking garage owner (Vicente Gil) cuts costs by hiring two security guards to work twelve-hour shifts—eight paid on the clock and four off. It’s a pretty cozy gig wherein you simply watch closed circuit camera feeds, do a couple walks, and let the automated ticket machines do the heavy lifting as far as payments go. There’s a system to everything, the well-oiled machine of professionalism mixed with boredom. Luna (Lali Ayguadé) arrives each morning on a schedule, changes into her uniform, pulls up her hair,…

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REVIEW: Pear Cider and Cigarettes [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“What was he fighting for anyways?” “He was born lucky and died unlucky.” These are the words Robert Valley uses to describe an old childhood friend named Techno Stypes, the subject of his twenty-five year autobiographical journey entitled Pear Cider and Cigarettes. From the youthful eyes of adulation, Techno was the fastest person alive and the coolest cat in Vancouver. He was good in sports, good with the ladies, and fearless when it came to living larger than any person should live. He became a millionaire after an injury settlement…

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REVIEW: Blind Vaysha [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“In her eyes the present did not exist” I did a double take upon hearing Theodore Ushev‘s name alongside his animated short Blind Vaysha during the Oscar nominations because I’ve watched his work progress the past five years. This Canadian by way of Bulgaria is a Toronto International Film Festival staple, a guy who alters his aesthetic with every new project. Whether rotoscoping, hybridizing Cubism and Constructivism, or dabbling in Abstract Expressionism, though, you always know it’s an Ushev film because of its content and craftsmanship. His latest is no…

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