WSFF 2011: June 5

Reviews of screenings from the 2011 CFC Worldwide Short Film Festival (WSFF), Toronto, Canada.

Short Dramatic Films (Canadian Film Centre)

The Short Take: To be honest, I headed to this one mostly because it fit into my schedule. I was vaguely expecting stolid Canadian mediocrity, but ended up impressed by all four films on offer. It helped that all of these films looked great and were presented on 35mm.

Picks:

Champagne (Dir: Hans Olson, 19 min.) My favourite of the quartet was a fine character sketch, understated and observational without feeling static. Clara works the night shift at a large furniture store. On one special night, both her birthday and a co-worker's last shift, Clara pops open a birthday bottle of bubbly and loosens up enough to try and reveal her feelings for her departing fellow employee. Filmed in GH Johnson's furniture store at Ossington and Dupont, this one also feels like Toronto. Bonus points for the use of Snowblink's "Ambergris" over the end titles, matching the emotional payoff just right.

How To Rid Your Lover of a Negative Emotion Caused By You! (Dir: Nadia Litz, 16 min.) As quirky as that exclamation point-ed title might indicate, a cheerfully audacious and stylish mix of comedy and horror flick against the backdrop of a relationship drama. The answer, as it turns out, is through home surgery.

Pans:

This was the only screening at the festival that I saw that merited no pans.

Otherwise:

Kill Brass (Dir: Michel Kandinsky, 17 min.) An homage to 70's-era action flicks, both in its use of split-screen visuals and in its enthusiasm for jaw-jaw over bang-bang. Sniper flicks have been done enough to be considered their own sub-genre, but this managed to both feel fresh and maintain tension throughout, all while maintaining an extended metaphor to a samurai legend. It also found an amazing location to situate the action.
Transmission (Dir: Randall Okita, 17 min.) Seeing a dog locked in to the back seat of a car he's about to haul away, a tow-truck driver finds out that trying to do the right thing can lead to unimagined complications. Well acted, and with a lot of little real-life details nestled around the edges.

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Silver Linings

The Short Take: The glimmer of light in a bad situation sometimes comes out in unexpected ways.

Pick:

Rubika (Dir: Claire Baudean, Ludovic Habas, Mickaël Krebs, 4 min.) Given the title, you can probably guess what the "twist" is on this most unusual computer-animated world. An energetic blast revealing what happens when gravity is suddenly working on a different axis.

Pan:

A Lost and Found Box of Human Sensation (Dir: Martin Wallner, Stefan Leuchtenberg, 15 min.) A sort of re-telling of the various stages of grief and recovery, this elaborately computer-animated collection of episodes was too portentous for its own good, trying to find the universal in the particular but not quite getting it. Voice work from Ian McKellen and Joseph Fiennes also felt overcooked and soggy.

Otherwise:

Cold Blood (Sang froid) (Dir: Martin Thibaudeau, 5 min.) A well-executed film that tells its story efficiently in its quick running time, and a musing on courage and the difference between grown-up and child perspectives.
Life and Death of Yul Brynner (Dir: Jean-Marc E. Roy, Philippe David Gagné & Dominic Leclerc, 6 min.) Very funny account of an incensed video store clerk and family misfortune. However, it turns on a weird technological incongruity — if your mother was in the hospital, why would you leave a message on your brother's answering machine and not just call him on his blackberry?
Holding Still (Dir: Florian Riegel, 26 min.) When there's a long series of static, unpopulated shots before a title card reading "Holding Still" you know you have to be prepared for something working at a slower pace. A portrait of a unique life — paralyzed for more than twenty years, Janis hasn't left her bedroom in all that time. The film's rhythm deliberately tries to examine and move into her dictum of holding still. That said, this was still longer and more languid than it needed to be.
Altarcations (Dir: Ron Leach, 6 min.) A showcase for the local Awkward Silence comedy troupe, this seemed a little glib and plastic-y until the punchline hit.
A Doctor’s Job (¡Una carrerita, doctor!) (Dir: Julio O Ramos, 11 min.) Second short at the festival about a doctor driving a cab, in this case Dr. Moran is moonlighting to pay for his mother's medical care. Strikingly set in Lima, Peru but the threads that provide the doctor with a moral dilemma line up in a too-pat manner.
Going Nowhere (Dir: René Frelle Petersen, 20 min.) Realistic in its account of the bonds of brotherly love, this veers just this side of melodrama as recently-disabled Jannik struggles to adjust to the new circumstances of his life.