CICADA Joins The Online Film Menagerie!

Despite the whole internet-age thing, many filmmakers still seem remarkably reluctant when it comes to putting their short films online. Every year when I attend short film festivals I am blown away by some of what I see, but then when I try to track those films down -- even many months later, allowing for the films to complete their festival run -- many are not online. 

When I spoke to Nash Edgerton in the interview published this week, he had some interesting anecdotal evidence to bring to the table: 

"When Spider was uploaded on YouTube that was when it started having a real life. A lot of people are still very precious; they don't put their short films online, but we've put up pretty much all of ours. Obviously we play as many festivals as we can, but online creates a whole other life for the films; people from other countries and places who don't get access to that kind of stuff get to see it. We've been invited to film festivals because festival directors and programmers have seen our stuff on YouTube. Spider is still being invited to festivals and it's been on YouTube for three years." 

This is all a huge introduction as to why I was so glad to discover today that one of my favourite short films of the last few years, Amiel Courtin-Wilson's Cicada, (seriously Aussies, what's with all the animal titles!?) is now online for everyone to watch! 

Selected for the 2009 Cannes competition, Cicada is a direct-to-camera tale by actor Daniel P. Jones recounting his first memory -- the brutal execution-style murder he witnessed as a five year old. He tells that story here in an intense, poetic monologue, staring down the lens of the camera. 

Cicada burned into my brain when I saw it years ago, and I've keenly followed the collaboration of Courtin-Wilson and Jones (which has also produced the feature drama Hail) ever since. Without further ado, Cicada.