Complete Small Gauge Trauma Synopses
We posted news about the upcoming Small Gauge Trauma DVD, a collection of thirteen of the very best short films to play the Fantasia Film Festival over the years. At the time we had little more than titles to offer but Mitch Davis of Fantasia has just forwarded along a complete run down of the titles included on the disc ... read on for those.
ABUELITOS (Grandfathers) (Spain / / 1999 / 15 min) Dir: Paco Plaza
WINNER:Canal+ Award, Brussels Film Festival 2000
A moody, atmospheric tale of sinister happenings in an old person’s home, stunningly photographed and seeped in spiritual pain. ABUELITOS ranks among the strongest films to have emerged from the contemporary Spanish horror revival.
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CHAMBRE JAUNE (Yellow Room) (Belgium / 2002 / 8 min) Dir: Helene Cattet & Bruno Forzani
WINNER: Jury Prize, Best fantastic Short, Sitges Film Festival 2002
The Giallo film reinvented as an experimental S&M-tinged fever dream, told through a combination of color-gelled cinematography and jump-cut still photographs, infused with dark sensuality and perverse cruelty. Stunning.
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FLAT – N – FLUFFY (Canada / 2001 / 7 min) Dir: Benoît Boucher
WINNER: Bronze Public’s Prize, Best Animated Short, Fantasia 2001
WWW Award, Stockholm Film Festival 2001
An acid-tripping pair of suburban revolutionaries accidentally shoot their war veteran neighbor’s dog to fluffy red pieces. What to do? Well, here’s what they probably *shouldn’t* do…
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GORGONAS (Gorgons) (Argentina / 2004 / 15 min) Dir: Salvador Sanz
A blood-chilling animated vision of apocalypse from Argentinean comic creator Salvador ('Angela de la Morte') Sanz, depicting a society nightmarishly turned to stone after the members of a superstar pop band reveal themselves to be gorgons. Eerie beyond words, sight or sound.
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I’LL SEE YOU IN MY DREAMS (Portugal / 2004 / 20 min) Dir: Miguel Ángel Vivas
WINNER: Best Art Direction, Madrid Short Film Festival
Gold Public’s Prize, Fantasia Film Festival 2004
Best Soundtrack, Bedajoz Iberian Festival
Silver Grand Prize of European Fantasy Short Film, Fantasporto
International Fantasy Film Award, Fantasporto 2004
Grand Prize of European Fantasy Short Film in Gold, Amsterdam Fantastic Film Festival 2004
The most expensive short ever produced in Portugal also happens to be a two-fisted cinemascope zombie epic that proved to be so popular it screened in front of EXORCIST THE BEGINNING’s Portuguese theatrical release!
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INFINI (Infinity) (Canada / 2002 / 9 min) Dir: Guillaume Fortin
WINNER: Best Editing / Best Young Director (short film), Montreal World Film Festival 2002
A shadowed man splices together super 8 filmstrips of an overdosed junkie’s memories, causing her life to flash fragmented before her eyes in this incredible experimental deathtrip that would have made Stan Brakhage proud.
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L’ILYA (Japan / 2000 / 39 min) Dir: Tomoya Sato
WINNER: Public’s Prize, Best short, Fantasia 2001
Jury Prize, Yubari Fantastic Film Festival, 2001
Meet L’ilya - a young video artist who documents peoples’ suicides and projects their final moments out of context in trendy clubs. Due to the film being a “moyen metrage” (or “medium-length feature” – meaning, as the name implies, a film whose running time is too long to be classified as a short yet too short to be presented as a feature), L’ILYA has had enormous difficulty getting seen, even on the festival circuit. It has nonetheless left scars wherever it was shown. This disturbing, haunting film will linger in your memory long after the obituaries fade.
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LOVE FROM MOTHER ONLY (Brazil / 2003 / 21 min) Dir: Dennison Ramalho
WINNER: Silver Public’s Prize, best short, Fantasia 2003
Audience Prize, best short, Cinemuerte 2004
Melhor Fotografia em Curta-metragem, ABC Brazil Awards 2004
Brace yourself for a demonic work of pure shrieking terror. Macumba voodoo, rage, lust and death tear through the screen in this nightmarish tour-de-force that proved to be more horrific than any feature produced in its year. It is also one of the few “devil films” in existence that feels unsettlingly genuine in its convictions, partially attributable to the fact that it was co-scripted by an actual Macumba priest… who is currently in prison.
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MISS GREENY (Japan / 1997 / .30 sec) Dir: Tenkwaku Naniwa
For those unfamiliar with Japanese underground artist Tenkwaku Naniwa’s prankster universe of the absurd…step right up!
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RUTA DESTROY! (Spain / 2002 / 15 min) Dir: Diego Abad
WINNER Best short, 2nd place, Cinemad Madrid 2002
Best Soundtrack, La boca del Lobo Fest 2002
Sex, drugs and ashtray-shaped haircuts fuel this outrageous raver delinquent musical that takes the piss out of youth culture. As the saying goes, life is just a party waiting to end. Hilarious and unique.
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THE SEPARATION (UK / 2003 / 10 min) Dir: Robert Morgan
WINNER Diploma of Honour: KROK Animation Festival, Ukraine 2003
Jury Prize: San Sebastian Horror and Fantasy Film Festival, Spain 2003
Critics Prize: Cinanima International Animation Festival, Portugal 2003
Grand Prix; Animated Dreams Film Festival, Estonia 2003.
Best Animation: Dresden Short Film Festival, Germany 2004
Audience Award, Malaga Horror and Fantasy Film Festival, Spain 2004
Young Jury Prize: Malaga Horror and Fantasy Film Festival, Spain 2004.
Special Mention: Cinema Jove Film Festival, Spain 2004
Welsh BAFTA: Best Short Film of 2004.
Best Animation: Melbourne International Film Festival, Australia 2004
Gold Audience Award: Fantasia Film Festival, Canada
2004
Special Jury Prize: Chiavari International Animation Festival, Italy
2004
Prize of the European Union: Badalona Film Festival, Spain 2004
Best Short Fantasy/Horror Film: Badalona Film Festival, Spain 2004
Best Animation: Celtic Film Festival 2005
The separation of conjoined twins and its shattering consequences are depicted in this Cronenbergian masterpiece of stop-motion animation that has won no fewer than 15 awards on the international festival circuit.
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SISTER LULU (UK / 2001 / 4 min) Dir: Phillip John
WINNER: Best B&W Short, 46th Cork Film Festival
A phenomenal, rosary-tight whirlwind of nunsploitation, premature burial and extreme exit strategies. Wow is the word, blessed be.
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TEA BREAK (UK / 2004 / 7 min) Dir: Sam Walker
WINNER Silver Melies Award, San Sebastian Film Festival 2004
A blood-stained worker systematically hacks through meat in a bizarre industrial abattoir in this darkly comic Grand Guignol depiction of numbed desensitization.
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Special Features include a video introduction by Brazilian horror icon Jose Mojica Marins (Coffin Joe), Filmmaker commentaries on most shorts, a deleted scene from THE SEPARATION, an outrageous music video for I'LL SEE YOU IN MY DREAMS, the making of RUTA DESTROY and more!
