Body horror is a sticky subject. No, really. I wasn't just making a bad pun.
In the wrong hands, attempts at stories of this kind can be simply disgusting. But when it is done well, body horror can yield evocative results. Brandon Cronenberg rocked audiences at Fantastic Fest a couple of years ago conjuring up his father David's spirit with the striking Antiviral (2011), and fellow Canadian Jesse T. Cook got even more gooey with Septic Man (2012) the following year. There are plenty of other examples, but it seems a lot of folks are thinking along the same bloodlines.
Enter Daniel Delpurgatorio. If you've heard of him, odds are it was his contribution to the long form version of Zac Snyder's Watchmen (2009) that afforded him the opportunity to direct the animated Tales of the Black Freighter (2009) segment, a narrative whose incorporation of survivalist cannibalism signaled a filmmaker unafraid of the gnarly.
His short Other (2012) has been sweeping the festival scene, leaving a slimy trail in its wake for more than a year now, winning awards and a ton of buzz. Plans are in the works to develop it as a feature. Uniil then, enjoy 14 solid minutes of body horror with heavy science fiction overtones, and most importantly, empathetic energy. Daniel Delpurgatorio invites us all to wonder how far we would go, what we'd be willing to change, in order to just keep living.