[Still from Olga's Eyes]
Having been a shorts filmmaker for most of my filmmaking life, I know exactly how difficult it is to get coverage at festivals for short films. When I’m able, I like to return the favor. While at the 44th annual Hawaii International Film Festival, I took in the Out for Blood shorts program. I’m happy to report that it was a very well-programmed block with a number of standouts, so let’s get to it.
The first short in the program was Binge, co-directed by Sam David Zhang and Rohit Relan. A microshort at three minutes, it’s basically a harrowing moment within a larger scene, and is perhaps a short proof of concept. The short stars Clayton Farris (MaXXXine) as a man being driven insane by the mirror image of himself on the television he watches.
Short number two is Agonist, which really feels like a scene lifted directly from a feature film that a studio like Blumhouse or A24 might release. Synopsis: A grieving young man falls into the final act of a cult leader's ritual. Well, he’s not the only one, there’s several of them, and none of it ends well. I’d like to see this as a feature.
Directed by Anne Marie Elliot, who’s also in the film, I checked out her imdb and was surprised to see that this short is her directorial debut, at least according to that website. My god, there’s a lot of promise here. Agonist is lushly filmed with great color and VFX, in addition to a number of very talented young actors, Peyton List (Cobra Kai) among them. Give women the funds they need and they will knock it out of the park. I have high hopes for this filmmaker, and I'd love to see more.
Short number three is my personal favorite of the bunch, Olga’s Eyes, from another superb female filmmaker, Sarah Carlot Jaber. Apparently, it’s 22 minutes long, the longest of the shorts in this block, but it breezes by in what feels like an instant. Here’s another instance of a woman that the powers that be should rain money on, should they want to make more money. I’m not kidding. Thankfully, she works out of Brussels, where that just may happen for her.
Olga’s Eyes stars an elderly woman (Vivian de Muynck) who’s having none of anyone’s shit, and could pass as a sister to Udo Kier. Somebody, please make this casting dream happen. Anyway, Olga also happens to be a vampire. After she and her daughter have drained their neighborhood, it’s time to feed elsewhere. She’s dropped off at a nursing home, where she both feeds on a man who abuses his wife, makes friends with a charming man who used to be a musician, and antagonizes a male nurse who’s onto her vampirism. The film manages to be funny, socio-political in terms of gender, and has a message about how this society treats the oldest among us. None of this is a small feat, and I hope this filmmaker gets a shot at a feature as soon as possible, so we can be gifted with more of her stunning work.
Next up is Lullaby from yet another outstanding female director, Chi Thai, where a refugee is haunted by a devastating incident from her past, namely, her son drowning. The film is beautiful and haunting, a very well-made metaphor for grief that reminded me a bit of Hideo Nakata’s eerie 2002 feature, Dark Water. Thai is a BIFA-nominated producer with a BFI Vision Award under her belt and among other films, produced the excellent female-centered film Raging Grace, which played tons of fests on the 2023 circuit. Give her funding, world, please.
Following that film was Where the Mountain Women Sing, directed by Juefang Zhang, another amazing female director, one who was an Assistant Director on Jackie Chan’s The Diary. Synopsis: In Northeastern China, a pair of filmmakers recording a shaman's succession become caught in a deadly ritual, as a terrifying nightmare unfolds. If you can imagine a Tibetan-esque Midsommar, then you know exactly what you’re in for with this short. (Zhang is another woman that deserves massive funding for a feature, too.)
In this film, a male cinematographer tries to quash a female filmmaker, both with his will and body against her story and body. The distant matriarchal tribe of female shamans they're documenting use their might against him, and in a very frustrating twist, we’re in for a huge “gotcha” when this male character gets what he deserves, but we find out that this is a film within a film. This ending is somewhat clever, but it also feels quite likely that it was tacked on by the patriarchal forces within the system that Zhang is working in. Nonetheless, I wish her luck and funding, because she clearly has huge talent deserves success.
Second to last in the block is Sean Carter’s Wake. Synopsis: With a hurricane raging outside, two nurses have to stow a dead woman’s body in the hospital morgue before the building floods. But the corpse quickly reveals itself to be more than it seems. The film is made very, very well, and stars a Black woman as the protagonist nurse, who’s under pressure at work (to say the least) and who’s contending with an aging mother who loses track of her facilities at times, another horror, this one a reality for so many of us. The film is really good, and I loved the actors and the ending. What I didn’t love was how similar it is to The Autopsy of Jane Doe. I hope that Wake is a proof of concept for a larger story, and Carter absolutely has talent, but the morgue, the storm, the relationship issues with a parent, and the dead pagan occult theme have all been done together in Jane Doe.
The block closes out with Dream Creep from Carlos A.F. Lopez, a terrific short that would also be at home among Blumhouse and A24 filmographies. At only 13 minutes, the film feels like five. The male half of a couple wakes to hear his other half’s panicked voice calling to him from within her ear. She begs him to stab her in said ear canal with a meat thermometer, saying that this is the only way she can escape an entity holding her captive within herself. I won’t ruin it, but this ends up being a pretty bad idea. The film is gory, original, and hilarious, and I’d love to see more work from Lopez.
Thanks Hawaii, for putting together such an amazing genre shorts block from some massive global talent.