Screenhead : Movies: Shorts

Greenpeace - Mr. & Mrs. Smith

Watching this short spot for environmental activist group Greenpeace, we not only laughed our asses off, but we had a Spinal Tap "Shit Sandwich" moment, in which we exclaimed, aloud, to an otherwise empty room:

"Can they do this? They can't do this. Can they do this?"

They did that. Possibly not safe for work, but you'd really have to work either for Fox or Sesame street.

Greenpeace - Mr. & Mrs. Smith [boards]

Forest Grove

Maya Churi's Forest Grove is one of the more interesting things we've seen: a Flash animation composed of photographs of models, presented like a slide show-- except when it breaks those rules to be something else for the sake of storytelling. Accompanied by a serene audio track of narration and a sparse sound bed, the end result feels like watching old home movies while in a spaceship that is in hyperspace or something equally physics-defying.

· Forest Grove
· Matthew Ross' cul-de-sac, a filmmaker Magazine article which describes Forest Grove.
With thanks to Matthew

Asian Pride Porn

Greg Pak's infomercial spoof in which playwright David Henry Hwang (M. Butterfly, FOB) promotes a porn more friendly to the image of Asian peoples. Tentacles are not addressed. Possibly stars that one girl from that other movie, but who can tell since they all look the same, are we right fellas? Not work unsafe, but it features porny noises.

Asian Pride Porn [atom films]

Fired Up

Newsbreakers is a group of people who spoof news media on location, guerilla - style. Newsbreakers founder Buck "Lucky" Owens is actually employed by the news media, so his actions could be taken as a sign that the broadcast news media has started to eat itself, the first flames licking the walls of the media Rome... or something. In truth it appears to be smug people in masks hassling local news dimwits in a manner slightly less sophisticated than the ones pioneered by the more creative Howard Stern fan, but they do manage get it all on tape, which is fun to watch... unless you're paying one, as Buck's boss was, right up until the first day after the very first Newsbreakers prank. "Fired Up" is the short video of Buck's return to his former workplace building, mostly to retrieve a can of soup. Wedding soup.

· Fired Up
· Mood (the first Newsbreakers stunt, which caused the firing)

Health Hazard

Health Hazard is Ottawa based indie filmmaker Pascal Trottier's horror comedy short in which a mutating blob of evil goo spurts up through the drain of a less than considerate chain-smoker, and gives him a new, more revealing look.

Health Hazard [ZED TV]

Dwarf Stand Tall

Dwarf Stand Tall is an odd and darkly hopeful promotional clip for multimedia collective Hobo Logistics.

"Experience the science of the Hobotix System by following the chronicles of an unpopular dwarf in the hours before he undergoes the controversial limb-lengthening operation:"

More of a short film than a promo video, this clip sort of gives up its ideas a layer at a time, like an peeled onion. Interesting stuff.

Dwarf Stand Tall
via Antille

Channel 187 The Homicide Network

Channel 187 proclaims itself "the largest on demand library of indie horror." As most guys who keep their shorts on in the shower at the gym will tell you, it's not the size, but what you do with it. Fortunately Channel 187 seems to be shaking their money maker with a plethora of indie shorts and clips of the macabre variety, such as Julien Vanhoenacker's CGI toon Anthem.

· Channel 187 The Homicide Network
· Anthem

Snow-Bo

Snow-Bo, Jenn Kluska and Vera Brosgol's classically styled animated film from their days at Sheridan College. The way simple drawings smoothly envoke emotion reminds us of both Chuck Jones and Charles Shultz in their respective heydays, after seeing it we understand illustrator website Drawn!'s gushing praise.

· Snow-Bo [verabee.com]
·The Vera Bee site

Andy Stuckey and Jon Murray's ode to Carson Daly

We missed this the first time around, we're happy to get to it now: of the thousands of Carson Daly masturbation tribute songs that clutter the mediascape, Andy Stuckey and Jon Murray's classic is by far the first.

Andy Stuckey and Jon Murray's ode to Carson Daly [stuckeyandmurray.com]

The World Championship of Illegal Pencil Fighting

The harsh underbelly of the life of some street fightin' men are revealed in this short. Cross The Patriarch and you'll have to write home to your mama with your feet, silkyboy.

The World Championship of Illegal Pencil Fighting [David Paul Meyer]

"We've secretly replaced the White House press corps with actual reporters."

One Good Move has clips of The Daily Show segment where the press questions White House Press Secretary Scott Mcclellan for details on Karl Rove leaking Valerie Plame's name. One thing is certain: Scott absolutely appreciates being asked things that he won't answer. Nice to see the Daily Show audience cheer when they notice the press core doing what they're meant to for the first time in half a decade or so. This follows another Daily Show clip Lies and the Lying Liars in which Karl Rove is examined. Fine viewing all around

An Ongoing Investigation [onegoodmove]

Lies and the Lying Liars [onegoodmove]

Beefight

Giant (by bee standards) hornets raid a hive of bees in this skillfully shot clip from some nature show. Comes complete with blood-curdling, ~~Charlie~~ Martin Sheen going down the river in Apocalypse Now "never get out of the boat!" narration from a guy who sounds just a little too into it all.

Beefight [nearlygood]

Thanks to John for the re-Sheening.

The hand that feeds

That one thing you hope to see every time some overly confident individual hassles with a giant wild animal in that way which you kind of know deep down inside that they really shouldn't? It happens in this short video clip. The serious bit is very quick, but not for the squeamish.

Crocs [putfile]
via Monkeyfilter

White Bits

A classic joke gets the short film treatment by Alex Jovy, with the mighty mighty (in the brick house sense of the term) Georgia Zaris providing the aforementioned white bits.

White Bits [atom films]

Director Alex Jovy has two other comedic shorts up at atom:
· Two's Company
· Holiday Romance.

Shutterbugs

Azizs Ansari and Rob Huebel's (aka: Inconsiderate Cell
Phone Guy) new short film made us laugh. Hard.

Shutterbugs (episode one) [Azizs is Bored]

Azizs is Bored

Also available at Channel 102