Tag Archives: Ted Wiggin

SLAMDANCE FILM FESTIVAL: THE BIG SHORTS COMPENDIUM (2025)

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Short films are a delight for me—whether they be hit-and-runs from artists I may not stumble across ever again, or “business cards” for up-and-coming feature film directors. Today we dive into a one-and-a-half-feature to explore this year’s animation showcase and a few of the experimental selections from SlamDance 2025.

CARTOON CORNER:

MIMT (dir. ; 4 min.)— I swear I’ve seen this animator’s work before. Simple computer graphics (think Glory Days of MS Paint), whose basic nature allow for innumerable flights of form. I recently adopted a cat who seems to be part snake—thanks to Ted Wiggin, I can visualize how that could happen.

Gemini (dir. Jamie Griffiths; 7 min.)— Back in ’82, the Alan Parsons Project used this title and created a wistful, float-y musing. There’s a bit of that sensation in Griffiths’ cartoon here, with its shapes, spirals, and a double cat who has a penchant for pranking its owner in a subtle manner. We all have a reflection.

mnemonic (dir. Raffaele Gans-Pfister; 6 min.)— Described in the digital program as “Building thinks thought, has realization. Landscape in translation.” Can’t say I can improve on that. The animation’s means for this nebulous plot are mesmerizing clay works complemented by pen-scratch 2D representations. Not sure what I saw, but it was gratifying to see it.

‘Never Fall In Love’ (dir. Lucy Sao Wa Lao, Angela En-Yu Lao; 6 min.)— Hate to hate on things, so I’ll just say that this was the only short among the dozen which disappointed. Dog and cat, doomed romance, with one interesting thing barely emerging from the back-ground: what’s up with the merged and split flags? I’m sure I’m missing some political connotations.

Tunnel Wandering (dir. Li Zehao; 10 min.)— Blue ink, or blue water-color? …Not to mention that Windows® dungeon screen-saver interlude. I may never find out what this (mostly) first-person journey is about, but at least I’ll have good company: the character wandering these tunnels doesn’t guess the right answer, either, and never gets past the giant naked woman.

Croûte-mousse (dir. Badminton Plus; 4 min.)— Copyright? On this thing? You better bet your bottom dollar that Badminton Plus ain’t having none of that. Day-Glo tinted TV samplings skitter along, all bound by Day-Glo frames. I believe the title might translate into “bread pudding”, but considering what B-Plus is laying down, most bets are off.

Weirdest!Birth Controlled (dir. Isabela Fraga-Abaza; 5 min.)— Following the school of ugly imagery, this slice of feminist commentary hits the mark—no surprise seeing as the protagonist is a dead-eye shot in the great game show of sex, birthing, and oblique oppression. Violent and graphic, and Continue reading SLAMDANCE FILM FESTIVAL: THE BIG SHORTS COMPENDIUM (2025)

SLAMDANCE 2021: THE BIG SHORTS COMPENDIUM

I’m a bit old to dance the “Slam”, but I still like to keep tabs on what the young people are up to. Please join me as I dive headlong into the short-form cyberspace transmissions of SlamDance 2021. (The festival’s entire slate, shorts and features can be watched online through February 25 for a $10 pass, $5 for students).  Some films may be online, in whole or in part, in other online venues; we’ve sprinkled in the occasional link or trailer.

For those who may be overwhelmed by my thoroughness, I can quickly (and highly) recommend the following for a 1/2-hour-or-so of programming: Opera (for awe), Passage (for weird), and The Danger in Front (for fun).

THE EXPERIMENTAL LOUNGE:

Letters from Your Far Off Country (dir. Suneil Sanzgiri; 18 min.)—It is doubtlessly mere coincidence that I watched this so soon after Hitler: a Film from Germany, but their parallel structure, and even general message, sync up uncannily. This movie explores “how history moves through us, and how we move through it”; and it asks, “What is one’s claim to the past?” It concludes “How we connect, how we comprehend, is up to us.” With a combination of contemporary news footage, 8mm-style home movies, song snippets, recorded speeches, and even what appears to be a Zoom conversation, Letters primarily addresses the Kashmir uprising in 1989, though the urgency of recent events is never far in the background. A thoughtful, moving video document, which I’m guessing will be banned by the local authorities.

Morning Sickness in the USA (dir. Cristine Brache; 3 min.)—Brache’s recorded phone conversation with her mother plays over a series of alternately odd and alarming images of pregnant women undergoing various observations. The mother’s anecdote about how she was sent to a mental institution for two weeks because doctors were unable to diagnose her strange nausea (“morning sickness”, as the title indicates) is amusingly related. The unsettling  photo-video undercurrent… less so.

Passage (dir. Ann Oren; 13 min.)—An androgynous foley artist sonically morphs into the horse for which they’re creating effects, and grows a handsome tail. I can’t help but think of Berberian Sound Studio brought to its (il)logical conclusion. Passage examines obsession through observation, but also illustrates the importance of sound design for the art of illusion. After clomping softly into the “Passage” theater, our protagonist views the fruits of their labor before disappearing. What begins with human feet ends with a horse’s eye.

Rumi and his Roses (dir. Navid Sinaki; 5 min.)—Navid Sinaki tells the story of his first boyfriend using the unlikely medium of DVD menu Continue reading SLAMDANCE 2021: THE BIG SHORTS COMPENDIUM